Throughout his career, Brian Eno has covered a lot of musical ground in his own work and his work with others as well. Earlier in his life, he had been interested in the popular American music he heard on the radio during the 1950’s and 60’s including Rock & Roll and doo-wop. It was not until art school where he started to play around with tape machines and actually became involved in some form of using sound as art. He had never learned an instrument or any music theory; his area of expertise fell into electronics. During his years in art school, he had become interested in the avant-garde styles of art music, particularly the minimalist style. One of his biggest influences was John Cage who wrote the book Silence that had influenced Brian greatly along with Cage’s experimentation with tape delay and loops. A few other minimalist composers who had an influence on Brian were Terry Riley, La Monte Young, and Steve Reich.

In order to compare and contrast Brian Eno’s work you really have to know what roll he played in the creation process. Once you understand his sound though, it is quite easy to pick out his influence in a song even if it is not his album. I started out listening to his third solo album Another Green World which had been completely written and produced by Brian. The album I decided to compare it to was The Joshua Tree by U2; Brian was only the producer on this project but his style and sound had quite a profound impact.

The music on Another Green World is brilliantly complex when it comes to texture and timbre. When you really get into the notes and rhythms played however, as a professional with music theory experience I can tell the amateurish nature of the music. I could tell that Brian had no formal music training but this just makes his work beautifully imperfect. It is almost a reflection of humanity. The synth like processed guitars, the bouncy rhythms on the bass, the unreal synth sounds, and all the tracks soaked in effects to pull it together. The album is a true form of audible art.

Listening to The Joshua Tree by U2, I could instantly tell that Brian Eno’s influence was dripping throughout this album. The pop rock influence is definitely more prevalent on this album, especially in the drum rhythms. The harmonic content of the album is much more mainstream and realized than Eno’s own work too. U2 did a great job at keeping a core sound of their own while completely embracing Eno’s sound and influence. The only other major difference between the two is the amount of vocals on this album compared to Brian’s work. U2’s album has vocals on every track in some sense but there are only a few tracks with vocals on Another Green World.

If I had not known anything about the albums or artists but I listened to them back to back I might think that they were both the same artist but from different eras. The swelling synths, the use of delays and reverbs, and this unique spacey wilderness feeling is constant through both albums. It is amazing how consistent one person can be throughout so much work without really trying to be.   

Brian Eno had come up with quite a mixture of art music fused with popular music. His early years of fusing rock & roll with experimental processes such as delays, electronic sounds and minimalist visions weren’t exactly new but he learned to harness them like very few had at the time. He thought about sound as if he was painting a picture. He used timbre and texture more than the standard importance of notes and harmony. He wanted to create unique landscapes that you could listen to; this is probably the thinking behind his visual/audio art displays throughout the world. Brian’s innovations using the studio as an instrument had really furthered what Brian Wilson and The Beatles had previously started. He seemed to take his concepts to space and then bring them back for the earth to hear. His techniques for processing instruments and vocals were technical even in his early years with Roxy Music. A few of these techniques were pioneered by the Beatles during the 60’s like reversed sounds and tape loops but instead of trying to keep the sounds familiar, Brian would manipulate them into sounds not from this world. The biggest surprise about all of this innovation is that it was all by chance, Brian was not afraid to experiment and he generally received great results.

Brian Eno’s work has had probably the greatest impact on my life before I had even know his name. The artists that he had worked with such as U2, Coldplay, David Bowie, and the Talking Heads have all been a part of my musical influence over the years. Who knows where electronic music would be at this point without Brian Eno or even ambient music for that matter. The man even created the wonderful start-up sound for Windows 95 operating system that I was accustomed to as a kid. His outlook on music and his lack of musical training brings a great sense of hope to me. I feel that as long as I work my hardest to innovate instead of replicate what is popular, I could have a chance in this music industry.