by Brian Eno
1974, E.G. Records

the sound: The jerky, loping guitar part that opens the first track on “Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy),” by Brian Eno, introduces listeners to a bizarre auditory experience. The song, like the rest of the album, manages to be poppy and catchy while maintaining an unusual and, at times, downright weird sound. The first track, “Burning Airlines Give You So Much More,” is probably the most radio-friendly song on the record, with vocals that seem to glide along like the jet described in its lyrics. The second track, “Back in Judy’s Jungle,” sounds like something off of Pink Floyd’s groundbreaking “Piper at the Gates of Dawn.” “The Great Pretender” features a stalking intro, supplemented by delightfully trippy background music, ending with a resonant chirping that continues long after the other instruments have died down. This is followed by the rapid bass and guitar riffing of “Third Uncle,” an early predecessor to punk and metal. The 10 tracks, most lingering around five minutes in length, often refract sound in multitudinous directions, adding instruments and taking them away mid-song. Eno sings and plays “snake guitar” and keyboards, with Freddie Smith on drums, Phil Manzanera on guitar, Brian Turrington on bass and Robert Wyatt on percussion and backing vocals. Other musicians sit in for brief cameos, including Phil Collins on extra drums on “Mother Whale Eyeless” and the Portsmouth Sinfonia playing strings on “Put a Straw Under Baby.” Collins’ guest appearance seems especially appropriate, since the album sounds slightly reminiscent of early Genesis records. The lyrics are quirky and intellectual, sung in a heavy British lilt. Both lyrically and musically, some songs are much more palatable than others—some are toe-tapping numbers with harmonic backing vocals, others are positively undanceable head-scratchers. But any fan of classic, progressive or experimental rock is likely to find something to celebrate in “Taking Tiger Mountain.”

the background: Brian Eno has had the kind of musical career Syd Barrett might have enjoyed, had he not forsaken his mind to LSD and madness. The British musician and record producer kicked off his career with an experimental early-1970s band called “Roxy Music,” then made four solo albums before helping to launch the careers of dozens of other influential musicians as a producer and collaborator. Following the release of “Here Come the Warm Jets,” which came out early in 1974, “Taking Tiger Mountain” reveals Eno at a time when he was beginning to apply new sound experiments to traditional song structures. He went on to father what we now know as ambient music and work with some of the most notable artists of the last three decades, including Robert Fripp, David Bowie, John Cale, David Byrn, Devo and U2. (All of this from someone who referred to himself as a “non-musician.”)

the significance: Eno has been bestowed with such high esteem for his accomplishments as a producer and musical theorist that his work as a solo musician is often overlooked. But “Taking Tiger Mountain” and Eno’s other solo releases should be credited as having as much influence on late-’70s and ’80s rock as more popular albums by Pink Floyd, David Bowie and Talking Heads. Eno germinated the concept of ambient music decades before the genre became an international craze, but he also wrote songs that had a lasting influence on the pop, punk and progressive rock industries. According to local guitarist Larry Simon, who met Eno in the late-’70s, New York subways were once scrawled with spray-paint declaring “Eno is God.”