The five best albums produced by Brian Eno
Roxy Music can be placed into two different categories: There’s Roxy Music BE (Brian Eno), or Roxy Music AE (after Eno). Because it’s easy to disparage the band for their diminishing returns after letting the alien keyboard player go, the alien dressing artist needed to go down his own path in an effort to realign with his sense of art.
Eno worked on many of the most interesting and diverse albums David Bowie issued during the 1970s, but contrary to popular belief, he didn’t work on either Low or “Heroes” as a producer, so you’re not going to see either album on this list. But I am confident to say that the number one entry is more satisfying than either of those entries, so it’s a small sacrifice to make.
The five chosen showcase Eno’s diversity as a producer and a soundscape artist, creating a sense of unity within the ranks of the world of popular music. That these batty, brusque works are also so effortlessly commercial shows his abstract standings never got in the way of his desire to release strong work.
From Devo to Coldplay, the songs are deeply thoughtful and carefully considered, creating a backlog of work that stems from the band’s sense of isolation in their journey to write fulfilling music. But he knows, he knows, he knows, Eno. He knows, Eno.
Ranking the five best Brian Eno productions, in order of greatness:
5. Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends – Coldplay (2008)
Haters begone – Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends is one of the best albums from 2008. It is Coldplay’s most sophisticated work, spanning genres as diverse as chamber pop and avant-garde jazz, culminating in one of Will Champion’s most aggressive use of backpedals and bass drums. It’s a musician heavy album, which is interesting considering that Eno’s metier is minimalistic. But what a way to journey into ornate, culminating in the best British pop single of the late 2010’s: ‘Viva La Vida’.
Eno also delivered some of the best vocals of Chris Martin‘s career. ‘Yes’ features the lowest vocal the singer produces, and no jokes please – Martin is a sensational singer when he’s pushed. And that’s what Eno has done time again and again, whether it’s Byrne, Bono, Booth or Martin: he gets the vocals on record as they should be delivered.
4. Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo! – DEVO (1978)
Even by Enoesque standards, this album is weird. The former Roxy Music keyboardist joined the American band in Cologne, West Germany. Eno joins them by playing the synthesiser on ‘Shrivel Up’, a frenzied, fraught turbo-charged number that uses a barrelling hook, and dizzying counter-melody that cements the tune. Elsewhere, the work is pure Devo, complete with thunderous hooks, and brusque drum patterns. The dizzying songs battle through the backlog of work, culminating in a collection of tunes that still sound modern in 2021.
The album features a tune that’s as striking as The Rolling Stones’ original arrangement of ‘Satisfaction’, but the bubbly hooks and brusque production design show that the band were capable of creating a singular backdrop that was busy with imagination and aspiration. Such is the work, it wears its confidence nicely.
3. The Unforgettable Fire – U2 (1984)
U2 worked with Steve Lillywhite for their first three albums, a brusque triumvirate of work that put the Irish band in the pantheon of 1980s stadium rock outfits. And yet there was something missing from the work, as was evident from their desire to return to Leinster, by recording in the holistic confines of a castle. Eno was impressed by their gumption and agreed to postpone retirement in an effort to help the post-punk band turn to more artful avenues, making it the first time they consciously changed direction in their career.
Eno worked as a co-producer, but Daniel Lanois was also responsible for the sound, and Lanois worked closely with the band in the 1990s as they underwent another radical change to that of a trendy dance outfit. “With Steve [Lillywhite], we were a lot more strict about a song,” bassist Adam Clayton recalled,”and what it should be; if it did veer off to the left or the right, we would pull it back as opposed to chasing it. Brian [Eno] and Danny [Lanois] were definitely interested in watching where a song went and then chasing it.”
2. Remain In Light – Talking Heads (1980)
Depending on who you ask, David Byrne is either visionary par excellence or a control freak who takes credit for the other members of the group who put together a mosaic of sound in one sturdy location. “It’s like he can’t help himself,” drummer Chris Frantz told The Guardian “His brain is wired in such a way that he doesn’t know where he ends and other people begin. He can’t imagine that anyone else would be important.” But whatever the merit of the material, Byrne’s incredibly original, and can only count Peter Gabriel as an immediate successor.
And like Gabriel before him, Byrne decided to work with Eno, even if his bandmates had some reservations. Eno was credited with “Enossifying” some of the tracks on The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway, and Talking Heads were also keen to use the keyboardist on what became their most fondly remembered album. Chief among the tracks is ‘Once In A Lifetime’, a jaunty bass-heavy piece that was brought to a greater life when it utilised Byrne’s spindly body.
1. Whiplash – James (1997)
British band James was responsible for some of the idiosyncratic anthems of the 1990s, which likely explains why the band chose their seventh album as an excuse to work with David Bowie’s finest collabarator. Like Bowie, Tim Booth was an avid Buddist, and there’s something very Zen about the band’s work. It’s less about the destination, the hook, or the drums with James: it’s all about journey. And journey is the very thing that centres Eno’s philosophy as a recording artist.
Recorded with great commitment, and scintillatingly performed, the album flows and ebbs, laying down to allow the thunder to return to the centre of the album, creating a mosaic that should be slower to wash over, rather than race to the finishing line as Oasis might have done on the sprawling Be Here Now album. The album holds a bona fide rock song with ‘She’s A Star’, but it also holds another seismic opus with ‘Watering Hole’ and ‘Blue Pastures’.
