Brian Eno

Brian Eno (/ˈiːnoʊ/ EE-no; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is an English musician, songwriter, record producer, visual artist, sound designer and political activist. He is known for his pioneering contributions to ambient and electronic music, and for producing, recording, and writing works in rock and pop music. He has been described as one of popular music's most influential and innovative figures. In 2019, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Roxy Music.

Born in Melton, Suffolk, Eno studied painting and experimental music at Ipswich Civic College's art school in the mid-1960s, and then at the Winchester School of Art. He joined Roxy Music as their keyboardist in 1971, contributing to their first two albums, and left in 1973. With the guitarist Robert Fripp, he recorded (No Pussyfooting) (1973) using tape-delay and reel-to-reel loops. In 1974, Eno released his first solo albums, Here Come the Warm Jets and Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy). Eno released the genre-fusing Another Green World (1975) the following year, which has been described as "a universally acknowledged masterpiece". Concluding his pop and rock run, he released the Oblique Strategies-inspired album Before and After Science in December 1977. At this time, Eno began to compose and release minimalist music via classically-constructed electronic composition. Several albums exemplifying this approach include Discreet Music (1975), Fripp & Eno's Evening Star (1975), the Moebius-Roedelius collaborations Cluster & Eno (1977) and After the Heat (1978), and Music for Films (1978).

During 1978, Eno recorded electronic music intended to be both compositive-friendly and "as ignorable as possible". The result was the start of the Ambient series, Ambient 1: Music for Airports (1979), an album credited with coining the term "ambient music", and described as the greatest in the genre's history by Pitchfork. He went on to record the second part with Harold Budd, The Plateaux of Mirror (1980). After producing the Laraaji-released third instalment Day of Radiance (1980), Eno released On Land in 1982, the last of the series. Eno, along with his brother Roger and Daniel Lanois, released Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks (1983), the ambient-driven soundtrack of the delayed NASA film For All Mankind (1989).

Eno has been a producer and occasional backing musician for several artists since the start of his career. David Bowie, an admirer of Eno's work, recruited Eno in his production line-up in Berlin. Those recorded in Berlin (Low (1977), "Heroes" (1977) (which also featured Robert Fripp), and Lodger (1979)), in what became known as the Berlin Trilogy, became some of Bowie's most acclaimed material. Eno became Talking Heads' co-producer in 1978, producing More Songs About Buildings and Food (1978), Fear of Music (1979) and Remain in Light (1980); the latter has been called one of the greatest albums. He and Daniel Lanois were also U2's head producers, producing The Unforgettable Fire (1984), The Joshua Tree (1987), and Achtung Baby (1991). He became a producer and writer for Coldplay in 2007, producing their album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends (2008) and co-writing all of Mylo Xyloto (2011).

Eno has also collaborated with John Cale, Devo, Peter Gabriel and Genesis, David Byrne, Slowdive, James, Laurie Anderson, Robert Wyatt, Grace Jones, Karl Hyde, and Fred Again. An advocate for humanitarian causes, Eno writes on a variety of subjects and is a founding member of the Long Now Foundation. He is an activist on behalf of environmental, anti-war and pro-Palestinian causes.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.