Earth Moving - Mike Oldfield

At long last my tour of Mike Oldfield albums ends with this 1989 CD, which I have had since it came out, and which is by far the worst of the lot.  It may just be that I'm hesitant to judge the earlier stuff because I don't have as much to compare it to, but this album is almost all bad.  It's bad British 1980's pop, with the first two tracks really amazingly awful.  The third track Far Country is actually fairly unobjectionable - it sounds strongly like a David Foster reject from the soundtrack to The Secret of My Success, but that's not all bad.  (I'm tempted to say that Runaway Son sounds like poor Alan Parsons, but I realized that's only because Chris Thompson is singing lead vocals - he has done many of Parsons' albums and makes clear here how much better Parsons' work is - the instrumentals are much sloppier here).  Innocent is just amazingly bad - lyrics sung by a female chorus like "You are omnipotent - when you're innocent" actually repeat.  The only track that is okay (not great, but okay) is the title track Earth Moving which I still sort of enjoy.  In general the album seemed to get more focused as it went along, and the second side is noticeably better or less bad) than the first.  The list servs discussing the album may have their finger on the problem - it's Oldfield trying to do pop, as opposed to orchestral instrumental, and the two are different things.