ENO, BRIAN

born May 15, 1948, Woodbridge, Suffolk, Eng. in full Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno British producer, composer, keyboardist, and singer who helped define and reinvent the sound of some of the most popular bands of the 1980s and '90s and who created the genre of ambient music. While an art student in the late 1960s, Eno began experimenting with electronic music, and in 1971 he joined the fledgling band Roxy Music as keyboardist and technical adviser. A rivalry with singer Bryan Ferry led Eno to leave the group in 1973, whereupon he launched a solo career. No Pussyfooting (1973), a collaboration with guitarist Robert Fripp from King Crimson, used tape-echo and tape-delay techniques to create new sounds and reached the Top 30 in Britain. Eno's next album, Here Come the Warm Jets (1973), was soon followed by the proto-punk single Seven Deadly Finns. In the mid-1970s Eno began developing his theory of ambient music, creating subtle instrumentals to affect mood through sound. Albums such as Discrete Music (1975), Music for Films (1978), and Music for Airports (1979) exemplified this approach. During this period Eno also began producing albums for other artists, and his experimental approach to music making was well suited to such alternative performers as Devo, Ultravox, and David Bowie (especially on Bowie's trilogy of albums recorded primarily in Berlin). Although Eno's work was influential, it was not until his collaborations with Talking Heads and U2 that mainstream listeners became familiar with his sound, most notably on Talking Heads' Top 20 album Remain in Light (1980) and U2's chart-topping albums Unforgettable Fire (1984) and The Joshua Tree (1987).