I was 4 years old the last time Electric Light Orchestra toured the US in 1981.
My wife and I last Christmas decided that instead of giving each other “stuff,” we’d give each other an event: a concert, a glass blowing class, a blacksmithing class, that sort of thing. So far it’s just been concerts; we saw Fleetwood Mac last month which was her gift. She was looking for a blacksmithing class to take me to, but I was perusing the local concert schedule this morning and saw ELO is coming through in July. We’ll buy tickets, but hopefully my friend who’s father owns a luxury suite at Capital One arena will let us use it that night.
I just noticed this morning they were touring. I put a bug in my friends ear about going to see them.
I doubt I’ll make it, but I’d love to see him/them. Looks like the closest they’ll be is St Paul or Chicago. Either way, one of us would be making a 6 hour drive, which we’ve both done over the years to see concerts that are an hour+ past the other’s house.
They released an album titled “Alone in the Universe” in 2015, and have been touring Europe for the last couple of years.
I figure this is likely my one and only chance to see them. While as far as I can tell Jeff Lynne has lived clean, he’s 71, reportedly doesn’t like to tour, and anyone can drop dead at any moment.
It’s ELO like Chinese Democracy-era Guns ‘n’ Roses was GnR. It’s Jeff Lynne (who got the rights to the ELO name back from drummer Bev Bevan), keyboardist Richard Tandy and a bunch of replacements. Officially the band is “Jeff Lynne’s ELO” to distinguish it from Bevan’s ELO Part II/The Orchestra.
Still, it’s a great show. I saw their 2016 date at the Hollywood Bowl, complete with orchestral backing from the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra. That kicked ass!
All of the above is true. I’ve been a huge ELO fan since the late '70s, and have followed all of the tribulations over the past few decades.
While Richard Tandy is still officially in the band, I don’t think he’s performed with them since 2016 or 2017 (I’m guessing that he has some health issues). Bevan retired from ELO Part II around 1999, and sold his share of the rights to the ELO name to Lynne at around that time. Since then, the band that had been going by “ELO Part II” has gone by “The Orchestra,” though they bill themselves as featuring former ELO members.
And, ELO’s main bassist, Kelly Groucutt, passed away in 2009.
So, at this point, the touring band is Jeff and a collection of (very talented) session musicians. I saw them when they came through Chicago last summer, and it was an outstanding show – it was also the first time I’d ever had a chance to see ELO live, as I was only a teenager the last time they’d toured, and the nearest tour stop was too far from Green Bay for me to be able to go.
Lynne isn’t really a big fan of touring – he’s much happier in a studio, and I suspect that he’s very introverted. He only started performing live again a few years ago, and I think that he’s been pleasantly surprised that he, and his music, have been so well-received, and I think that it’s that revived interest in the band (along with the money, no doubt) which is keeping him touring now. The few ELO recordings that have been released over the past 20 years (two original albums, and one album of re-recordings of older ELO songs) have been 95% Lynne playing and singing, with a few other musicians, like Tandy, appearing on a few tracks.
I have tickets to see them again when they come back to Chicago this summer (and, coincidentally, I also have tickets to see Peter Frampton the following night).
I saw them on their *Time *tour in 1981, and it was a great show. I had tickets for the *Zoom *tour in 2001, but it was cancelled due to poor sales, alas. My sons and I now have tickets for their July 30 concert in Columbus, Ohio, and we’re looking forward to it!
He didn’t appear with the band when they were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2017 (though he was an inductee; my memory is that he was supposed to be there, and had to cancel at the last minute), and he wasn’t a part of the band for last summer’s U.S. tour.
I had tickets for the Chicago date on that tour, as well. As it turned out, even if the tour hadn’t been cancelled, that show would undoubtedly not have occurred, since it was scheduled for September 12th, 2001.
With the conversion rate from the Canadian, isn’t that only about 275 miles?
My son and I went to see them last year when they came to Dallas - I even made us custom T-shirts - and it was totally worth it, even if they didn’t perform any songs from Time. I will never get tired of listening to their classics and, as kenobi 65 attests, the very talented band Jeff Lynne has built around him do them very well.
When we saw last year’s concert, we noted that they performed at least one song from every ELO album up through Discovery (as well as a song from Xanadu), but only two songs from later than that (“When I Was a Boy” and the Wilburys’ “Handle With Care”).
George Harrison’s son opened, and he came out and sang his father’s part on “Handle With Care.”
ELO went through all the biggest hits. I am very impressed with their sound engineers. I’ve seen a lot of shows at Verizon Center/Capitol One Arena, but it’s not a concert hall, it’s just a big room. For music, it’s fucking terrible. Everyone sounds like shit there, with, until tonight, the lone exception of The Police. Whatever their sound guys did, they need to teach it to everyone else. When they turned it up at the end of the show it went to the normal shitty sound, but for most of the rest of the show the sound was still echo-y (nothing you can really do about that) but actually listenable.
Jeff Lynne is still looking and sounding pretty good for 71. Actually, he sounded near perfect; unlike Fleetwood Mac they seemed to be playing everything in the original key; they didn’t have to tune down to accommodate Lynne’s age.
I agree; his sound team seems to be really good. When ELO came through Chicago last year, they played at the Allstate Arena (a mid-sized basketball arena just north of O’Hare), which is a 35 year old sports barn with terrible acoustics. I’ve seen several other shows there, and the sound was never good. But, ELO sounded really good there.
On this tour, they’ll be playing at the United Center, on the near west side of the city. It, too, is a basketball arena, but a much bigger one (it’s where the Bulls and Blackhawks play). It’s newer, but still kind of a barn, so I hope they’ll sound just as good this time out.
