Is no one going to talk about Randy Newman’s song, “The Story of a Rock & Roll Band”?
It’s pretty clearly about ELO.
I’ve never been able to figure out if he really likes them. A large part of that song seems sarcastic.
Do you think he likes them or hates them?
When we think of ELO, we realize that while we liked them back in the day, it would be no great loss if we did not ever hear them again.
I’ll never get my head around the whole “Br-r-r-r-uce!” thing.
And I’ve never liked the name Bev Bevan.
We love them but don’t think their ouevre holds up like say Steely Dan. ELO has a strong middle after they get out of their prancing English Satyr phase…and then Jeff runs out ideas.
But I like his production work and that new “When I was a Boy” song.
ah yes, thanks for the mondegreen!
Sometimes I’m haunted by not knowing why Bruce is going to bring them down.
It’s funny I see this thread as they (or at least some of them) are at Epcot right now and I watched a few songs
IMO having a dozen or so of their best songs is enough, even if you like them, which I do. I never thought of them as having a seemingly endless stream of great music like the Beatles or the Stones.
In recent interviews, Jeff has noted that he started to feel constrained by the concept of using the string section, and yes, probably was running out of ideas on how to do so. (Bear in mind that he had zero formal training with classical instruments, and to this day cannot read music – not uncommon among pop musicians, but it made composing for strings interesting.)
Also, by the final two pre-breakup albums (Secret Messages and Balance of Power), they were fulfilling their contractual obligation to the label – if not for that contract, Jeff likely would have disbanded the band after Time was released. In retrospect, it’s now clear that he eager to move on to other things.
Who you saw is a group named “The Orchestra”, which is a group that evolved out of “ELO Part II”…when ELO broke up in the mid 80s, both Jeff Lynne and Bev Bevan had rights to the band’s name. Lynne was done with the ELO concept (at least at that time), but Bevan wanted to continue, so he formed ELO Part II, with several other people who had had roles in ELO (as well as some new faces) – they toured a lot, and put out a couple of albums.
In 1999, Bevan broke up ELO Part II, and sold his 50% share in the ELO name to Lynne soon after. Members of that band re-formed under the name “The Orchestra” (since they no longer had rights to use the ELO name). The only people currently in The Orchestra who had any connection to the original ELO are Mik Kaminski (violinist for most of ELO’s albums and tours), and Louis Clark (who conducted the string section on several ELO albums).
That sort of surprises me. I’d think you could add some strings to just about any piece of music, especially if it didn’t have to be prominent or to carry the melody.
I’m no composer, but my suspicion is that he didn’t want to have strings in there simply because “ELO is supposed to have strings”. I also suspect that that perception (ELO as a pop band with a string section) may have been part of what led him to want to move on from the concept. When you look at the final three original ELO albums, the use of the strings steadily declined, to no more than cameo roles.
I like it, too, but so far, “One Step at a Time” is my favourite from the new album. I need to give them all a few more listens, I think.
Trapped in time, surrounded by evil, and low on gas … Bruce can be a desperate individual!
I wrote this over a year ago, and feel I should amend my statement. I bought Zoom shortly after it came out, and was disappointed that it only had one good song on it. There was a “Deluxe Edition” that included an extra song on it - “One Day” - that I liked. Didn’t even know that existed until I stumbled across it on iTunes.
A similar thing happened many years ago with Time, my favourite album. I bought it on cassette, so I got what I got. However, if you bought the “Twilight” (my favourite ELO song of all time) single back in the day, the B-side was “Julie Don’t Live Here”, a song I had never heard until decades later completely by accident.
Some re-leased versions of Time include “Julie” as a “hook” to get you to re-buy an album you probably already had in your collection.
Bumped.
It’s official! ELO will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Hooray!
Awesome.
It’s about Time. 
ELO? Just another ‘meh’ 1970s band whose stuff has been played far more times than I need to listen to it.
Hell, even much of the good stuff from that era has been wearing thin, IMHO. Fortunately, that problem is easily solvable: I’ve pretty much stopped listening to the ‘classic rock’ stations anymore. There’s plenty of good new music out there that I haven’t heard a thousand times already.
Only four members of ELO are being inducted: Jeff Lynne, Bev Bevan, Roy Wood, and Richard Tandy. Looks more like they’re inducting the Move than ELO!