ALBUMS: Ole’ ELO (1976); Outta the Blue (1977)
MVC Rating: 5.0/$$$$$ Blue 4.5/$$$$$
My countdown continues with yellow vinyl. Is that a sign?
You may have heard about the yellow bird.
A beautiful yellow cardinal, the result of a rare genetic mutation, has been photographed and videotaped here in the Birmingham area.
Now the bird is fathering babies. I hope they are each a different color.
So there’s the yellow bird flying free having babies and I have the yellow vinyl.
It’s a yellow record called ELO OLE, an early greatest hits album from the multimillion selling supergroup the Electric L
ight Orchestra. The yellow disc and ELO’s ‘Out of the Blue’ album are my NP (Now Playing) portion of my column.) I will follow this NP with five records culled from deeper in my blog. Overall, since last September I have reviewed 169 records on the way to 678. It’s all to bring awareness to Lewy body dementia, which I have. On with the Yellow Vinyl.
I recollect that it was approximately 1978 in Athens, Ga., when the local AM radio station, WRFC I believe, asked for caller number something would get this record. I called and I got it. I’ve opened it and have played it just a few times, left the shrink wrap on because thought it was special.
It was a promotional DJ copy and it is a little rare. Worth about $60 in this great condition, according to my perusal of the Internet. It’s good music too (as a bonus).
Jeff Lynne and ELO wanted to make music that combined grand symphonic features and flourishes. They fancied themselves taking up where the Beatles left off in such pieces as ‘A Day in the Life’ or ‘Magical Mystery Tour.’
And they did well. This yellow disc compilation of early ‘hits’ is a fascinating look at how the group was blending orchestral instruments with rock and roll. You can almost hear them testing the waters with OLE. On ‘10538 Overture’ and ‘Kuiama’, they are very much in ‘prog’ rock territory. Cellos and violins and synthesizers sweep around on various floors of this musical building. As the album progresses you can guess where this group is headed: Hitsville baby.
I got proof of that in my other ELO album, ‘Out of the Blue,’ which was a two-record worldwide hit that seemed to spawn endless amounts of Top 40 hits.
Now there’s no question these guys were good at what they did – but they couldn’t ever really get the respect? Was it an Eagles thing I’ve addressed before? Or like Dire Straits, they just got so big they weren’t ‘cool’ any more? Again. I say it’s an undeserved lack of respect. They sell multimillions of records by being bad? Like Yogi Berra said, nobody goes there anymore it’s too crowded. That said, they started going for the pop life about the same time I was moving away from it. So songs like ‘Strange Magic,’ though catchy, is not something I’d choose on a jukebox. ‘’Boy Blue,’ maybe.
Addressing this lack of respect issue I can’t help but remember this unfortunate moment about ELO. At the George Harrison tribute concert, a band of superstars commenced playing ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps.’ Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne, and their respective band members, and Harrison’s son, Dhani Harrison. Anyway, the ELO guitarist is just jamming away, soloing, picking, doing a pretty good job.
Then Prince emerges from the other side of the stage. Prince had reportedly left the rehearsal of the song in a huff, fired his sound guy, so there was a lot of uncertainty what if anything Prince’s performance would be.
Here’s description from a New York Times story:
The Petty rehearsal was later that night. And at the time I’d asked him to come back, there was Prince; he’d shown up on the side of the stage with his guitar. He says hello to Tom and Jeff and the band. When we get to the middle solo, where Prince is supposed to do it, Jeff Lynne’s guitar player just starts playing the solo. Note for note, like Clapton. And Prince just stops and lets him do it and plays the rhythm, strums along. And we get to the big end solo, and Prince again steps forward to go into the solo, and this guy starts playing that solo too! Prince doesn’t say anything, just starts strumming, plays a few leads here and there, but for the most part, nothing memorable.
So when the real thing went down, some didn’t even know Prince was playing.
More NYT: The group featured Tom Petty and two other members of the Heartbreakers, as well as Jeff Lynne, Steve Winwood, Dhani Harrison (George’s son) and Prince, himself an inductee that year. Marc Mann, a guitarist with Mr. Lynne’s band, played Eric Clapton’s memorable solo from the album version of the song. But Prince, who essentially stood in the dark for most of the performance, burned the stage to the ground at the song’s end.
The ELO guy didn’t know what hit him. Probably still doesn’t. Petty’s mouth hung open. Harrison’s son shook his head with a huge smile.