Electric Light Orchestra, led by Jeff Lynne, is most popular for
\ntheir pop-sounding records, like “Turn To Stone”, “Evil Woman”, and
\n“Can’t Get It Out Of My Head”. But if you observe their album
\ntracks, you will notice that they have experimented with orchestral
\nand classical music. Their second album,
\nElectric Light Orchestra II<\/i>, has that experience, more ways
\nthan one.<\/p>\n
On that topic, one thing I have always emjoyed about ELO, is how
\nthey used instrumentation in various songs. One song in particular,
\nis “Fire On High”, from their 1975 release,
\nFace The Music<\/i>. This song was heavily used for introductions
\nto various radio and television programs. Like this song, the
\nopening track from
\nELO II<\/i>, “In Old England Town (Boogie #2)”, is anything BUT a
\nboogie. The beginning of this song is heavily instrumental, and
\ncould be easily used for a mystery\/horror flick. This piece has you
\nsitting back and visualizing something from such a movie.<\/p>\n
“Mama” also has instrumentation of an orchestra-type fashion,
\nwhich has been heard in the band’s most popular songs. Using
\ncellos, violins and strings, this song is a typical ELO song, a
\nslow-paced tune in the standard pop vein.<\/p>\n
Probably considered the only well-remembered song from this
\nalbum is their cover version of Chuck Berry’s “Roll Over
\nBeethoven”. What makes this version so great, is that ELO mixes
\nrock and roll with classical music. Since Beethoven was a popular
\nclassical music composer, the beginning of this song sounds like
\nbasic classical music, as ELO begins playing Beethoven’s 5th
\nSymphony. Then, they rip into the familiar opening guitar riff
\nChuck Berry used in his song. Throughout the song, it’s rock and
\nroll, as they use the familiar riffs from Beethoven’s 5th Symphony.
\nThis is a great way of experimenting with two different sources of
\nmusic.<\/p>\n
“From The Sun To The World (Boogie #1)” starts out with
\nsynthesizer keyboards that are just too sweet. When the vocals
\nkicks in during the first minute, this song features orchestration
\nwith strings and keyboards heard in any popular ELO song. But
\nduring the third minute, it’s all classical music. Then, in its
\nfourth minute, it takes another turn: It’s piano-and-orchestra
\nboogie. The vocals return in the fifth minute, as heard earlier,
\nand ends throughout with the ‘boogie’ music.<\/p>\n
The album ends with “Kuiama”, another typical pop-rock ELO song.
\nLike The Beatles, this song has similarities to the fab four’s
\nlater albums, like
\nSgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band<\/i>,
\nMagical Mystery Tour<\/i> and
\nAbbey Road<\/i>. The ending of this song is somewhat psychedelic,
\nyet it has that ending effect as in The Beatles’ “A Day In The
\nLife”.<\/p>\n
Each song on this album is long. The shortest song is clocked in
\nat 6:54 and the longest at 11:19. Still, this album clearly defines
\nhow a band can experiment with two different sources of music, both
\nclassical and rock. This album is not to be ignored. Most fans of
\nmusic recognize Electric Light Orchestra for their AM radio pop
\nrock favorites in the Seventies and early Eighties. But you’d be
\nsurprised in listening to their many album tracks, as they use
\norchestration in their music. Here you’ll see why the word
\nORCHESTRA is used in their name. In fact, some of their music could
\nbe compared to the instrumentation of such groups as Emerson, Lake
\n& Palmer, and King Crimson. But ELO’s music is much more styled
\nin the pop category as compared to ELP’s and King Crimson’s
\nmusic.<\/p>\n
\nELO II<\/i> is an experimentation, and an excellent one. Where
\none may just focus on a band’s popular songs heard on the radio,
\nmany may want to hear the other songs that didn’t make it regularly
\non the airwaves. In experimenting with that, you maybe just
\nsurprised as I was in what you hear. A second look at a band that
\nmay just be famous for their easy-going pop tunes, has more than
\nenough talent to explore the boundaries of popular music. ELO just
\ndoes that, as they feature orchestration with both rock and
\nclassical music. Classical music is another source of music that
\nmost rock fans seem to ignore. After hearing
\nELO II<\/i>, not only would some of these rock fans take another
\nlook at ELO’s music in another sense, they just might do the same
\nfor Classical Music as well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":27575,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6624],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-38950","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-electric-light-orchestra","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38950","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38950"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38950\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27575"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38950"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}