2345

This is post 2345 on sevendaysin and I am not sure I would ever reach this number or keep posting for this long. I started here on the 18th of February 2007 and am still doing this now. I chose Echo and The Bunnymen's "Never Stop" because it is a great record and appropriate for the point of this post.

The thing is in life we do things that seem to never end (apart from the obvious Grim Reaper scenario) , such as washing up , cleaning , working , and watching TV and listening to music , plus walking and lots of other thing.

The thing is if you break things up into manageable chunks you can then enjoy the success of each finish point you define.

While working from home I have listened to several CD box sets which I don't think I could have done even walking to work. I have just finished the Electric Light Orchestra box and, apart from "Discovery" , I would rate all of the albums, although the first five are my favourites.

I have Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen boxes and they are being lined up for my next plays. Having a CD player to hand , plus the discs i sa great convenience, but it means I am not listening to much Radio 6 for a change as certain DJs I thing would be more at home on Radio 2 , so I don't feel I am mising anything.

So that's post 2345 , and basically I will never stop with this here blog.

896504

This is post 2344 , the next will have it's number as the title. We really can't do without numeracy, although politicians are fine without it. The number in the title is the dimensions of the video above. I thought this may be a good starting point for a post , but it's not really, I can't think of anything else to say about it , so I will mention the music that I have been listening to this week.

I started with some Roxette Greatest Hits then PJ Harvey "The Hope Six Demolition Project" , followed by Prince "1999" (which was released in 1982 so more numbers there, and in the PJ Harvey title) , and this was followed by Kate Bush "Director's Cut" which three CDs consisting of "The Red Shoes" , "Sensual World" then reworkings of songs from those albums, it is a very illuminating listen.

My latest is an Electric Light Orchestra box , which  does trace their fall from pioneering musos to prepacked pop purveyors. They are responsible for my second favourite album ever "ElDorado" and Jeff Lynne is a purveyor of some extremely muscular riffs on the earlier albums ("Ma-Ma Belle" and "10538 Overture") , he also revisits The Move's "Do Ya" which is possibly his finest moment , on "A New World Record" which is when they hit paydirt and the fall began.

I'm currently up to "Face The Music" and not sure if I will finish the whole box, but the first five albums are worth the price of admission, maybe on the next post we will find out how far I got.

I Now Have A Top Three

I am always positive, looking for positives in any situation. As I was make breakfast , porridge and coffee, I ran out of milk. This meant I had to go to my local shop to get more milk, but in the process added 600 steps to my daily sep count , which is always good.

Anyway back to the point of the post.

On my morning walk I decided to listen to "Dirty Computer" by Janelle Monae, which I was so impressed with that I posted this two years ago. and every time I listen I am floored by the album. It now joins "Future Games" by Spirit and "El Dorado" by The Electric Light Orchestra in my top three albums ever. I do like music and have eclectic taste and if I were to choose top artists it would probably be David Bowie and Bob Dylan.

I have included the Emotion Picture that contains most of the album , and is a great piece of science fiction music culminating in th ewonderful "Amercans" . The album has lost none of it's joy and power since I first heard it , and it's so good I never skip a song , similar to the other two albums in my top three.

It is an amazing , joyful and thought provoking piece of work and is always great to listen to and always lift my spirits.

This also shows that there is always great music being produced, and while often it's cited that the music you hear between the ages of 14 and 16 shapes your whole future tastes , I think that you have to keep an open mind and listen to everything.

Also you don't have to be yound to produce great music , age can educate you and I thing that Sparks are  still one of the most at the edge original band still going.

So keep a very open mind and let the good stuff flow into you.

Fire On High

I first heard this as the 'B' Side of "Livin' Thing" . It is the opening track to the great Electric Light Orchestra album "Face the Music". I remember being impressed by the Electric chair cover, although the album was anything but grim.

It's actually quite a monstrous sound and shows fun, ingenuity and brilliance that seemed to desert the band in later years producing insipid pap such as "Mr Blue Sky" and "Xanadu".

ELO did produce my second favourite album ever "Eldorado"  and this song was the opener from the follow up "Face The Music" which contained some excellent blue eyed soul as well as this over the top sound storm. It is another one for the #SongsYouveNeverHeard sequence although it may one that you have forgotten.

The ELO were formed to continue where the Beatles finished with "Strawberry Fields" but when Roy Wood left it did become Jeff Lynne's vehicle.

So this is my last post for August 2018, and it is time to hit my bed now.

Enjoy this.

#TenAlbumsInTenDays #2 - Eldorado - A Symphony By The Electric Light Orchestra

When Jeff Lynne and Roy Wood were in The Move they wanted to start a project that contined where The Beatles' "Strawberry Fields Forever" had left off. That project became The Electric Light Orchestra and their early albums contained some amazing musical detours, but with a heavy reliance on the string section hence the "Orchestra".

Some of the early singles showed their versatility none more striking than the all out orchestral rock and roll arrangement of Chuck Berry's "Roll Over Beethoven" being followed up by the perfect Philadelphia soul sound of "Showdown".

A switch of label from EMI's progressive arm Harvest to Warner Brothers (now Sony) for "On The Third Day" and then my second favourite album of all time "Eldorado".

I was a fan of the band an bought the single from the album the gorgeous "Can't Get It Out Of My Head" but was blown away by the full on string backed rock and roll of the 'B' Side "Illusions in 'G' Minor". That persuaded me to invest in the album with it's "Wizard of Oz" cover and it has remained a favourite ever since. The use of strings and choir organ / vox humana make for a most impressive sound for Jeff Lynne's excellent songs.

The string arrangements throughout the album are amazing particularly on "Poor Boy" but almost every song is a gem , and it is an album that you happily play from start to end. THis was followed by "Face The Music" before they finally hit paydirt with "A New World Record", but in my opinion this is their finest forty minutes and I still play this frequently.

Light On - Light Off - Light On - Light Off

I have a couple of solar security lights at the back, a lot simpler that wired one and easily fixable to the wall (you can get 'em from Amazon here) They do what they're supposed to , but when it gets windy (supposedly with #StormBrian) and movement from bushes and trees can set them off , over and over and over , and the poeple that get it are my neighbours at the back. Havin said that , I get theirs too so I suppose we balance each other out. We don't use the back rooms for socialising musch so it's not a huge hassle , but there isn't much you can do about the weather and the lights are functioning as they are supposed to.

The wind is getting up and it's actually cold, and I can imagine this stopping me from hitting my daily steps target, though the reality is is that I will see it as just another challenge, which I will succeed at.

This weekend I have been feeling run down, probably due to my 'flu' jab, and tomorrow it's back to work so I am sure that I really need to get some sleep, that is the way to help your physical frame to recuperate it's powers, so I will choose a piece for you.

It's quite funny how people often see pieces of music quite differently, Richard Osman of "Pointless" stated that teh ELO's "Mr Blue Sky" was the greatest "British" song ever (and we're not talking nationalism here we're talking identity), personally I think it's awful, contrived and formulaic from an ELO past their sell-by date. Maybe something by The Kinks or Beatles might fit that bill, and the ELO have a lot of better songs in their catalogue.

So I will leave you with a Beatles cover of "The Inner Light" ("B" side of "Lady Madonna") by The Grip Weeds. Enjoy it and sleep well my friends.

Copping Out With The Electric Light Orchestra - - #ALifeInNumbers #38

When I'm tagging posts I am sometimes very surprised at the things I've written about. Going back I find some very short posts , maybe about twenty words. The thing is a blog is a diary and sometimes you may not have much to say but still want to record it for one reason or another. Here is my first ever post that states what I wanted to do with this blog and I think it's grown a bit since then and now each post gets around fifty hits which is nice (though I don't know how many are robots). I love it that a core of friends visit and so are reading my thoughts and putting me right when I need it.

Anyway we  hit number 38 and this is one of the many cop outs as Dave pointed out, but this one was decided fairly early on, and it's an amazing record, which I bought as soon as I heard it. The Electric Light Orchestra was conceived by Jeff Lynne and Roy Wood to continue where the Beatles left off after "Strawberry Fields" and "A Day In The Life" which was rock and popular music where the orchestra became and integral part of the piece.

The Electric Light Orchestra are responsible for what is still my second favourite album ever "El Dorado" and that was after Roy Wood had departed but prior to them hitting paydirt with "A New World Record" and "Out Of The Blue"

Anyway the song I've chosen is "10538 Overture"  because it does contain "38". It starts with that huge descending guitar arpeggio / riff  (lifted by Paul Weller for "Changing Man") then joined by the muscular string section (led by a hirsute Roy Wood on Cello if I remember rightly).  So you can enjoy this , because this is what the ELO were formed for, but I think they lost their way after "Face The Music" The video is from 1972, and the masks are very worrying given that I've been watching the current series of American Horror Story (My Roanoke Nightmare).

Anyway this month has seen the most posts I've ever done in one month and there's still three more days to go. So have a great Friday my friends, the weekend is almost here.

On The Third Day ....

.. and that's the name of an Electric Light Orchestra album (when they were good) . Today the computer decided not to start and the burglar alarm decided to just play silly buggers. The weather is still good , in fact very hot , so summer looks like it's here.

For the June's Tunes I want to get away from the numbers but also want to have the Bob Dorough original of Three (Is a Magic) number. I have 30 days to go for more obscure stuff , so I will actually go for it. I first heard it on an excellent Blue Note sampler.

Incidentally Roy Wood formed the Elelectric Light Orchestra because he wanted to continue the musical direction taken by the Beatles on Strawberry Fields. Whether he was successful you can judge for yourself but Roy Wood left after the first album leaving Jeff Lynne to produce some excellent stuff while Wood went off and formed Wizzard as well as producing a great body of solo work.

Anyway here's Bob......