Electric Light Orchestra

Time

... cold, exhuberant, creepy, sad, and exciting all at once!

Review Score:

(10/10)
The time-travel concept album "Time" by Electric Light Orchestra is, at the time I write this, one of the only two ELO albums I own/have listened to (the other is from six years earlier, 1975's "Face the Music". This is of course not counting 2001's "Zoom", which is really just a Jeff Lynne solo effort, with the ELO logo on the cover to sell more copies) and of those two it's my favorite. As I said in my subject title, all kinds of moods and feelings are conveyed through the music presented here, and yet they all fit together perfectly. The opening moments of the first track (which is not really a song at all, just an introduction... kind of like the orchestra tuning up before a symphony concert) are loaded with anxious anticipation, finishing up, as it blends into the first actual song, "Twilight" with (if you turn up the volume to notice it) a creepy bit of faint, high pitched, demonic (well, maybe more impish than demonic) laughter. Why? I don't know, it's just odd and rather unsettling, but in a good way. "Twilight" kicks the album off on a very nice start, being fast and energetic and ready to begin an adventure in the Future, no matter what happens or what the future world will be like. Lots of fun, but there's more to it than that... it's a real miniature epic set within a larger one. '...it's either real or it's a dream there's nothing that is in between...' Great. As "Twilight" segues into the next tune (the transition is unnoticable if you are listening to the album straight through), you hear a second or two of a choir of voices sounding an awful lot like Queen II -era Queen. It was a happy observation for me, considering that I only really started to get into that particular moment of Queen's career very recently.

Getting into more creepiness without being repulsive is the highly bizarre "Yours Truly, 2095", which involves one of the citizens of the Future world trying to profess his love for an unfeeling "female" robot, even as he tries to speak in her language (I'm assuming the oft-repeated phrase in the song, 'is that what you want', heard to be sung both by Lynne and a female voice, are the main character's attempts to teach her how to ask him that very question. Am I right? I'm sure only Mr. Lynne knows for sure). Sounds weird, but great music... very creepy, especially with the electronically enhanced voices (which would seem cheesy anywhere else but here, given the context of their use) and the violins we hear between each verse. Touches of Queen are heard again once again in the next song, "Ticket To the Moon", but even without the familiar sound it's another great tune. It's followed by the contradictory "Is This the Way Life's Meant To Be", which I call contradictory mainly because though the music is actually quite upbeat (with some fun Monty Python Mounty-choir vocals, and percussion courtesy of Mr. Bev Bevan), the lyrics are really quite sad ('...as I wander around this wreck of a town where people never speak out loud...'), where the main character takes a walk down a street in the future, recognizing no one and realizing for the first time how out of place he is there. There's an element of sadness latently realized to be there in the music as well, but you don't really notice it the first time (at least, I didn't).

Skipping a bit, "The Rain is Falling" is a slow, genuinely beautiful tune, perhaps continuing the lonely walk through the empty streets of the Future on a cloudy, wet afternoon (the image in conjurs up for me, at least... everyone else is inside at their computers, I'm guessing), while time travel experiments are being conducted by some of the local residents (interfering with the walk, perhaps?) as is, in a far different way, "The Lights Go Down" (love the synth! It's perfect, as is the highly catchy chorus). "Lights" is followed by a series of futuristic news reports, which serve as the backdrop for "Here Is the News". Looking back on the album, the amount of detail that went in to creating the Future world is actually quite impressive. News reports, lonely, insulated characters, and tons and tons of atmosphere.

The final major highlight for "Time" is a song that begins the album/adventure in the future's conclusion (beginning of the end), sort of bringing us back to the way we started, the highly cheerful, bouncy, and fun "Hold on Tight". What a great song! Bright, opimistic lyrics contrast to the cold lonliness we saw in the Future, blending together with some great piano playing courtesy of Richard Tandy (very prominent, but it's not the only thing you'll hear) as we find ourselves deposited back in the present day (that is, 1981), with the dreamy, vague "Epilogue", which perfectly, for me at least, puts into music the process of waking up after a long, deep sleep, drifting back into reality.

The bonus tracks included with this release are really quite good (which doesn't happen to often, in my opinion!). In fact, I like them so much I really wish they could have been fit contextually into the actual body of the album rather than being tacked on at the end. I especially liked the bluesy "Bouncer" and even more than that, "Julie Don't Live Here Anymore". Nice piano melody, and the song moves quickly and (almost) bouncily while at the same time sounding very sorry and regretful. Lynne tells us in the liner notes that it's about a girl who's moved away to another dimension. An aquaintance/more of the time traveler, perhaps? Even as a supplement to the album's end, it's a sweet little listen on its own.

"Time" will serve as a nice introduction to ELO, if you're new to them (as it was and remains for me, really), and if you already like ELO you've probably got it by now anyway. It's a marvelous way to spend an hour, and you'll find yourself coming back to it pretty often. I don't know if I like everything about the Future, but... well. Maybe it can be changed. Of course, if it was changed, we wouldn't have the same album anymore. Hmmm...

Carry on Carry on,

MN

More Reviews: