Electric Light Orchestra
On A Third Day

THE REVIEW

In the early years of development, the Electric Light Orchestra, led by the flamboyant and brilliant figure of Jeff Lynne, produced sounds quite different from those that enabled their unstoppable rise: pop-dance products like Discovery and Out Of The Blue entered the charts worldwide, and even though ELO is not very well-known in the country shaped like a boot, it achieved fame comparable to that of the Beatles.

There is, however, a particular detail that escapes most: John Lennon himself has often praised ELO's work, even calling them "the sons of the Beatles," but he was not referring to the band's golden years, but to the year 1974 when On A Third Day (1973 Columbia Records) was born, the third album of Lynne and his crew. In the first album, we found an extremely experimental approach, with compositions oscillating between prog-rock and classical music, thanks also to the strong neoclassical influences of Roy Wood, who left the band after the release of the subsequent ELO II, although he directly participated in the creation of the two Boogies from the aforementioned album. On A Third Day represents the improvement of ELO II, which, ultimately, was excessively redundant, and the lack of a certain inclination to prog led ELO to fail in its attempt to emerge as a Progressive band, despite the beautiful cover of a classic by Chuck Berry, known as Roll Over Beethoven, and the highly underestimated From The Sun To The World (Boogie No. 1). Thus, with the third album, we have a perfect transition between what was and what will be. Although Prog influences are still present, the average length of the tracks was practically halved compared to the monumental (by their standards, of course) productions of ELO II, while there were no significant improvements worthy of the name in terms of arrangements, which still remained quite sparse (a situation finally corrected with their masterpiece, Eldorado), despite the introduction of the Mini Moog synthesizer; in any case, from a purely artistic point of view, we are faced with an album navigating through highs and lows.

The most successful compositions are those that are more direct and catchy, like the splendid Showdown and a true tribute to Rockabilly, Ma-ma-ma Belle, which would become one of their most popular live concert titles; in the future, Lynne would cyclically repeat with tributes to Rockabilly, which began with the already mentioned cover of Roll Over Beethoven, and continued with major pieces like Rockaria! and Illusion in G Major. In the first four tracks, however, we find a draft of a concept, with four connected tracks, the result of which is rather decent, while the album's closure is entrusted to a bizarre remake of one of the most famous classical music pieces: In The Hall Of The Mountain King; the aforementioned cover has been, to use a euphemism, "desecrated" of its original charm by really out-of-place initial sound effects, but the ending crescendo with extensive use of guitar and drums manages to improve, but not save, a really overly ambitious cover attempt.

As I have repeated in various ELO reviews, this is a transitional album, and should be taken as such, in fact, the search for an easily accessible sound has already begun, even though the desire to try to mix rock rhythms and classical compositions is still very much alive, and the decent "Concept" experiment on side A will become a reality with their next album, Eldorado. In short, we are faced with an album with good ideas, but probably inferior to both the first album and its direct predecessor, given that Roy Wood's departure caused a sort of "Year 0" to start from, but the results will not be long in coming, the masterpiece is near.