Electric Light Orchestra
Out Of The Blue

THE REVIEW

Electric Light Orchestra – Out Of The Blue - 1977
It was incredibly tough in the '70s to make pop music. You could write little masterpieces of simple genius, but the "serious" critics of the time showed no mercy: the public, moreover, would never have allowed it. Imagine, then, in the full punk era!
Thus, it was simply impossible to speak enthusiastically about the Electric Light Orchestra. Which is a pity, as an album like this one (originally a double, but a single CD) truly deserved.

"Out Of The Blue" is for ELO what "Pet Sound" is for the Beach Boys (for a moment I was tempted to bring up "Sgt Pepper", but better not to unleash cataclysms), however, "Pet Sound" has always been considered a masterpiece, whereas "Out Of The Blue" hasn't received much attention.
Nevertheless, it's extremely rare to find in the history of rock (let's use this term in its broadest sense) an album that, first and foremost, encapsulates such a wealth of genius melodic lines.
Because, in short, if the beauty, the power, of a song also lies (I would be tempted to say: above all) in the happiness of its melody, at least ten of these 17 songs are absolute masterpieces. Then there are the brilliant arrangements and the small, grand ideas in the production.

To stay within the pop realm, in a song like "Mr. Blue Sky", just to name one, there are more ideas than in an entire album of any boyband from the last 10 years: it doesn't take much (you might say), but it's true. No band has ever used voices so perfectly (and there's no boyband - yet again! - that hasn't tried), none has used the orchestra so functionally. Jeff Lynne, writer of music, lyrics, arrangements—basically anything you hear coming out of the speakers, is owed (and how much!) by the pundits and rock critics: he is a musical genius only rarely acknowledged (listen to his brilliant and unmistakable work in George Harrison's "Cloud Nine" or in the Travelling Wilburys project) and to whom the rock world (and its audience) should have given much more. Unless you know another song capable of kicking up as much desert dust as the enchanting "Wild West Hero".