Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Artist: Electric Light Orchestra
Label: Legacy Recordings
Released: 1975
Rating: 4.5/5
With “Face The Music”, the fifth album from the legendary British art rockers Electric Light Orchestra, frontman, guitarist, singer, producer and main songwriter Jeff Lynne pulled off another masterpiece, a refined blend of classic rock muscle, pop rock sensibility and the floating symphonic sweep of gorgeous orchestral arrangements. All of it wrapped in that trademark glossy production that was undoubtedly ahead of its time. The album was a successful next logical step in the band’s evolution, and it also brought them solid commercial success, mostly across the Atlantic, while back home they were still being overlooked. “Face The Music” coughed up two ELO hit singles, “Evil Woman” and “Strange Magic”, which still rank among the biggest hits of 70s popular music, but it shines with other tracks too, and there isn’t a weak moment among them.
“Face The Music” is also an important album because it marks the first appearance of the classic ELO lineup, the one that made their biggest hits and scored a huge worldwide success the year after this record came out. Kelly Groucutt and Melvyn Gale took over from the “retired” Mike de Albuquerque and Mike Edwards on bass and cello respectively. On “Face The Music”, ELO largely carried on with the successful musical recipe they’d laid down on the previous album, the conceptual masterpiece “Elodorado : A Symphony” (1974), only here they showed even more melodic sensibility and Lynne’s knack for writing big radio hits. The album is (in true ELO tradition) very well balanced musically, with enough goodies both for prog rock gourmands and for fans of melodic/pop rock who prefer lighter rhythms. It doesn’t lack for pomp in the individual arrangements either, and in that respect it can be counted among the key releases that led to the shaping of the idea/new genre of arena rock. The band also showed a rarely seen sense of black humor in music with the unusual front and back covers of the album. While the front shows an electric chair, the back shows the band members pressing their faces against the glass, watching an execution with tense expressions. All except keyboardist Richard Tandy, who was firmly against the death penalty and so chose to turn away.
As already said, the album is remarkably diverse and there isn’t a single weak moment on it. The opening prog rock instrumental treat “Fire Down Under” is a kind of satire aimed at self-appointed American moralists who accused ELO of hiding a “scandalous” subliminal message in one of the songs on the previous album. So they deliberately recorded a spoken message into the intro of this track, which you can make out if you play it backwards. In it you can hear drummer Bev Bevan say “The Music Is reversible but time is not. Turn back. Turn back. Turn back. Turn back”. Another fine example of English black humor. The track opens with a chilling, almost avant-garde intro with the aforementioned subliminal message, a repetitive hammering of a single piano key, strings, assorted wacky effects and later a gospel choir too. In time comes an excellent transition, with mighty orchestral arrangements crashing in on keyboards and strings along with a punchy Lynne guitar riff, which helps build up a deeply symphonic feel. While Lynne unleashes dramatic guitar riffing, the sounds of both cellos and the violin weave in and out of each other dramatically. The mood of the composition peaks with a “weeping” guitar solo and majestic choral vocals in the background.
The ballad-leaning “Waterfall” is a much calmer and more refined piece, with lots of lovely orchestral passages on strings and keyboards, backed by mighty drum fills. This excellent track clearly shows how far Lynne’s melodic, multilayered vocals had come by this point, especially in the technically tougher high registers that he’d usually steered clear of before. Next up is the phenomenal single/ultra hit “Evil Woman”, their first worldwide hit and one of the most beloved songs in the band’s history. After a short classical orchestral intro, Lynne’s dramatic vocals crash in, then over the sound of the piano it tips into a bouncy rhythm with elegant passages on guitar and strings. With his easygoing, at times slightly sarcastic vocal approach, Lynne cranks up the overall sex appeal of this wonderful song even more. Its main charm lies in the bouncy riff and the ultra melodic chorus, where erotically embellished female backing harmonies join in later on. In the rhythmic flourishes you can even spot some disco finesse, which they’d lean on a lot later in their career. Without a doubt one of the best things in the band’s history, an eternal radio classic and one of my favorite ELO songs. It’s hard to believe Lynne’s claim that it was the fastest song he ever wrote and that it was originally meant as one of the less important space fillers on the album.
“Nightrider” has a dramatic, “Beatles-esque” intro with melancholic vocals and simple keyboard passages, before moving into an energetic section with mighty string work and varied singing that occasionally hits unusually high registers. This is another superb track, with a melodic chorus, a bouncy rhythm and a good balance between symphonic grandeur and rocking punch. The ending is fully classical and orchestral. The rhythmically wound-up “Poker” is another interesting experiment on the border between prog and heavy rock, with plenty of punchy guitar riffs and dramatic keyboard passages from Tandy. What makes it special is that the lead vocalist isn’t Lynne but the new member, bassist Kelly Groucutt, who did a great job. The track is a wonderful mix of different musical styles, from heavy rock to symphonic rock and pop rock, and above all it shows off the technical chops of the individual instrumentalists, who trade off in dramatic instrumental breaks, whether it’s woodwinds, witty riffs or razor-sharp keyboard solo epics.
The esoteric classic “Strange Magic”, the album’s other big hit single, opens with an exceptionally beautiful orchestral arrangement, then moves into a calm section of acoustic guitar, piano and melancholic vocals. In the gorgeous melodic chorus, where dramatic vocal harmonies mix with dreamy string passages, you can truly feel that extraordinary orchestral ELO magic that sensitively combines melodic accessibility and technical polish. This inimitable classic has a contrasting quality: its dreamy chorus can easily carry the listener off into a dream world, yet it also has a strongly energetic component that keeps them “awake” the whole time. Next comes the cowboy satire “Down Home Town”, the album’s joke moment and without a doubt one of the strangest experiments in the band’s history, since besides the usual combination of orchestral arrangements and energetic guitar passages, it also packs in burlesque elements of country and Dixieland. Here Lynne, backed by acoustic guitar, deliberately sings in an exaggerated “cowboy” style with a Southern accent. For the closing chorus, female backing harmonies join in to make the cowboy atmosphere even stronger. Even though it leans mostly on country in the sound of the strings and guitar (or maybe precisely because of that), this playful experiment comes off as a success and is even fun. The closing, mystical, ballad-like symphonic rock masterpiece “One Summer Dream”, on the other hand, is one of the deepest works in their history, where you can once again sense the influence of their eternal idols, the Beatles. Majestic orchestral curtains of strings and keyboards (including some lovely mellotron passages) flow through Lynne’s singing. An incredible air of nostalgia hangs over this magical composition the whole way through, especially when the female backing harmonies come in and the mellotron becomes the dominant element amid the dreamy orchestral arrangements.
“Face The Music” is yet another ELO masterpiece and a worthy successor to “Eldorado”, which was “doomed” to big success on the American music market while it went completely overlooked at home. That changed in an instant with the very next album, “A New World Record” (1976), which was when their famous spaceship, or flying saucer, first appeared, and with it they finally conquered the whole world and became one of the most successful bands of the second half of the 70s. The huge success of that next album, which will get more words in another review, also helped raise the profile of “Face The Music”, one of the few albums that can be enjoyed without prejudice by eternal seekers of technical skill, prog gourmands and fans of radio sounds alike, the kind that don’t insult the listener’s intelligence, of course. After “Face The Music”, ELO were already one of the hottest rock acts of the time, and only one small detail was missing for them to conquer the world.
Lineup
Jeff Lynne – vocals, guitar, keyboards
Bev Bevan – drums, percussion, spoken intro (backwards), backing vocals
Richard Tandy – keyboards
Kelly Groucutt – bass guitar, backing vocals
Mik Kaminski – violin
Hugh McDowell – cello
Melvyn Gale – cello
GUEST SINGERS:
Ellie Greenwich – backing vocals
Susan Collins – backing vocals
Nancy O’Neill – backing vocals
Margaret Raymond – backing vocals
Production
Jeff Lynne
Track list
1. Fire on High (5:30)
2. Waterfall (4:27)
3. Evil Woman (4:19)
4. Nightrider (4:23)
5. Poker (3:31)
6. Strange Magic (4:29)
7. Down Home Town (3:54)
8. One Summer Dream (5:47)
Album length: 36:20
