Jeff Lynne's ELO: 2015 Album, "Alone In The Universe." Release Date: November 2015.

Sorry - my wording can sometimes be a little off when I'm writing in a hurry (as I was when putting down my "stream of consciousness" thoughts on the EQ adjusted version of Time while listening to this). In my opinion, The Way Life's Meant To Be might have been a moderately successful hit if only it had been released as a single earlier into its parent album's life cycle rather than appearing much later, and that a video would have further helped its chances. Due to prior commitments, the guys in ELO weren't able to shoot a promotional clip for this song, which they only added to their live set after scheduling a last minute rehearsal once Jet made it clear they planned to issue this as one final cash-in to coincide with the ongoing world tour. If you're in any doubt it was never intended to be released in this form, just look at the sleeve design, its spaceship illustration a blatant recycling of an image previously used for the Ticket To The Moon/Here Is The News double A side picture disc!

 

So, I've added my own bass guitar playing to "When I Was a Boy" as I mentioned a few posts back and the track sounds much fuller. Will post a link tomorrow for anyone interested in checking it out.

 

Wow what can I say, but tonight's show at the Fonda was about as close to perfect as you can get. Just fantastic. The playing, the sound, the amount of fun and smiles on the stage from all of the band members including Jeff.
And even all the musicians in the audience were having a good time, Ringo, Tom Petty, Joe Walsh, Steve Lukather, and more that I can't remember right now.
This was definetly worth the 30 plus year wait.

 

I presume that's Birmingham in the video?

This track (despite the '80s, synthetic production) is actually one of the more Beatlesque things Jeff ever did; much more than most of those singles critics were always citing.

 

yep this ad is actually getting airplay in Australia.

 

There is auto-tune throughout, but it's used fairly subtly, I think the most prominent is on 'alone in the universe' - where I suspect it's deliberately being used for 'effect' on the whole - I don't think auto-tune is being used for correction in this instance. I'm not a fan of auto-tune but as already said Jeff's voice is in great shape and actually, auto-tune in this case doesn't have as terrible an effect on his voice as with some others (Michael Buble and Brian Wilson for instance).

As much as I hate auto-tune, I don't find the use of it that distracting on this album. Sadly, even really good singers seem to be using it - it's become the norm, the preferred 'modern' vocal sound - it's like 'botox for the voice' and strips too much character from a vocal in my opinion, but in this case it's relatively subtle and not totally detrimental to the overall sound.

 

I think that's sort of my litmus test for autotune as well. If I listen to something and immediately think "awww man, that has autotune all over it, bummer", then well, it's a bummer.

But if I can't really tell, then it's certainly unobtrusive to a degree that I can't complain much about it.

Jeff definitely puts a good amount of EQ on his vocal stacks, most especially on something like the backing vocals on "When the Night Comes", so I could just as easily see rather subtle autotune as being a possibility there as well.

But on at least some of the leads, I hear little imperfections that would be smoothed out more with even moderate use of autotune. So I don't feel, for instance, that he's using a autotune pre-set on his lead vocal throughout every song or anything along those lines.

Interestingly, while Jeff's voice has rarely if ever been injected with heavy autotune, he strikes me as the type who I could easily envision using it. He's not all about analog warm and fuzzies. He likes grainy acoustic sounds. But he's not all about analog tape and tube-everything, etc.

 

I was watching some of the recent interviews of Jeff in the new album. He seems really laid back and more sentimental. On one interview they said so you are playing most all the instruments and he said something like yeah but I don't play them all that well except for guitar which I'm really good at. I wonder if he has requirements up front before interviews that people are not allowed to bring up? I know some artist do that some topics are off limits to discuss. I'm surprised someone has never asked Jeff, so it's Jeff Lynne ELO, but where are the original band members? I mean that could happen unless he has a policy upfront not to talk about the past.

 

I read a recent interview where that very question was asked...and he, somewhat off-handedly, simply said I haven't seen those guys in like 35 years or so...and it was left to drop after that, the reporter completely oblivious to the notion that it's more like 28 or 29 years...the whole "Part II" debacle was a real deal-breaker for JL in regards to the other band members...

 

A contrary perspective can be taken.....the crowds who saw Part II perform from 1991-2000 may not consider the band to be a "debacle" if in fact it was the only chance to see most members of ELO playing live in America, Europe, or Australia. Since Jeff Lynne didn't tour, I don't blame anyone who went to those concerts. If concert goers had a good time, how can that be a debacle? One of the major reasons to see any rock band live is so the fans can enjoy the music live. Jeff walked away from all of that for 1+ generation. So now he's enjoying playing live. Good for him.

Of course, given how Jeff is prone to revising history, I wouldn't be surprised if he thinks that the collapse of virtually all the ELO friendships were other people's fault.

 

I completely agree with you. I should have chosen my words more carefully. I only meant "debacle" in the terms that its existence led to the dissolution of the partnership of great musicians. In many ways, Part II helped keep the name ELO in front of the public. Unfortunately, the issues of music quality (marginal at best) and deceptive promotional practices (not always within the band's control) ended up creating more of a problem than a solution. And yes, Jeff is amazingly adept at revising history...

 

I would never support deceptive promotional practices by any rock band, so if it was ever proven that the musicians themselves encouraged deceptive advertising, I wouldn't blame Jeff for firing off cease and desist orders. But on the other hand, the former members of ELO are grown men and musicians and they seemed to be much happier that they had more input into the Part II than they ever did in the original ELO. This goes to the issue of control within the band, and we've already seen discussions on this thread about how Bev was increasingly marginalized after OTTB...and he was a 50% partner!

 

Yeah, the problem seemed to be local or regional event promoters simply calling the band ELO in their advertisements, and the band not really trying too hard to clear up the confusion. IIRC, much of this took place after Bev was bought out by Jeff around 2000. Bev stopped playing with them around the same time, mostly becoming a Groucutt - Clark product, who also did little to avoid the confusion. Were they contributing band members with Jeff at one point in time? Or were they just role-players with an assigned task? I guess that depends on who you ask...

I don't really have a dog in the fight, so to speak. I get what Jeff's beef is all about - it was primarily his creative vision, but he seemed more than willing to walk away in 1986 (or so), and only got worked up when the Part II crew seemed to show that there was at least some interest by the public. IMO, Jeff should have let the band name die, and just continue to work and build up a separate legacy with his own name.

 

Here is a review from last nights LA show
http://consequenceofsound.net/2015/11/live-review-jeff-lynnes-elo-at-los-angeles-fonda-theatre-1124/

 

So, here's a Dropbox link to my "amended" version of When I Was A Boy with bass guitar added to the left channel. Why left channel only? It seemed to sound better that way than in the middle for some reason. Anyway, check it out...comments welcome.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/8v91c4txgi7homg/mobilegarageband - My Song 7-normalized.m4a?dl=0

 

My bluspec2 shipped from Japan on Nov 17 and I am still waiting.....

 

Chart News ‏@chartnews 10h10 hours ago
WW sales: @JeffLynnesELO, Alone In The Universe 110,000 (debut).

 

There was a really entertaining hour on Irish radio last night. Thomas Walsh of Pugwash and The Duckworth Lewis Method chatted with Tom Dunne about ELO, Jeff, The New Album, and his own new album with Pugwash (which is rather brilliant by the way). You'll get the podcast by searching for "Tom dunne

 

Wow those are great numbers. It's currently not even for sale on Amazon at this point.

http://www.amazon.com/Jeff-Lynnes-E...K6-H7KL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160,160_

 

Finally!!! After being lost in the global postal system for 3 weeks the new ELO has arrived

very happy Jeff has some new material after 15 years. On first listen its great. Too many nehsayers here at Hoffman anally analysing everything and forgetting to listen and enjoy the music. Nice German presssing, excellent gate fold packaging and mastered to laquer by Chris Bellman - sounds pretty good. Jeff has kept the drums in the background like older ELO albums except on Ain't it a Drag which is good.
Alone in the Universe is such a strong song to end the album, I already want more new songs. I will just play side one again.

Vinyl is the way to enjoy album

 

I saw ELO II twice when they toured in Sydney. they were superb live in concert and I never realised that Kelly Groucutt was such a good singer. Obviously I would have preferred Jeff playing live, but this was a very good 2nd choice escpecially with so many original members including Luis Clark.

Bev Bevan gave me one of his drum sticks after the 1998 show and the band signed my large plastic cup, as well as a copy of the actual set list they were going off. Bev and Kelly (RIP) were really nice guys.

 

It's a Dutch pressing!

 

As long as its not GZ Digital!!

I said German as it is a Sony music Germany release

How do you know its Dutch?

 

Because I worked on the record myself and the order was so big I guessed it was the worldwide pressing.