ELO "Don't Bring Me Down" question

What are they singing after the "Don't Bring Me Down"...sounds to me like "bruce"...is that right? And if so, who is "Bruce"?

 

According to the Strange Magic liner notes, they're saying "groos" or something similar. Jeff Lynne said he came up with it on the spot. They found out from their engineer, Mack, that it's supposedly danish for "greetings."

 

I always thought it was "Chris".

 

Jeff Lynne said it was just a nonsense word he made up. Mack told him that it sounds like "groose" which means "greetings" so he left it in. On VH1 Storytellers, Jeff said that people always ask him if he says "Bruce" or not, so he changed it to "Bruce" for live performances. "**** it, I'll just sing Bruce", he said.

 

They say, "I buried Paul."

mud-

 

Add me to the list of people who always wondered who Bruce was. You learn something new everyday!

 

I thought he wanted some juice. Maybe Jeff was an OJ fan!

 

I thought it was Proust. Highbrow pop music.

 

Didn't want to start a new ELO thread for this observation:

In listening to my newly stolen (at $7.99 - I consider it stealing!) DCC "Eldorado" (Great sounding CD Mr. S!) last night I happened to notice the uncanny similarity (in the metier/timing & rhyming of the lyrics) on "Mr. Kingdom"(Track 6) and Mr. L's "Across The Universe"!!!

I know Jeff was a huge Beatles fanatic but this is a ridiculously obvious cop! (To my ears as close as "My Sweet Lord" was to "He's So Fine" - which George paid a pretty $ (Sue Me, Sue You Blues non-withstanding)

To quote a certain Mr. Christgau (while discussing Rod's "The Killing if Georgie" and Zim's "Shelter From The Storm" ) "Reminded me of just how precise an arrangement can be!!!"

 

According to the orignal lyric sheet it's "Don't Bring me down... grroosss". Whatever that means...

Here's an answer I got from the Both Sides Now forum (when I asked the same question myself)

 

Wow that's pretty much the same thing I said. Spooky. I must really know my ELO!

Actually, it's just the story that Jeff told on VH1 Storytellers.

 

Given the amount of time Lynne typically applied to writing lyrics (a few minutes relative to the days or weeks he'd work on the music), I completely believe Lynne's story that he made up the word on the spot and that it means nothing.

Kwad

 

Yes, for "Eldorado" Jeff had some problem coming up with the lyrics, so he sat aside a week to work them out. I think some of his "deepest" lyrics actually can be found on the latest "Zoom" album. While not the best ELO album music wise, the lyrics is certainly his most personal in years.

 

This was on some web site: "Actually, the German expression is 'Grüss dich', which means 'Greetings to you'."