Pop Culture from an Alternate Dimension

           In 1988 the Traveling Wilburys released their first album Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1 . The group consisted of George Harrison, Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison and Bob Dylan. In 1990 they released Traveling Wilburys Vol. 3 . What about 1989? Roy Orbison had died before Volume 1 was released and Bob Dylan was busy, but the other Wilburys were working with another rock idol of theirs: Del Shannon. To make a volume two I compiled songs from Del Shannon's Rock On! (which was co-produced by Jeff Lynne), Tom Petty's Full Moon Fever (which was produced by Lynne, Petty and Mike Campbell), Jeff Lynne's Archair Theatre and George Harrison's Best of Dark Horse 1976-1989 .      I open the album with Del's "Walk Away" which was written by him, Tom and Jeff. Next is "I Won't Back Down", written by Tom & Jeff, with Tom, Jeff and George all playing and singing. Third song is "Cockamamie Business" from George. Following is "I...

       In 1983 Jeff Lynne had decided he wanted to stop doing Electric Light Orchestra, although in 1986 they released Balance of Power , with only Lynne, Richard Tandy and Bev Bevan as the band. However, in 1990, Lynne released his first solo album, Armchair Theatre , which had Tandy performing on six songs. Bevan had wanted to continue doing E.L.O. so in 1989 he formed Electric Light Orchestra Part II, with Louis Clark arranging the strings as he had on previous E.L.O. albums. Kelly Groucutt and Mik Kaminsky started their own band: Orkestra. They had six songs on the soundtrack of 1989's Summer Job which were on Orkestra's first record, Beyond the Dream , released in 1991.      When I did my first "what if Jeff Lynne included contributions from other band members" E.L.O album in July 2023 there were songs I wanted to include but avoided because I only wanted to use songs sung by Lynne or Groucutt since they were the lead vocalists on the earlier E.L....

       Here is another in the "what if Jeff Lynne let other members of E.L.O. have their compositions on the albums" series. This week I reconfigured the 1981 album Time. In 1981 E.L.O. bassist Kelly Groucutt was recording his debut album, Kelly, with other ELOers Richard Tandy, Bev Bevan and Louis Clark. From that album I grabbed "I'll Cry Tomorrow" and "Sea of Dreams". 1981 also saw the release of an album of "production music" called Building Tension. Half was by John Cameron and the other half by our own Louis Clark. I pulled "Unease" from there.        To make room for these I removed three songs from the original album; "Another Heart Breaks", "The Lights Go Down" and "Hold on Tight". Although that last song is a banger, it doesn't seem to fit the album. In this alternate reality it would still be released as a single, so the "coffee achievers" would still have their anthem.      I u...

  ELO has had a lot of compilation albums. Ole ELO was a collection of songs from their first five albums. Assorted greatest hits collections were put out after that. Jeff Lynne even put out a "best of" album where he re-recorded all the songs. This collection is what if they put out a selection of songs where the first letter of each song spelled out the name of the band. I went through a lot of iterations trying to get it under 80 minutes to fit on a CD. Then I realised  I had no songs from On the Third Day  and re-did it all.  Give it a listen here:  E.L.E.C.T.R.I.C.L.I.G.H.T.O.R.C.H.E.S.T.R.A. - YouTube

  Since this is my first anniversary blog I figured I would make the first "what if" album I thought about. Those of you that have followed my blog know I am an E.L.O. fan. I bought the L.P.s and CDs and when I found out about other albums from the band members I wondered what it would have been like if Jeff Lynne let other members contribute pieces to E.L.O. I figured since the  Xanadu  soundtrack was only half E.L.O. I could fill in the rest with other contributors. I then did nothing with it.... until now. To follow how the Beatles did the Hard Day's Night  album the first side is songs from the movie and the B-side is other songs. Aside from the songs from the soundtrack I included "Drum Dreams" which was in the movie but only released as a B-side of the single "I'm Alive". I put in "Am I a Dreamer?" by Kelly Groucutt because it sounds like he was writing it during Xanadu  considering how well the lyrics suit the movie. Also from Kell...

  Last blog I mentioned turning ELO's Secret Messages into two albums so here is the other one. Kelly Groucutt does not appear on any of the tracks. I wanted to use the songs that had backmasking such as Stranger and Time After Time to fit in with secret messages theme. I used the title song, Loser Gone Wild, Stranger, Danger Ahead and Time After Time from the original CD, After All was a bonus track on the 2001 release, Buildings Have Eyes, Mandalay and Hello My Old Friend were all on Afterglow and the 2018 double album. In fact, the last four songs of this album are coincidently side four of the double album. The front cover was prereleased promo art for the album and the back is the Jodrell Bank radio telescope seen in the Secret Messages video. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCHnLE0OxajFpqxBFjpMG4BZYC2hywhh5&si=zg5UeZZo21Ene3BS

  E.L.O.'s 1983 album Secret Messages was the last to feature Kelly Groucutt before he was let go. In fact he doesn't appear on all of the songs. Also in 1983 his album Kelly was released in the U.S. It was recorded over a couple of years and included Bev Bevan on drums, Richard Tandy on keyboards and strings arranged and conducted by Louis Clark. Secret Messages was originally planned to be a double album so I made it two albums. The first is this one. What if Lynne allowed songs written by Groucutt on the album? I included the songs Groucutt performed on and tried to make it more of a "rocker". "Bluebird", "Take Me On and On", "Four Little Diamonds", "Train of Gold" and "Rock 'n' Roll Is King" are from the original Secret Messages album. "No Way Out" and "Endless Lies" are bonus tracks on the 2001 CD release of Secret Messages. "The Bouncer" was the B-side to "Four Little Di...

 When I heard there was to be a new Electric Light Orchestra album in 2001 I was excited. It had been decades since the last. Despite how good it was I was disappointed that the only other member of the band besides Jeff Lynne was keyboardist Richard Tandy and he only appeared on one song. In 2001 The Orchestra released No Rewind with members including Kelly Groucutt, Mik Kaminski and Louis Clark. It was quite a good album and I would have included songs "Jewel and Johnny" and "Over London Skies" but the vocals were by Eric Troyer who wasn't in the E.L.O. so I used "Before We Go" sung by Kelly Groucutt who did vocals on the some of the classic E.L.O. songs. However I wanted to include Bev Bevan since he had been on all the E.L.O. albums until then. I went back to 1995 for A Matter of Trust by Electric Light Orchestra Part II with Bevan, Groucutt, Kaminski and Clark. I chose "Blue Violin" written by Groucutt and Kaminski as well as Interlude...