Electric Light Orchestra—Out of the Blue

Electric Light Orchestra—Out of the Blue

Out of the Blue—Divisive though it may be, Out of the Blue was the defining Electric Light Orchestra record set. It wasn't their breakout LP—that was the gold-selling Eldorado (1974)—but it is the greatest testament to Jeff Lynne's talents. ELO are one of those bands where it's hard to say what their best-known song is, but one of them is certainly the revved-up, bipolar blues "Turn to Stone," which always impresses with its call-and-response lyrics. "It's Over" is one of their great album cuts, featuring striking minor-key dips during its chorus. The sweetly obsessive march "Sweet Talkin' Woman" is their peak here—3:50 of symphonic pop bliss (check that chanting in the back of the third verse) and agent of Lynne's underrated humor ("Home run") as well as a great drumming change-up at the end of the song. "Across the Border" accurately portrays the feeling of constant movement.

The dissonant "Night in the City" could have been inspired by Lynne's impending divorce, while "Starlight" sounds like it was written for a child, though Lynne's daughters wouldn't be born for a few years; notwithstanding, it features a notably excellent outro refrain. "Jungle" is the album's cheesiest moment, though as always that's part of the charm, and "joyful harmony" is right. The vocoder interlude "Believe Me Now" sets up the melodramatic closer of the original first LP, "Steppin' Out."

Side three is comprised entirely of the "Concerto for a Rainy Day." which are words that can be heard synthesized at the beginning of "Standin' in the Rain" just after the opening melody. Lynne flexes his prog muscles for the first time in a long while before leading into the movie-music epic "Big Wheels," which is at least more bearable than "Xanadu." The self-empowering "Summer and Lightning" is brighter and more palatable; the celebrated and celebratory "Mr. Blue Sky" is one of Lynne's best melodies. He sneaks in the line, "Hey you with the pretty face/Welcome to the human race," belying a different topic, and closes the song on the comically sentimental note, "But soon comes Mr. Night/Creepin' over, now his/Hand is on your shoulder/Never mind; I'll remember you this way."

"Sweet Is the Night," partially sung by bassist Kelly Groucutt, is one of those songs that probably could have been a hit with a few tweaks; the melodies are great, but they're overloaded with sound effects, the tempo is a little too sluggish, and the lyrics are among Jeff Lynne's most poetic. "The Whale" is a pleasant but mystifyingly out-of-place instrumental. "Birmingham Blues" tributes Lynne's hometown, but with the knowing end verse, "I'll go and stay a while and all the folks I meet /They'll say, 'You won't stay long, you got them travelling feet'/You'll soon be long gone/'Cause boy, you got the rest of the world blues." The love-it-or-feel-ambivalent-about-it "Wild West Hero," if it fails, fails because of its strangely unsympathetic subject matter, which is exactly what it purports to be: "I wish I was a Wild West hero."

It's easy to see why Out of the Blue is not as beloved as its sales might indicate. It sags here and there outside of side one, and the "Concerto for a Rainy Day" wasn't good enough to merit such ostentation. On the other hand, there are nice little moments scattered throughout the record that jump out on each new listen, even on the lesser songs. If not their best, the album may at least be their most fun.

The Cure—The Head on the Door

The Cure—The Head on the Door

The Head on the Door—The strange disappointment of The Top (1984) was a necessary venture for the Cure. Three Imaginary Boys (1979), Seventeen Seconds (1980), Faith (1981), and Pornography (1982) were all fairly solid and artful or at least charming, though every one was imperfect, and they were all somewhat internally repetitive; the latter three especially were somewhat unvaried. Murkiness was the name of the game, but the songwriting of Robert Smith, Lol Tolhurst, and Simon Gallup wasn't uniformly great, and so it often detracted from the atmosphere. They threw out the book for The Top, and while it produced something far from a masterpiece, the direction they were headed was promising. The optimism of songs like "The Caterpillar" and the non-album singles "Let's Go to Bed" and "The Love Cats" were refreshing after the drugged-up, despairing mess of Pornography.

Between The Top and The Head on the Door, the Cure were joined by guitarist Porl Thompson (who played on Three Imaginary Boys and The Top but never was credited as a full member) and drummer Boris Williams (which freed Tolhurst from the spot to play keyboards full-time). The extra personnel brought new dimensions to an aspect of the band most would not expect: songwriting, which contrary to popular belief was never handled solely by Robert Smith.

The bright, polyrhythmic "In Between Days" was their best song to date, and the first song since Three Imaginary Boys where the Cure actually sounded like a band—also note the recurrence of Smith's "feeling old," to be compared with "I Want to Be Old." The unsettling dream "Kyoto Song" hooks the Cure's trademark grotesquerie with keyboards like they never did before, helping them make the transition from post-punk to new wave. "The Blood" was one of the first songs to diversify their sound, adding flamenco guitar to the mix; "the blood of Christ" refers to an exotic wine. "Six Different Ways" is a cutesy keyboard-led piece with elements reused from Siouxsie and the Banshees' "Swimming Horses" during the brief period in which Robert Smith was a member of that band. It was one of the first truly saccharine moments for the band that were generally disowned by the fans of gloomier goth music, but it showed that when they wanted to, they could command major-key melody with ease.

"Push" is excellent, quintessential post-punk. "The Baby Screams" forecasts "Lullaby." Radio favorite "Close to Me" is a trademark Cure song where the listener doesn't know if it's a love song or a nightmare. One must wonder if Smith or someone was referencing the basic nature of the dissolving-relationship song "A Night Like This" with the line, "The most gorgeously stupid thing I ever cut in the world," although "Screw" is definitely the album's throwaway. "Sinking" more closely resembles the following three albums, unwittingly foreshadowing the water tones that were all over that period.

Although The Head on the Door has neither their best song nor a plurality of their best, it is the Cure's most consistent, tightest album. It was less drudging than their early period and less overwhelmingly indulgent than the albums that followed, even though their best individual moments were yet to come.