TIME

It is not so often that I read some reviews before posting mine. What I want to say here, is that on the contrary of the feeling that this album is one of the most underrated ELO album, I would on the contrary say (when I look at the ratings) that it is substantially overrated.

Jeff is again willing to reproduce a symphonic and concept album like "El Dorado" on and on. A "Prologue" to start like in the good old days ... But, gosh ! What a miserable one. "Twilight". is one of the very few bearable track to my ears.

Disco is almost everywhere, poor melodies are reigning (what happened to you Jeff ?). If it were not such a pity, one could laugh at least. But there are no reasons to laugh. Only cry my friend.

When I selected the first fifteen bands I would review on this site, I decided to do it all the way through : from start to finish. I picked up ELO since it was a band I quite appreciated in my youth (74-76 period). How is it possible in such a short period of time to go from the Capitol to the Tarpeian Rock ?

We'll even have to suffer a reggae-ish disaster with "The Lights Go Down". Please, when will this nightmare stop ? Not with "Hold On Thight" and its ridiculous French wordings I'm afraid. I can only be glad to have reached the "Epilogue" : this one is not so bad (but lasts only for 1'31").

There are almost not a single good track on this album. Just a collection of useless songs and boring moments. A VERY weak ELO album.

Even their participation on "Xanadu" was better ! Fortunately, in these days there were real good bands emerging to avoid us being completely devastated with stuff like this. FYI, I have liked ELO quite a lot : my previous reviews speak for themselves (up to "Out Of The Blue") but this is really a bad effort to which I can only apply the one star rating.

I really had a hard time with this review (but, unfortunately there are more ELO albums to come). Sorry Jeff, but you did this, not me.