Concept Album Series Part I:Electric Light Orchestra's "Time" (1981)

A lot of people dismiss Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) as disco tripe, or a Beatles rip-off band. 

Admittedly, Jeff Lynne’s fusion of orchestral music with progressive rock and pop music was, at times, quite obviously both. Other times, it was something more.

It can’t be denied that Mr. Lynne could write a great pop song, regardless of how schlocktastic the lyrics were, or how derivative his music sounded (of himself, or of others). By the 8os, ELO had run the gauntlet from orchestral and string-oriented music, to a more rock’n'roll sound, to blatant disco, culminating with 1979′s Discovery (Disco? Very!). 

1981′s Time, on the other hand was a whole new direction, with a clear leaning toward new wave music.

The cover of Electric Light Orchestra's Time

Okay, the concept:

A man is hanging out with his girlfriend when some people from the future come and take him away to the to their time: the late 21st century (Wait, that’s this one!). Upon arriving there, he wanders around all sadly, missing his girl. Eventually, it is revealed that the future sucks, and that the future-beings wanted him to see how shitty life is going to be if he doesn’t change things back in 1981. So after some exciting space-opera antics, they send him back, because he’s not a “21st Century Man” and in the end, he holds on to his dreams (in french, even!) and the future-beings look on, telling him how lucky he is to have learned whatever lesson they taught him.

Okay, the plot's a bit weak - but you can fill in the holes with your imaginaaaation!

Now, the focus of the album isn’t so much on how the ravages of time lay waste to all  as it is on how embracing technology leads to a cold and inhuman future. I’m no Luddite,  and I suspect that neither was Jeff Lynne, considering that apart from his guitar and a small amount of string arrangement, the album is pretty much drum machines and synthesizers all over. So, you have to realize that the whole thing is just a story, which – if fleshed out to a much greater extent – could be pretty compelling (or could be the 1985 movie Back to the Future).

So, what makes this concept album great, despite my admitting that it’s a flawed album? Oh, I don’t know… Good tunes? Seriously, though, let’s get a little more in-depth, so I can flesh out what is not fleshed out, maybe.

The opener ‘Prologue’ sums up the whole thing pretty nicely. Basically, it says that if you could see what lies beyond the border of your waking mind (the future), then you’d be pretty happy that you can’t go there.  Unfortunately for the protagonist, the voice in the prologue (a vocoder; which was a pretty prominent continuity element on this and the previous two albums) belongs to the future-beings, and they have a message from another time: “the future sucks, but you’re coming back there with us, loser.”

Obviously, this would upset any normal person. The first real track on the album "Twilight" explains how upset this dude is.  It’s also pretty much the best song on the album, and the most reminiscent of the hallowed Out of the Blue era ELO (it has a similar keyboard-heavy, upbeat quality to that of "Turn to Stone").  The song describes the experience of having some people come down from the sky telling you lies and then taking you away to the future without so much as a ‘by-your-leave.’

So, he’s kind of peeved. What do they do to assuage his woes? They give him a sexy robot girlfriend in "Yours truly, 2095." He professes that he still loves his lady, and that until the day he can’t go without some sexy lovins, he’ll leave this robot chick alone.

Following that, we get two musical throwbacks with little relation to the story apart from an implicit “it sucks being out here in the future” message: "Ticket to the Moon" and "The Way Life's Meant to Be." However, the latter of the two is very catchy, features a not-bad impersonation of Roy Orbison, and has a bit of exposition involving a rhyme of ‘avenue’ with  the phrase ‘say or do’ (a feat!).

One of the standouts on the album in terms of music and progression of story is the song "Rain is Falling" which features a pretty powerful vocal from Mr. Lynne, and some nice imagery. Again, the song is extra-good because it  is reminiscent of the "concerto for a rainy day" (a suite of  songs on Out of the Blue, culminating in the classic "Mr. Blue Sky"‘). However, it surpasses many of the songs in that suite, in terms of greatness. 

The gist of the song is that the people in the future have never seen rain for some reason, and then it rains, causing everyone to freak out (which is not very important to the plot). However, there is mention of a brand new time transporter with which he might get home, but unfortunately, despite their best efforts, they can’t figure out how the hell to get him back, so he’s stuck in the rain.

To put it bluntly, "From the End of the World" is a disco mess. It’s not contributing anything, plot-wise, and the music is riding a dead horse all the way to disco town. 

However, the following track "The Lights Go Down" takes the amusing turn of seeing the protagonist reach the aforementioned point at which having sex with a robot seems desirable. Apart from the joy that comes with conjuring images of man-vs-robot coitus, it’s a pretty fun reggae-ish song with a catchy sing-along chorus (more in the style of UB40 than Bob Marley).

"Here is the News" hints vaguely that the protagonist’s desire to return to 1981 to see his girlfriend has led to his attempted escape from Satellite 2 (a location mentioned in an earlier track). The song has a driving beat and some sexy synthesizer use as well as some phoney (but realistic) news report audio pastiche all over it.

Another of my favourite tracks on the album is the pseudo-finale "21st Century Man" which is narrated by the future-beings again (sans vocoder), and explains that even with all the grand designs of the future, he’s not happy to have been taken out of his own time, so they’re sending him back, because he’s not a 21st century man. The chorus has an emotionally evocative progression which builds in intensity as the song progresses, and lyrically gets to the heart of the issue: Nobody likes to be taken away from the things they really love, no matter what the future may hold.

Following that is a semi-superfluous track called "Hold on Tight" (which became a minor hit). One can imagine that it’s the sort of song where, if it were a musical, the entire cast would come out and be all “Yeah! even the dead people are here to sing the last happy song!” (see also: Les Misérables).  

As I mentioned, occasionally the lyrics switch to French for no apparent reason. Blondie pulled it off on "Sunday Girl," so, I guess I can’t complain. Anyhoo, picture, if you will, a dude in a time-machine singing this happy song about holding on tight to your dreams, so that when you’re taken to the future by a bunch of space-jerks, you don’t get depressed.

The closing track “Epilogue” is the sort of thing where one might imagine the future-beings using some fancy glass device apropos of  a Logan’s Run-esque sci-fi romp, looking regretfully upon the protagonist as he lives happily ever after. They warn that he should be so happy to get his wish… to go home after they abducted him, the jerks. And I guess somewhere in the middle he saved the future from sucking, maybe.

Now, I’d also like to mention two additional conceptually linked B-sides from the album “When Time Stood Still” and “Julie Don’t Live Here Anymore.” The former is another depressing ballad, describing a moment at which time has stood still, which is ultimately very sad because it’s a very lonely existence. 

The latter is on par with "Twilight" in terms of music. The content is interesting (and reminds one of the second half of Back to the Future II) in that the protagonist runs around trying to find his girlfriend’s house after having been transported through time, only to discover that she doesn’t live there, because… well, it’s the future, isn’t it? She moved away. As I said, it’s musically a great pop song, with bombastic descending piano lines and a catchy 60s pop revival style, tempered by 80s new wave. Both tracks would have been welcome additions to the album and were fortunately included in the 2001 remastered release.

So, now that I’ve wasted a pile of text on a track-by-track review and plot outline, I suppose that what makes this a great concept album is not so much a richness of plot (because half the songs are barely related) as it is a potential for richness of plot. That is, the plot is vague enough, but also interesting enough for me to think a more detailed one up with the power of my imagination (insert finger-wiggle here). 

Additionally, I refer to my initial statement: good tunes. 

The album is hook-tastic. It has good vocal performances, great melodies, and very well produced, as one might expect from Jeff Lynne (who also produced the Beatles’ Anthology's unfinished John Lennon singles “Free as a Bird” and “Real Love” ).

… So… That’s it. I like ELO’s Time. 

It ended up being the band’s last album that didn’t have to live in the collective shadows of Face the Music or Out of the Blue.  It could stand on its own, and it ended up being their last truly great album, and one of my all-time favourite albums at that.

… good tunes.

Every album should be a concept album

Almost a year ago (when I began writing this particular entry), I went through my entire CD collection  and arranged it in alphabetical (by artist) and chronological (by release date) order. Turns out, I have a lot of CDs.  Somewhere in the vicinity of 350, not including mixed CDs and my own, humble recordings.

Anyhoo, if you were to look at my CD collection, you’d see that a LOT of the albums are by the same artists. Why is this? Because despite the vastness of my collection, my tastes are not all that varied or eclectic. The one thing that ties many of the bands and albums together, that keeps them in my pile is the prevalence of conceptual continuity in the band’s work. Conceptual continuity refers to a pervading similarity and consistency of theme, message, musical motifs, etc from album to album.

Unsurprisingly, one of my favourite genres of music is progressive rock, a genre which often makes use of conceptual continuity, overtly or subtly. As such, one of the staples of progressive rock throughout its existence is the concept album.

Let’s take a minute to define a concept album. 

Here’s what wikipedia says:

“In popular music, a concept album is an album that is “unified by a theme, which can be instrumental, compositional, narrative, or lyrical”. Commonly, concept albums tend to incorporate preconceived musical or lyrical ideas rather than being improvised or composed in the studio, with all songs contributing to a single overall theme or unified story. This is in contrast to the standard practice of an artist or group releasing an album consisting of a number of unconnected (lyrically or otherwise) songs performed by the artist. Given that the suggestion of something as vague as an overall mood often tags a work as being a concept album, a precise definition of the term proves problematic.”

Now, in that definition lies the very reason why I love concept albums: a unifying theme or narrative.  I like music to tell a story. I like continuity. I feel like an album full of songs that aren’t connected might as well be sold off song by song as mp3s. Now, you know how I feel about the “music single” mentality and digital music. 

Long story short: a single is disposable, and cannot possibly be representative of a good musician’s work, because commercial viability is apparently more important than nuance, subtlety, production value, etc.  Likewise, the mp3, “shuffle” and, playlist schema propagates and perpetuates that single mentality, removing songs from their primary context: the album.  The crime of removing a song from its context is especially heinous when the album happens to be a concept album.

Before I get too lost in that topic, let’s talk about unifying themes and narratives. Some say that every song tells a story. That might be true, but is it a simple boy-meets-girl story, or is it just a chapter in  a larger story that has some kind of resonating relevance? Is i t just one small story being told in the grander story that is the concept album?

In order to explore a few of these themes and narratives, I'm going to do an ongoing and sporadic series on concept albums in the form of combined literary analyses / music reviews.

The Rab Townsend Video Experience Part III: Concept Albums for the Goodtime Have!

Concept Albums are for the good time have!

The Rab Townsend Explodo-Pantsuit: Episode Three from Rab Townsend on Vimeo.

In which Rab fails to fail in every respect, especially when it comes to failing to say “so that was” after every song. Additionally featuring the waxing on and off poetic with respect to what makes a good concept album, who has made a good concept album, and why you suck for not having seen “The Last Unicorn.”

Song List:

1. Electric Light Orchestra – Prologue/Twilight (4:57)

2. Marilyn Manson – Kinderfeld (4:51)

3. Pink Floyd – Hey you (4:42)

4. The Moody Blues – Watching and Waiting (4:16)

5. The Alan Parsons Project – The Cask of Amantillado (4:29)

6. Frank Zappa – Outside Now (5:50)

7. Midlake – Bandits (4:04)

8. Nine Inch Nails – In This Twilight (3:33)

The Rab Townsend Video Experience Part II: The Guitar/Pantymess Connection

It's the guitar/panty-mess connection!

The Rab Townsend Explodo-Pantsuit: Episode Two from Rab Townsend on Vimeo.

In which Rab fails to keep his show within an hour long format by twenty minutes because the guitar solos therein were too epic to condense.

Other topics of conversation include unemployment beards, DDR failure, and the last Canadian God of Rock.

Song List:

1.  Jakalope – Feel It (3:53)

2. Radiohead – Just (3:53)

3. Steve Vai – Answers (2:41)

4. Tool – Lateralus (9:24)

5. Frank Zappa – Drowning Witch (12:13)

6. Rush – Freewill (5:24)

7. Primus – Bob’s Party Time Lounge (4:44)

8. Nine Inch Nails – Deep (3:36)

9. Moby – Face It (10:01)

The Rab Townsend Explodo-Pantsuit Video Experience!

So, I was unemployed for three months*. 

I decided to make some magical videos of this blog, because I couldn’t be bothered to write anything, because I’m a tool. I promise to write something soon… but don’t hold me to it, because I’m a useless bitch.

Anywho, these videos are basically a radio show. I filmed myself talking about stupid things, and then I’d play a song, and then return to the stupid topics, and so forth.

That comes to nearly 3 hours of entertainment, all together.

If you’re as unemployed as I was, that should take a chunk out of the monotony.

In this and the next two posts I'll be posting those videos for your entertainment, with a song list for you to follow along with.

So… EMBEDTH!

The Rab Townsend Explodo-Pantsuit: Episode One from Rab Townsend on Vimeo.

In which Rab Townsend fails to be eloquent while discussing his stupid hair, Kanye West, Anarchy, the 90s, Cherry Pepsi and the follies of intarweb videomagic.

Song list:
1. Freezepop – Less Talk More Rokk (4:59)
2. ON – C’Mon Collapse (3:11)
3. One Ton – Supersexworld (4:04)
4. They Might Be Giants – Birdhouse In your Soul (3:19)
5. Chumbawamba – Amnesia (3:23)
6. Johnny Hollow – Superhero (3:11)
7. Her Space Holiday – My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend (4:31)
8. Republica – Drop Dead Gorgeous (4:31)
9. L7 – Pretend that We’re Dead (3:54)

*(Note that, historically, this was posted on June 1, 2009, but is now being reposted in three parts, retroactively dated with the original post-dates of the videos themselves).