THE ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA
The Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) are a British rock group from Birmingham, England, who released eleven studio albums between 1971 and 1986 and another album in 2001. Despite early singles success in the United Kingdom, the band was initially more successful in the United States. By the mid-1970s, they had become one of the biggest-selling acts in music. The band holds the record for having the most Billboard Hot 100 Top 40 hits, 20, of any group in US chart history without ever having a number one single. The band sold over 50 million records worldwide during the group’s original 13-year period of active recording and touring. (More from Wikipedia)
I am pretty sure that I must have heard a track or two by the Dutch progressive rock band Ekseption on college radio back in the day; otherwise, I don’t know how Aram Khachaturian’s “Sabre Dance” would sound so familiar to me. The opening track on their self-titled debut album in 1969, Ekseption – simply called “The 5th” – is based on Ludwig van Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. This might be the first pop treatment of the symphony, though there have been many others over the years. One of the Electric Light Orchestra’s earliest hits is a cover of Chuck Berry’s “Roll Over Beethoven” that incorporated some parts of the symphony.
(January 2013)
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The Klubs returned to Liverpool and took part in the Kaleidoscope ’68 festival there alongside big names like Pink Floyd and the Move (a leading 1960’s British band that took the name the Electric Light Orchestra in 1972). According to an article in the Liverpool Echo, however, the Klubs “stole the whole show . . . with painted faces and setting off fireworks that stunned the whole audience”. The response was so overwhelming that the Klubs were brought back for a second appearance the next day.
(July 2013)
