CD Reviews for Aug. 8, 2008
The Moody Blues
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The Moody Blues
DAYS OF FUTURE PASSED/IN SEARCH OF THE LOST CHORD/ON THE THRESHOLD OF A DREAM/TO OUR CHILDREN’S CHILDREN’S CHILDREN/A QUESTION OF BALANCE/EVERY GOOD BOY DESERVES FAVOUR/SEVENTH SOJOURN
Originally a British beat band based in American rhythm-and-blues, the Moody Blues embarked upon an epic, seven-album journey in late 1966. Following adventurous albums that same year from America’s Beach Boys and Britain’s Beatles (Pet Sounds and Revolver respectively), new Moody Blues members Justin Hayward and John Lodge helped the revitalized band blaze a new direction.
The group’s new lineup released Days of Future Passed, a brilliant maiden voyage recorded with the London Festival Orchestra, in November 1967. Hayward’s contribution to the disc included the spellbinding, future classic-rock staple, “Nights In White Satin.”
During the next five years, even as they constantly toured, the prolific Moodies recorded six more albums, most of them worthy of the group’s daring debut. Even without an orchestra, the Moody Blues produced symphonic-rock thanks to Ray Thomas’ flute, a general willingness among the band members to play any instrument deemed necessary for a song and, most of all, through a new, sonically diverse keyboard called the mellotron.
But best of all, the band put its sonic grandeur in the service of often magnificent songs composed by its four composers: Hayward, Lodge, Thomas and Michael Pinder. The group had a resident spoken-work artist, too, drummer Graeme Edge.
The Moodies kept the quality high, filling their albums with gems like the Timothy Leary-inspired “Legend of a Mind,” the soaring “Ride My See-Saw” and “Question” and lovely and poignant “Lovely To See You.”
Exhaustion finally took its toll with 1971’s Every Good Boy Deserves Favour. Nonetheless, even as the band was disintegrating, the weary musicians rebounded to create fresh new songs for 1972’s Seventh Sojourn, the final Moodies album before a six-year hiatus in recording.
Most of these remastered reissues also feature many worthy bonus tracks and each contains excellent notes about the recording sessions and the band’s history.
DAYS OF FUTURE PASSED/IN SEARCH OF THE LOST CHORD/ON THE THRESHOLD OF A DREAM/TO OUR CHILDREN’S CHILDREN’S CHILDREN/A QUESTION OF BALANCE/EVERY GOOD BOY DESERVES FAVOUR/SEVENTH SOJOURN
Originally a British beat band based in American rhythm-and-blues, the Moody Blues embarked upon an epic, seven-album journey in late 1966. Following adventurous albums that same year from America’s Beach Boys and Britain’s Beatles (Pet Sounds and Revolver respectively), new Moody Blues members Justin Hayward and John Lodge helped the revitalized band blaze a new direction.
The group’s new lineup released Days of Future Passed, a brilliant maiden voyage recorded with the London Festival Orchestra, in November 1967. Hayward’s contribution to the disc included the spellbinding, future classic-rock staple, “Nights In White Satin.”
During the next five years, even as they constantly toured, the prolific Moodies recorded six more albums, most of them worthy of the group’s daring debut. Even without an orchestra, the Moody Blues produced symphonic-rock thanks to Ray Thomas’ flute, a general willingness among the band members to play any instrument deemed necessary for a song and, most of all, through a new, sonically diverse keyboard called the mellotron.
But best of all, the band put its sonic grandeur in the service of often magnificent songs composed by its four composers: Hayward, Lodge, Thomas and Michael Pinder. The group had a resident spoken-work artist, too, drummer Graeme Edge.
The Moodies kept the quality high, filling their albums with gems like the Timothy Leary-inspired “Legend of a Mind,” the soaring “Ride My See-Saw” and “Question” and lovely and poignant “Lovely To See You.”
Exhaustion finally took its toll with 1971’s Every Good Boy Deserves Favour. Nonetheless, even as the band was disintegrating, the weary musicians rebounded to create fresh new songs for 1972’s Seventh Sojourn, the final Moodies album before a six-year hiatus in recording.
Most of these remastered reissues also feature many worthy bonus tracks and each contains excellent notes about the recording sessions and the band’s history.
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