Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site sdcc6.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!whuxlm!harpo!decvax!ittatc!dcdwest!sdcsvax!sdcc3!sdcc6!ir278 From: ir278@sdcc6.UUCP (Paul Anderson) Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers Subject: Re: Science Fiction in Music Message-ID: <2169@sdcc6.UUCP> Date: Sat, 3-Aug-85 03:08:59 EDT Article-I.D.: sdcc6.2169 Posted: Sat Aug 3 03:08:59 1985 Date-Received: Mon, 5-Aug-85 07:23:48 EDT References: <124@ecrcvax.UUCP> Reply-To: ir278@sdcc6.UUCP (Paul Anderson) Organization: U.C. San Diego, Academic Computer Center Lines: 82 Keywords: Electric Light Orchestra In article <124@ecrcvax.UUCP> snoopy@ecrcvax.UUCP (Sebastian Schmitz) writes: > >How about: > >Virtually all the tracks on ELO's album "Time" > No kidding. The whole album itself is a science fiction story about a man from 1981 who is taken into the 21st century, and all the aspects of life there. Jeff Lynne's talent for presenting moods, ideas, and images with music alone is brought into full light on this LP. Stop the article here if you don't want to read a summary of the songs. From start to end: PROLOGUE - brief sound effects of swishing, roaring, etc to a background of cathedral-like music, sounding much like waking up in a new dimension or something, while an electronic voice tells of a "message from another time". TWILIGHT - song from someone who, after disorientation (twilight, see 'Prologue') finds himself in the future. The verses suggest he was brought there ("With your head held high/ And your scarlet lies/You came down to me/From the open skies","You brought me here but can you take me back again?") YOURS TRULY, 2095 - letter from someone far away from his love, telling of a computer he fell in love with because it was modeled after her, and its cold reactions. TICKET TO THE MOON - our hero ain't lucky in love and tries escaping to a new life elsewhere; this song is his confused, regretful farewell. THE WAY LIFE'S MEANT TO BE - our hero's amusement and grieving over how the world he knew in 1981 had turned out a century later (culture shock?) after getting to know the place. ANOTHER HEART BREAKS - this is a mytic, rhythmic instrumental. I'm not sure whats it about since I rarely listen to it. RAIN IS FALLING - Basically about wet weather, although some mention again of our hero missing his lost love, and the 21st century people offering him a way back. FROM THE END OF THE WORLD - I dont listen to this one much either, but seems to be about how hard it is for our hero to reach his distant love, and its starting to get to him. THE LIGHTS GO DOWN - Not a sci-fi song, more about how he's got to get back to his love in 1981. The music isn't spacey, so I suspect this is supposed to be a song he wrote while longing for her. My personal favorite. HERE IS THE NEWS - a humor song on the turbulent world of 2095. A few bad puns. 21st CENTURY MAN - song about how a man from 1981, for all his clever adaptions, simply isn't cut out for life in the 21st century and has to return (and oh what he has to tell eveyone when he gets back) HOLD ON TIGHT (the Coffee song) - this was more designed for commercial release (it was their main release from the album and became the theme song for the Coffee Achievers commercials), but carries the theme that, in the future world, or even out of it, really anything is possible if you keep faith. EPILOGUE - first a brief romanticized rendition of "21st century man" (as if a farewell reception), into which fade choruses of the word "Time", into which fade the same mystic sound effects of the Prologue (slipping between dimensions), into which a pattering note sequence repeats louder and louder and louder and louder and silence all at once, snapping the listener back into reality. I really didn't do the album justice with the above descriptions, they're pretty weak, but the music really does follow a thematic story that carries the listener off the world temporarily, then at the very end snaps him back into it. I recommend it for Sci-fi music fans. A must-buy for ELO fans. I would review Mission: a New World from _A_New_World_Record_, but Steve Stuart already did it better than I ever could. Paul Anderson sdcc6!ir278 "Okay, take it after four........four!"