Chapter 54: Pacific Ocean Blues (May - December 1977)

May - August 1977

Stevie Nicks and Jeff Lynne in Amsterdam, 1977.

The Electric Light Orchestra's sixth album, A New World Record, was a platinum seller despite losing Roy Wood, Rick Price and Mike Burney, the former two who had been part of the group since its inception in 1970. With hit singles "Livin' Thing" (#4 UK, #13 US) and "Telephone Line" (#8 UK, #7 US), the band was slowly beginning to reach new heights. Casey Kasem would later dub ELO as the "world's first touring rock 'n' roll camber group" before he played "Livin' Thing" on the radio.

JEFF LYNNE: "After that big tour following New World Record, we took a break. I wrote up what would become Concerto for a Rainy Day in the Swiss Alps over three weeks after I felt this sudden burst of creativity. It was raining hard during my time in Switzerland, and it was the weather there that inspired what would become one of ELO's biggest hits." (2001)

What would become known as "Mr. Blue Sky" had a Beatlesque arrangement, inspired from the Beatles' very own "A Day in the Life" and "Alice and the Puppy" (working title, "Martha My Dear") while sharing the harmony of the first four chords and rhythm with the highly-regarded "Yesterday". It was to be the final track of the concerto, while ending with a message telling the listener to turn the record over and play the second side.

July - September 1977

Linda and Paul McCartney, the latter of whom holding a newborn James in his hands, 1977. Like his dad and grandfather before him, James would go on to have a music career himself. (Image courtesy of the Beatle Photo Blog.)

BRIAN MAY: "We'd already made a decision that after A Night at the Rock Show and Silly Love Songs, we wanted to go back to basics for Water Works. But it was very timely because the world was looking at punk and things being very stripped down. So in a sense we were conscious, but it was part of our evolution anyway." (2017)[1]

Although Paul McCartney & Smile had begun demoing a few tracks for their fifth album, to be titled Water Works, back in February in the midst of a tour for Silly Love Songs, proper work did not begin until July. By then, John Lennon, Madeline Kahn and their son Freddie had visited the McCartneys at their home in Scotland, and Lennon had brought in a few recordings to present to McCartney, many of them being from Apple's newest artists courtesy of their new A&R Jake Riviera and producer/singer Nick Lowe. Along with the changing landscape of music, this inspired McCartney to take Smile's next album on a left turn from their previous album.

ROGER TAYLOR: "By then, we'd recorded a few of Paul's and Denny's songs - 'London Town', 'Deliver Your Children', 'Don't Let It Bring You Down', just to name a few. When we got back into the studio, we recorded probably some of our hardest material yet - 'Sheer Heart Attack', which I'd actually started when we did Band on the Run, 'Girls' School', 'I've Had Enough', etc. We even did a version of 'Girlfriend', although Paul was intending to give this to Michael Jackson to record as a guide track." (1989)

PAUL McCARTNEY: "I didn't want the entire album to be all punk, y'know; had to throw in a few ballads to kind of balance things out. It was also during the sessions that we did a song Denny and I wrote reflecting on my love for the Scottish countryside." (2005)

During the sessions, Linda McCartney's pregnancy was advancing, which put plans for another tour on hold before they were cancelled altogether. On 12 September, her fourth child (her third with Paul) and only son was born, James Louis McCartney, sharing the same first name as his father and grandfather before him, the latter of whom had died the year before. (Paul was nearly always called thus since childhood to avoid confusion with his father Jim.) Despite the break in recording due to young James' birth, they had managed to get the album ready for an October release.

23 September 1977

Electric Light Orchestra - Concerto for a Rainy Day

Released: 23 September 1977

Recorded: May - August 1977

Producer: Jeff Lynne

Track listing[2]

Side A

Night in the City
Believe Me Now
Standin' in the Rain
Big Wheels
Summer and Lightning
Mr. Blue Sky

Side B

Sweet is the Night
Starlight
Jungle
Birmingham Blues
Steppin' Out
Across the Border

Although seventeen songs were recorded for Concerto for a Rainy Day, four of them were held back as non-album singles, with a fifth serving as a non-album B-side. "Turn to Stone"/"Wild West Hero" (#6 UK, #13 US) was released shortly after the album on 17 October, while the second non-album single, "Sweet Talkin' Woman"/"It's Over" (#5 UK, #20 US), would not come out until the following year on 27 February. The only single off of the album was "Mr. Blue Sky", backed with the non-album B-side, "The Whale", and was released under Apple Records on 12 December, topping out at #2 in the United Kingdom (kept off of the top spot by Paul McCartney & Smile's "Mull of Kintyre") and #10 in the United States, since then being regarded as the group's best ever song.

Concerto for a Rainy Day also received a similar appraisal by critics and fans, with the first side being dominated by the titular suite while being preceded by "Night in the City" and with "Believe Me Now" segueing into the suite itself. The second side consisted entirely of self-contained songs. The album reached #4 on both sides of the Atlantic based upon pre-orders alone and quickly went multi-Platinum, remaining on the UK charts for about 108 weeks. It was sometimes referred to as "the Blue Album" for its plain cover accompanied only by its text while the back cover consisted of a spaceship designed by John Kosh with illustrations by Shusei Nagaoka. Although it was intended to be the front cover, it had been made the back cover due to an error, resulting in the plain blue front cover instead. Later releases would have the spaceship as part of the front cover.

7 October 1977

Freddie Mercury - Champions of the World

Released: 7 October 1977

Recorded: July - November 1976 and July - September 1977

Producer: Freddie Mercury and Mike Stone

Track listing[3]

Side A

We Are the Champions
You Take My Breath Away
Who Needs You
The Millionaire Waltz
You and I

Side B

Somebody to Love
Get Down, Make Love
Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy
Spread Your Wings
My Melancholy Blues

As was becoming tradition by this point, Freddie Mercury's next album consisted of newly recorded material alongside the material that had been previously recorded for an extended play. The five new tracks were "Get Down, Make Love", "Who Needs You", "My Melancholy Blues", and both sides of the lead single, "We Are the Champions" and "Spread Your Wings" (#2 UK, #4 US). The former was inspired from an audience response following a concert at Bingley Hall in Stafford in which they sang "You'll Never Walk Alone" to Mercury as well as Paul McCartney & Smile. The latter was penned by John Deacon, often performing bass duties whenever Brian May and Roger Taylor recorded and performed with Mercury.

Champions of the World hit #1 in the United Kingdom and #3 in the United States and garnered mixed to positive reviews from critics. The cover featured remembers of the Liverpool Football Club after winning the European Cup in their 1976-1977 season; it was very fitting given the theme of the opening track, "We Are the Champions", which has since gone down to become an anthem for victories at sporting events.

28 October 1977

Paul McCartney & Smile - Water Works

Released: 28 October 1977

Recorded: February - September 1977

Producer: Paul McCartney & Smile

Track listing[4]

Side A

I've Had Enough
Cafe on the Left Bank
Sheer Heart Attack
All Dead, All Dead
London Town
Famous Groupies
Fight from the Inside

Side B

Girls' School
Deliver Your Children
I'm Carrying
Sleeping on the Sidewalk
Don't Let It Bring You Down
Mull of Kintyre ("With a Little Luck" in US re-releases)

In the midst of Bee Gees domination in America, Water Works stalled out at #2 there and managed to reach #3 in the United Kingdom, but it was still a commercial success nonetheless. Critical reception, however, was a bit more mixed, with some deriding Paul McCartney for straying as far away from the "good boy" image previously established with the Beatles in the 1960s as possible, while others claimed that even in a world in which the Sex Pistols, the Ramones and the Runaways dominated the music scene, his music was still too soft at times.

A couple of weeks following the release of the album, the first single "Mull of Kintyre"/"We Will Rock You" came out on 11 November, with the A-side quickly reaching #1 in the United Kingdom, and staying there all the way into Christmas. "Mull of Kintyre" was a darling in McCartney's native country, even becoming the all-time best selling single there, taking over the record previously broken by the Ladders' "Imagine"/"Bangla Desh" double A-side from 1971, which in turn had broken the record set by the Beatles' "She Loves You" in 1963. This marked the third time that any combination of the Beatles had broken the record for having the United Kingdom's all-time best selling single, and they remain the only band to do so. Sadly, the A-side failed to appeal to North American sensibilities; instead, they preferred to listen to the non-album B-side, penned by Brian May, "We Will Rock You", which consisted of a stomp-stomp-clap-pause beat and a power chorus, becoming an anthem in its own right, especially after hitting #4 in America. In a sense, it wasn't all a big loss for the single.

Two more non-album singles, both recorded during the Water Works sessions but were left off due to lack of space, would come out the following year - "With a Little Luck"/"Children Children" (#1 US, #5 UK) on 20 February and "It's Late"/"Name and Address" (#17 US, #39 UK) on 8 May. The former marked Paul McCartney & Smile's eighth #1 single overall in either the United States or the United Kingdom (in some cases, both), and because of its success in America, "With a Little Luck" ended up replacing "Mull of Kintyre" as the final track in future re-releases there, while the British re-releases stuck with using "Mull of Kintyre".

Footnotes

1. Verbatim quote taken from The Quietus, with the album titles changed up to reflect TTL.
2. All tracks are sourced from Out of the Blue.
3. Tracks are sourced from Queen's A Day at the Races and News of the World.
4. Tracks are sourced from Wings' London Town and Queen's News of the World. "Mull of Kintyre" and "Girls' School" are bonus tracks on the 1993 release of the former.

Author's Comments

Well, here we go with the third to last chapter of the 1976-1977 block, and after a surprise chapter and an Apple Corps summary for that period, we move onto the 1978-1980 period. If I'm lucky, and if I keep to the fortnightly schedule, I'll have completed not only Phase Three, but also the first draft of Strawberry Peppers by the end of next year. Fingers crossed!

There won't be much going on for ELO in Phase Three; while the post-Concerto albums come out like in OTL, there will be changes made like a compilation album being released in 1978 and an odds and ends album in 1980 both as stop-gap releases. 1979's Discovery will come out like it did with no changes, while 1981's Time and 1983's Secret Messages will have changes in their own right, but you'll have to find out what they might be, though I reckon you can guess what they are.

Meanwhile, it's not long before Paul McCartney parts ways with Smile, largely due to a desire to have the Beatles properly reunite, something that's also lingering in the minds of the other three for the remainder of the decade. Although it hasn't been stated, Paul could see that Freddie Mercury was working far better with the rest of Smile than he did, and over time, Freddie's taking over as a full-time vocalist for Smile. We'll see how this all plays out over the next three years. (In universe, obviously!)