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RATING 100%+
Electric Light Orchestra where formed in 1970, from the remnants of the sixties group The Move. Through out the seventies, they blazed the charts with landmark albums, such as "A New World Record", "Out of the Blue", "Discovery", and their early eighties platinum piece, "Xanadu". In 1981, the Jeff Lynne Orchestral Experience reached it's peak with the album "TIME"
This album was released during an era, when the seventies studio production sound started to merge, into the synth pop sound of the early eighties. Lynne presents this change with a theme of space and time. In 1981 this album came across with a futuristic feel. The present seems to throw a whole new prospective on the album, when listening to the lyrics. Many of the tracks describe how once they were wild imaginations, on what the 21st century would bring.
The album opens with a surrounding orchestral prologue, which leads into the first track entitled "Twilight". Other tracks I enjoyed very much included "Ticket to the moon", "The way life's meant to be", "Rain is falling", "From the end of the world", "The lights go down", "Here is the news", "21st century man", and the top five hit "Hold on tight", which charted in August of 1981.
I just couldn't imagine my music collection without this CD. This would have to be my all time favourite album.
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RATING 100%+
Abba are well known for their success in the 1970's. Super Trouper displays Abba at their audio best. Tracks include "Super trouper", "The winner takes it all", "On and on and on", "andante, andante", "Me and I", "Our last summer", "The piper", "Lay all your love on me", "The way old friends do" and "Happy new year".
Every time I've played this disc, I've never skipped a track. These were the days when you bought an album and every track sounded excellent.
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RATING 100%+
A stunning showcase of production work from Jeff Lynne and John Farrar. Just like Abba's Super Trouper, Xanadu was an album with a lot to offer, with many hits from Electric Light Orchestra and Olivia Newton John.
Olivia gave us "Magic", "Suspended in time", "Suddenly" with Cliff Richard, and the albums best offering "Xanadu". Olivia in combination with The Tubes, swirled together the 1940's cabaret sound of the Andrews Sisters Song "Forget about the Blues", with the electrifying early eighties sound of "Dancin", performed by the Tubes. The mix Jells like dynamite and gives both tracks a whole new sparkle. Jeff Lynne's contribution gave this album it's unique sound, that makes this soundtrack an unforgettable classic. Tracks like "It's alive", "I'm alive", "Don't walk away", and "All around the world" were recorded by Electric Light Orchestra.
If I could only take ten albums to a desert island, this would be one of them.
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RATING 100%+
80's Techno-Pop has never sounded so good as this album. I am a BIG BIG Fan of this style of music as some of my favourite artists include Pseudo Echo, Bananarama, Rick Astley, Madonna (early years), Irene Cara and the list goes on.
Tales of the City features both Peter Blakeley and Wendy Matthews at their finest. Both simply went down hill after their departure from this group, particularly Wendy. From the opening, this masterpiece catches us with the electric rhythms of "New groove". The perpetual dance flavour keeps our legs moving with "Rhymes", "Jump", "Thief", "What's it gonna be", "Boogie-tron", "Dreams in the empty city", "Get back on the groove", and "Money talks". At the time of release, the album was sold with an extra EP called "six on the floor". The EP featured an extended six-track dance mix of their popular singles.
Today many record shops have hundreds of those dance compilations sitting on rows of racks. Nothing ever can come close to this one.
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RATING 100%+
Unfortunately at the time of release, Rick Astley was tagged as a mimed singer, due to the attachment to Stock Aiken and Waterman.
From the first day of this albums release, I always believed that this performer had talent. He lived up to his true standard, when he performed live in London in 1991, promoting his then album "Free"
When ever you need somebody was another great techno-pop experience. The album kicks in immediately with his biggest hit "Never gonna give you up", and follows through nicely with more great tracks. Other brilliant cuts from this album include "Whenever you need somebody", "Together forever", "It would take a strong, strong man", "Don't say good-bye girl", "No more looking for love", "You move me", and the old Nat King Cole hit "When I fall in love". The best version I've ever heard.
I don't care what others think, this guy's got true talent.
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RATING 100%+
The British group Bucks Fizz formed in London during 1981, and won the Eurovision Song Contest that year with their world wide hit "Making your mind up". This track went to #1 in early July that year and set the scene for their chart on-slaught. They followed up with more hits and two more AMS top 20 #1's. Their next hit was "A piece of the action" in September 1981 - "Land of make believe" #1 in January 1982. Other big hits included "Now those days are gone", "My camera never lies" (top 5 in June 1982), "London town", "I hear talk", "You and your heart so blue", and many others.
This group mainly got their success in Europe. Many European groups suffered poor sales in Australia, due to insignificant air-play. This is still a major downfall of Australian Commercial Radio.
When taking into consideration their huge success in Europe, Bucks Fizz played a Big presence on the AMS top 20 Charts. They had moderate success on the Australian Music Report top 100, with their biggest hit "making your mind up". (#6 in June 1981)
In the early 1990's, It was great to see a record label like Pickwick, releasing obscure retro material. This album has all their hits on it. Great early 80's euro pop sound through this entire disc.
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RATING 95%
Rick Ocasek and Benjamin Ore are some of the finest song writers and when it comes to ROCK, they really know how to ROLL me over. WOW! Nothing fishy here.
The best cut is "Tonight she comes", which got to #1 in September 1985. (AMS top 20 Singles Chart) This CD catches most of their great hits "My best friends girl", "Just what I needed", "Let's go", "Touch and go", "Shake it up", "Let the good times roll", "You might think", "Magic", "Drive", and "I'm not the one", which went top 5 in January 1986.
I was somewhat disappointed, that the selection missed the tracks "Hello" and "Why can't I have you", but then I bought the Heartbeat City album; which kind of solved that one. It also slipped up on the Benjamin Orr track "it's all I can do".
Besides not having those three tracks, the rest is nothing short of amazing, from start to finish.
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