| Jeff Lynne |
Jeff
Lynne performing live 1976
|
| Background information |
| Birth name |
Jeffrey Lynne |
| Born |
December 30, 1947 (1947-12-30) (age 59) |
| Origin |
 Birmingham,
England |
| Genre(s) |
Rock
Pop |
| Occupation(s) |
Singer-songwriter,
multi-instrumentalist, producer |
| Instrument(s) |
Guitar, Piano, Synthesizer,
Bass
Guitar, Drums,
Cello |
| Years active |
1966 — present |
| Label(s) |
Jet Records, Harvest
Records, Epic records, SonyBMG, Reprise
Records |
Associated
acts |
The Idle Race
The
Move
Electric Light Orchestra
Traveling Wilburys |
| Website |
http://www.ftmusic.com |
Jeff Lynne (born December
30, 1947) is
a Grammy
Award-winning English
rock songwriter,
singer, guitarist
and record producer.
Born in Birmingham, England, he is
best known for his involvement with the Electric Light Orchestra
and the Traveling Wilburys. After
disbanding ELO, Lynne became a much respected and much sought after
record producer, working with many of his musical heroes and
culminating with his involvement with The
Beatles on their Anthology project.
|
Contents
- 1 Early
career
- 2 The
Electric Light Orchestra (1970 - 1986)
- 3 The
1980s
- 4 The
'90s
- 5 The
2000s
- 6 Discography
- 6.1 Albums
- 6.2 Singles
and highest chart positions
- 7 Notes
- 8 External
links
- 9 See
also
|
Early career
In 1963, Jeff Lynne, Robert Reader and David Walsh formed a
group using little more than Spanish guitars and cheap electrical
instruments to produce music. They were originally named "The Rockin'
Hellcats" however this was changed to "The Handicaps" and finally to
"The Andicaps". They practiced at Shard End Community Centre and
performed weekly. However, in 1964, Robert Reader and David Walsh left
the band and Lynne brought in replacements. At the end of 1964, Lynne
decided to leave to replace Mick Adkins of the local band "The Chads".
In 1966, Lynne joined the line-up of The Nightriders
as guitarist, the band would soon change their name to the The
Idle Race, a name allegedly given to them unwittingly and sarcastically
by his grandmother Evelyn Lynne who probably disapproved of the pop
music culture as not being a proper job. Despite recording two
critically acclaimed albums with the band and producing the second,
success eluded him. In 1970, Lynne accepted a lifeline from friend Roy
Wood to join the line up of the more successful band The
Move.
The Electric Light Orchestra
(1970 - 1986)
The Move / E.L.O (1971)
Lynne contributed songs to The Move's last two albums while
formulating with Roy Wood and Bev Bevan a
band built around a fusion of rock and European classical music, a
project which would eventually become the highly successful Electric Light Orchestra
(E.L.O.). Creative differences led to Wood's departure in 1972 after
the band's eponymous first
album, leaving the 24-year-old Lynne as the band's sole creative force.
Lynne's writing and production skill grew through a succession of band
personnel changes and increasingly popular albums: 1973's ELO II
and On The Third Day,
1974's Eldorado
and 1975's Face the Music.
By 1976's A New World Record,
Lynne had almost completely abandoned the art-rock roots of the group
for a dense and unique pop-rock sound augmented by studio strings and
layered vocals and focused on tight, catchy pop singles. Indeed, while
Lynne's now almost complete creative dominance as producer, songwriter,
lead singer and guitarist could make ELO to appear to have been almost
a solo effort, the sound was also indelibly shaped by Louis Clark's
string arrangements, Bev Bevan's primitivist drumming, Richard Tandy's
tasteful use of new keyboard technology, Mik Kaminski's electric violin
solos and Kelly Groucutt's high tenor vocals in backing counterpoint to
Lynne's light baritone. This group contribution becomes obvious in
contrast to the later ELO albums (with no Groucutt or strings) and
Lynne's solo work.
The apex of ELO's chart success and worldwide popularity was
the expansive 1977 double album Out
of the Blue, which was largely conceived in a Swiss chalet during a two-week writing marathon. The
band's 1978 world tour was a spectacular featuring an elaborate "space
ship" set and laser light show. In order to recreate the complex
instrumental textures of their albums, the band used pre-recorded
supplemental backing tracks in live performance and although the
practice has now become commonplace, it caused considerable
derision in the press. Lynne has often stated that he prefers
the creative environment of the studio to the rigors and tedium of
touring.
In 1979, Lynne followed up the stunning success of Out
of the Blue with Discovery,
an album primarily associated with its two disco-flavored singles,
"Shine a Little Love" and "Last Train to London". However, the
remaining seven non-disco tracks on the album reflected Lynne's broad
range as a pop-rock songwriter in the Lennon/McCartney
tradition, including a heavy, mid-tempo rock anthem ("Don't Bring Me
Down") that represented the antithesis of disco. On a recording
distributed to the fan club of the time, Lynne stated that he liked the
"bang bang" of disco,
although the absence of any further forays into dance music indicates
that this may have been a sentiment purely for promotional benefit.
In the absence of any touring to support Discovery,
Lynne had time to contribute a large portion of the soundtrack for the
1980 movie musical Xanadu (film).
While the quality of his production work for Xanadu
was on par with the best of his ELO work and the score yielded a pair
of top-40 singles, Lynne was not integrated into the development of the
film and the his material subsequently had only superficial attachment
to the plot. Despite its later resurgence as a cult favorite, Xanadu
performed weakly at the box-office and has often been regarded as the
nadir of the musical film genre. Lynne
subsequently disavowed his limited contribution to the project,
although he later reappraised his work and re-recorded the title song
(with his lead vocal) for the 2000 box-set Flashback.
1981 saw Lynne taking the band into a somewhat different
direction with the science-fiction themed album Time,
jettisoning the strings in favor of heavily synthesized textures and
shortening the band's official name to ELO. Following a marginally
successful tour, Lynne kept this general approach with 1983's Secret
Messages and a final contractually-obligated
ELO album Balance
of Power in 1986. Although ELO could still get
a hit single into the top 40, Lynne had tired of the artistic
constraints and promotional demands imposed by the ELO concept. With
only three remaining official members (Lynne, Bevan and Tandy), the
band had become little more than a brand and with ELO's place on the
pop charts being taken by younger, more video-friendly performers,
Lynne began devoting his full energy to producing.
During his time in the Electric Light Orchestra, Lynne did
manage to release a few recordings under his own name. In 1976, Lynne covered
The
Beatles songs “With a Little
Help from My Friends” and “Nowhere Man” for the evanescent musical
documentary All This and World War II.
In 1977, Lynne released his first ever solo single, the disco-flavoured
"Doin' That Crazy Thing"/"Goin' Down To Rio". Despite ELO's high
profile at that time, it received little airplay and failed to chart.
In 1984 Lynne and ELO keyboardist Richard Tandy contributed two
original songs "Video" and "Let It Run" to the film Electric
Dreams. Lynne also wrote the song "The Story of
Me" which was recorded by the Everly Brothers on their comeback
album EB84.
The 1980s
Before 1986,Jeff Lynne began focusing almost exclusively on
studio production work,producing and writing,"Slipping Away" for Dave
Edmunds,he also played on sessions,with Richard Tandy,on the
album,"Information". After "Balance Of Power", showing both the
influences that characterized much of ELO's work and an influence from
rockabilly-style music,rock n'roll and the Beatles,would shine through
in later years after ELO vanished,until,"ZOOM" In contrast to the
dense, boomy, baroque sound of ELO, Lynne's post-ELO studio work has
tended toward more minimal, acoustic instrumentation and a sparse,
"organic" quality that generally favors light room ambience and
coloration over artificial reverb, especially on vocals. Lynne's
recordings also often feature the jangling compressed acoustic guitar
sound pioneered by Roger McGuinn.
The Beatles' connection was strengthened when Lynne produced George
Harrison's Cloud Nine,
a successful comeback album for the ex-Beatle, released in 1987,
featuring the popular singles "Got My Mind Set on You," "When
We Was Fab" (where he played the violin in the video), and "This Is
Love," two of the three songs co-written by Lynne.
Jeff Lynne's, association with Harrison led to the 1988
formation of the Traveling Wilburys, a studio
"supergroup" that included George Harrison, Tom Petty, Bob Dylan
and Roy
Orbison and resulted in two albums (i.e. Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1 and
Traveling Wilburys Vol. 3), both co-produced by Lynne. In 1988 Lynne
also worked on the Roy Orbison's album Mystery
Girl co-writing and producing his last major
hit, "You
Got It",plus two other tracks,on his last album.(Rock On) the
final(Del
Shannon) album,Jeff Lynne,co - wrote "Walkaway" and finished off
several tracks after,his death.
In 1989, Lynne co-produced Full
Moon Fever by Tom Petty, which included the hit singles "Free
Fallin'," "I Won't Back Down," and "Runnin'
Down a Dream," all co-written by Lynne. This album and Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1
both received nominations for the Grammy Award for Best Album of the Year
in 1989. Lynne's song "One Way Love" was released as a single
by Agnetha Faltskog and appeared on
her second post-ABBA
album, "Eyes of a Woman". Lynne co-wrote and
produced the track Let It Shine for Beach Boys
founder Brian
Wilson's first solo album in 1988. Lynne also contributed 3 tracks to
an album by Duane
Eddy and "Falling In Love" on "Land Of Dreams" for Randy
Newman Dave
Morgan.
The '90s
Traveling Wilburys Vol. 3,
(1990)
In 1990, Lynne collaborated on the Wilbury's follow up Traveling Wilburys Vol. 3
and shortly after that released his first solo album Armchair Theatre,
with old friends George Harrison and Richard
Tandy featuring the singles "Every Little
Thing" and "Lift Me Up." The album received some positive critical
attention but little commercial success. Lynne also provided the song
"Wild Times" to the motion picture soundtrack Robin Hood Prince of
Thieves in 1991.
In 1991, Lynne returned to the studio with Petty, co-writing
and producing the album "Into the Great Wide Open"
for Tom Petty and the
Heartbreakers, which featured the singles "Learning to Fly"
and "Into the Great Wide Open". The following year he produced Roy
Orbison's posthumous album King of Hearts,
featured the single I Drove All Night.
In February 1994, Lynne fulfilled a career-long dream by
working with the three surviving Beatles on the Anthology
album series. Because of the elderly George
Martin's poor hearing, Lynne was brought in as a fresh set of ears to
assist in reevaluation the original studio material. The songs "Free
as a Bird" and "Real Love" were created
by digitally processing John Lennon's demos for the
songs and overdubbing the three surviving band members to form a
virtual Beatles reunion that the band had mutually eschewed during
Lennon's lifetime. Lynne has also produced records for Ringo
Starr and worked on Paul McCartney's album Flaming
Pie.
Lynne's work in the 1990s also includes production of a 1993
album for singer/songwriter Julianna Raye entitled Something
Peculiar and production or songwriting contributions to
albums by Roger McGuinn (Back from Rio), Joe
Cocker (Night Calls), Aerosmith (Lizard Love), Tom
Jones (Lift me Up), Bonnie Tyler (Time Mends a Broken
Heart), the film Still Crazy, Hank
Marvin (Wonderful Land and Nivram), Et
Moi (Drole De Vie), and the Tandy Morgan Band (Action).
In 1996, Lynne was officially recognised by his peers when he
was awarded the Ivor Novello Award for
"Outstanding Contributions to British Music".
The 2000s
Following legal
action to get the ELO name back from Bevan's touring group ELO
Part II, Lynne released a new album in 2001 under the ELO
moniker entitled Zoom. Although
the album featured guest appearances by Ringo
Starr, George Harrison and
original ELO keyboardist Richard Tandy, it was
essentially a second Jeff Lynne solo album, with Lynne multitracking a
majority of the instruments and vocals. The album received positive
reviews but had no hit singles. Despite bearing little sonic
relationship to the halcyon ELO days of the late 1970s, it was marketed
as a "return to the classic ELO sound"
in an attempt to connect with a loyal body of (now, older) fans and
jumpstart a planned concert tour (with Lynne and Tandy as the only
returning original ELO members). While a live performance was taped and
shown on PBS
(with subsequent DVD release), poor advance ticket sales a resulted in
a cancellation of the tour and an unfortunate end to this attempt to
revive the ELO brand.
Earlier in 2001, Lynne began working with George Harrison on
what would turn out to be Harrison's final album, Brainwashed.
With Harrison's death from cancer on November 29, 2001, Lynne returned to the studio in 2002 to
help finish the uncompleted album. Lynne was also heavily involved in
the memorial Concert for George, held at London's
Royal Albert Hall in November 2002, and subsequently produced the Surround
Sound audio mix for the Concert
For George DVD released in November 2003. The
DVD received a Grammy
for Best Long Form Music
Video.
In 2002, a tribute to Lynne called Lynne Me Your Ears was
released featuring two CDs full of artists performing Lynne/ELO songs,
including Todd Rundgren, SWAG (featuring members
of Wilco, The
Mavericks and Cheap Trick), Sixpence None the Richer, Doug
Powell, PFR, Jason
Falkner, Fleming and John, Jerry
Chamberlain of Daniel Amos, Rick Altizer and others.
In 2006,Jeff Lynne reunited with Tom Petty as producer and
session musician on Petty's third solo album, Highway
Companion. Lynne won the Q Icon Award at the 2006 Q Magazine
Awards.
Jeff Lynne actively remastered the ELO back catalogue and
every ELO album has been re-released on CD with improved sound quality,
extensive sleeve notes and bonus tracks. The pinnacle of these was the
re-release of Out
of the Blue on February 2007, which peaked at 18 in the UK album chart
30 years after its original release and included as an extra track the
download only single Latitude 88 North.
Re-releases continued with a double CD issue of Idle
Race Back to the story, which many ELO fans believe to
contain some of Jeff Lynne's best work and the infant ELO. July
2007,mini replica remasters of the first two albums were released in
Japan. June 2007 saw a UK number 1 album when Travelling
Wilburys Vol 1 and Vol 3 were re-mastered as a double CD with
additional DVD included on Rhino/Warner all over the world and also
Japan.
Outstanding issues now for Jeff
Lynne, include the re-mastered, re-issue of the 2001 ELO album Zoom, a double live CD
from the Storytellers concert that same year, and the re-mastered,
re-issue of his only solo album Armchair Theatre. Again, all these
will it is assumed,will come with unreleased tracks.
Although speculation, indications are that one more release
may be forthcoming from Lynne. We maybe kept waiting,now he seems
happy to produce and remaster recordings.
A passionate football fan, Lynne supports Birmingham
City, and the Blues play the ELO hit song "Mr.
Blue Sky" at the start of each home game. The next to last track on the
1977 ELO album "Out of the Blue" (which includes Mr. Blue Sky) also
features a song called "Birmingham Blues". Indeed, Lynne was briefly
linked with a possible buy-out of the club in 2003 as part of a
consortium. Ultimately, the supposed bid never materialized.
Lynne, who has been very protective of his private life, has
been married
twice and has two daughters.
Discography
Albums
Armchair Theatre
(1990) US #83
Billboard
200
Armchair
Theatre, (1990)
Singles and highest chart
positions
Release
date |
Single |
UK |
US |
Album |
| 1984 |
"Video!" |
- |
#85 1 |
Electric Dreams |
| 1990 |
"Every Little
Thing" |
#59 |
#9 2 |
Armchair Theatre |
- Notes
- Billboard Hot 100
- Mainstream Rock Tracks
Notes
-
Brumbeat:
The Andicaps biography
External links
See also
| v • d • e Jeff
Lynne
|
|
Discography
Solo:
Armchair Theatre
With
the The
Idle Race: The Birthday Party
• Idle
Race
With
The
Move: Looking On
• Message From the Country
With
Electric Light Orchestra:
The Electric
Light Orchestra • ELO 2
• On
the Third Day • Eldorado,
A Symphony • Face
the Music • A
New World Record • Out
of the Blue • Discovery
• Time
• Secret
Messages • Balance of Power
• Zoom
With
the Traveling Wilburys:
Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1
• Traveling Wilburys Vol. 3
|
|
The Beatles |
| Members |
John Lennon • Paul McCartney •
George
Harrison • Ringo
Starr
Pete
Best • Stuart
Sutcliffe |
| Management |
Allan
Williams • Brian
Epstein • Allen
Klein • Lee
Eastman • Neil
Aspinall • Mal Evans • Alistair
Taylor • Apple
Records |
| Production |
George
Martin • Geoff
Emerick • Norman
Smith • Ken Scott • Phil
Spector • Jeff
Lynne • Abbey
Road Studios |
|
Official studio albums
|
Please
Please Me (1963) • With
The Beatles (1963) • A Hard Day's Night
(1964) • Beatles
for Sale (1964) • Help!
(1965) • Rubber
Soul (1965) • Revolver
(1966) • Sgt. Pepper's
Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) • Magical Mystery Tour
(U.S., 1967 / U.K., 1976) • The
Beatles (The White Album) (1968) •
Yellow Submarine
(1969) • Abbey
Road (1969) • Let
It Be (1970) |
|
Official post-
breakup albums
|
Live at the BBC
(1994) • Anthology
1–3 (1994–1996) • Let
It Be... Naked (2003) • Love
(2006) |
|
Official compilations
|
1962–1966
(1973) • 1967–1970
(1973) • Past Masters, Volume One
(1988) • Past Masters, Volume Two
(1988) • 1
(2000) |
| Filmography |
A Hard Day's Night
(1964) • Help!
(1965) • Magical Mystery Tour
(1967) • Yellow Submarine
(1968) • Let
It Be (1970) |
|
Related articles
|
Line-ups
• Bootlegs
• Discography •
Love (Cirque du Soleil) •
Lennon/McCartney
• Influence •
Beatle
boots • The
Quarrymen • The Beatles' breakup •
London
• Beatlemania
• Fifth
Beatle • Paul
is dead • The Beatles (TV series) •
British
Invasion • Apple
Corps • Northern
Songs • Yoko Ono • Linda
McCartney • Cynthia
Lennon • Billy
Preston • Tony
Sheridan • Chas Newby
• Andy
White • Jimmy
Nicol • Astrid
Kirchherr • Klaus
Voormann |
