Oh, Oh, Telephone Line–How ELO’s First Album was Given its Title by Mistake

no answer

(Reprinted from Snopes.com)

Claim: A record label inadvertently mistitled the U.S. version of the Electric Light Orchestra’s debut album because of a misunderstood phone message.

Status: True

Origins: In the early 1970’s Jeff Lynne, Roy Wood and Bev Bevan, members of a group called The Move, developed a concept for fusing rock and classical music. All three continued to bide their time recording and performing as The Move while they assembled the collection of classical instrumentalists they needed to flesh out their “Electric Light Orchestra”. Meanwhile, their manager, Don Arden, managed to line up a recording contract for the nascent group with Harvest Records (UK) and United Artists (U.S.)

After some delay while The Move wound down, the Electric Light Orchestra finally recorded their first album, which was released in the UK by Harvest in December 1971 and (in line with common practice for debut LPs by new groups) assigned the eponymous title of Electric Light Orchestra. When the same album was released in America by United Artists three months later, however, it bore a completely different title: No Answer.

Why the switch?

As groups such as the Beatles had learned years earlier, American record companies had no compunctions about retitling (and even rearranging) the LPs of British groups to suit their notions of what would sell in the American record market. But what possessed United Artists to reject a straightforward album title in favor of one that seemingly made no sense? After all, No Answer wasn’t the name of a song on the LP, the phrase wasn’t found in any of the album’s lyrics, and it certainly didn’t signify anything of importance to the American record-buying public.

The answer is that the title was an accident, the result of a misunderstood phone communication.

The legend differs slightly in some of the details from telling to telling, but the basic premise is that when United Artists was preparing to schedule Electric Light Orchestra’s debut album for release in the U.S. someone from United Artists (either an executive or his secretary) placed a call to someone connected with ELO (either an executive at Harvest Records or the group’s manager) to find out, among other things, what the LP should be titled. The caller, having failed to reach the desired party, jotted down the notation “no answer”, a phrase which was mistaken for an album title and assigned to the U.S. version of the group’s debut record.

This all sounds like a story a PR person might have concocted to garner some free publicity for a new band, but no one has ever offered a plausible alternative explanation for the origins of the No Answer album title, and Bev Bevan, ELO’s drummer, affirms that the familiar account is true:

Bevan confirms the story that the album was called No Answer in America due to a misunderstanding. The American record company phoned to discuss the title with ELO manager Don Arden, but his secretary couldn’t contact him and replied with the two words that became immortalized on the album sleeves.

“It was quite a good title, though, wasn’t it?” says Bevan, the band’s drummer and percussionist.

In an odd coincidence, a similar mix-up at about the same time resulted in a Byrds LP mistakenly being released with a title of Untitled.

Mom Convinces Michael Bublé To Let Her Son Sing

It’s getting to the point where even when you pay to see a professional singer perform, someone wants to turn it into an episode of My Kid’s Got Talent.

My first reaction was: He’s really good! Wow, that worked out really well.

My deleyed reaction was: How incredibly inappropriate to do something like that. No matter how well your teenage son can sing, the fact is that no one in the room paid money to see him. And you’re fortunate your interruption of the concert didn’t get you kicked out.

Yes’ “Roundabout”: Big in Japan

“Hello to our friends in Japan!

We are delighted that Roundabout, performed by YES and written by Jon Anderson & myself, is so popular in your country right now!

I look forward to returning with Yes or on my own in the very near future.”

—Steve Howe

End credits from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, a popular Japanese manga series-turned TV show.

Unknown Asian band perform a super-tight version of “Roundabout”.

The Troggs Tapes: “Put a Little Bit of F***ing Fairy Dust Over the Bastard!”

(Source: Open Culture)

Reg Presley, lead singer of the Sixties rock group The Troggs, died Monday at the age of 71. The Troggs (short for Troglodytes) are often mentioned as a major influence on the punk rock movement of the 1970s. They recorded a string of hits between 1966 and 1968, most notably “Wild Thing.”

The Troggs are also remembered—much to the band’s chagrin—for one of the most notorious bootlegs ever: “The Troggs Tapes,” described by Uncut magazine as a “hilarious, 12-minute swearathon.”

The Troggs Tapes were recorded in London in 1970. The band was working on a song called “Tranquility,” but things weren’t going well, and the session degenerated into a foul-mouthed orgy of acrimony and recrimination. A copy of the recording somehow made it onto the bootleg market and became legendary.

Saturday Night Live parodied the Troggs Tapes in a sketch with Bill Murray, John Belushi and others playing a group of frustrated medieval musicians who say the word “flogging” over and over.

The tapes are also parodied in This is Spinal Tap, during the recording scene at the “Rainbow Trout Studios.” In a piece this week paying tribute to Reg Presley, the Telegraph music critic Neil McCormick writes:

Before the internet, The Troggs Tapes were hard to find, yet everyone seemed to know about them, an elusiveness that only added to their allure. I remember getting my hands on a copy in a Dublin flea market, then sitting around late at night with friends laughing ourselves silly at the inanity and palpable sense of frustration as the musicians fail to find a way to articulate and capture some sound idea, beyond the reach of either their language or their technical abilities…. In truth, it is the kind of conversation you can hear every day in recording studios all around the world, but there was something liberating and myth-busting about the experience of eavesdropping on these unguarded musicians at work.

You can listen to an abridged version of The Troggs Tapes above.

7 Things I Would Rap About If I Had Any Musical Talent

Matthew

(Source: Thought Catalog)

By Laura Jayne Martin

I love rap songs. I love R&B songs. I have zero musical talent. These are the second, third, and fourth most important facts to consider when perusing the following article. The most important fact to consider is that, were I talented, my musical alias would be either Lotsa $nackz, D.J. Tanner, or Lil’ Young Old Big Cheesy Bastard. (God, I love cheese, television, and cheesy television.) Anyway, since childhood I have dreamed of one day writing my own rap lyrics, only to see my dream consistently dashed by my complete lack of flow. Other obstacles to my rapper career include: too old, musical inexperience, outdated rhyming dictionary, fear of producers, innate dearth of technical ability, and my boombox has no more batteries. Currently, I have about as much a chance of releasing my own rap album as does any middle school principal. Sad, though admittedly tangential, is the fact that I also have almost no chance of becoming a middle school principal.
This is disturbing for several reasons. Chiefly, how the hell am I ever supposed to get an awesome nickname if I can neither be a rapper nor a middle school principal?! While I stew in this disappointment please indulge what I believe to be the top seven most overlooked rap song subjects. Or more accurately, what I would write my rhymes about, were I to have the ability to write them.

1. Pretzels

I’m wondering if Seinfeld cursed me/Because “these pretzels are making me thirsty.” I know; it’s not great. But just think about how amazing it is going to be the first time someone actually manages to rhyme another word with “pretzel.” And think of how much more amazing it will be if that person is DMX. I want to be at that concert — eating a pretzel.

2. Menstruation

Who wouldn’t love to hear someone go hard for three verses about endometrial lining? I’m not talking about one couplet that’s really just an attempt to insult someone else’s masculinity; I’m talking about an ENTIRE song devoted to the ovarian cycle—follicular phase through luteal phase. I feel like there are men and women out there up to the task — and not just like a verbal Cathy cartoon either. PMS rhymes with a ton of stuff, so I get that it’s tempting. However, I think it’d be more rewarding to hear something along the lines of “I’m slightly annoyed and putting raisins into me, efficiently/so I can avoid an iron deficiency”.

3. Sour Candy

Okay, so candy does get rapped about sometimes. However, I’m tired of listening to overused sexual metaphors. I want the next person who raps about candy to actually be talking about candy. Sex is great. You know what else is great? Candy. You know what’s even better? Sour candy — and I want to hear people talk-sing about it over a delightful beat.

4. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority

The phrase “stand clear of the closing doors” presents a multitude of lyrical options. Do you know how many words rhyme with clear and door? Rappers do. People in rap or R&B lyrics are always kicking in the door, knocking on the door, or opening the door. There’s at least enough material for two remixes. Potential song titles I’m hoping include: “Stand Up Motherf-cker, That Seat is Full of Pee!”, “Track Work”, “Welcome to the G Train: You’re Gonna Miss That Appointment”, and “How to F on the F.” The latter hopefully would have more of an R&B vibe and contain the sultry hook, “Ladies and gentlemen. We are being held temporarily, so hold each other temporarily!”

5. Baby Haircuts

There aren’t enough songs about haircuts to begin with, and there are even fewer songs about baby haircuts. Get it together, rappers of the world.

6. The Boxcar Children

Are you even aware how incredible these children are compared to children in general? Most plain children just enjoy vigorous running, jumping, or games, and have smaller bone structure than adults.  THESE children banded together and lived in a boxcar for, like, years! If anything deserves an anthem it is four fictional children roasting potatoes in a fire pit after a day at Surprise Island.

7. Nature Valley Granola Bars

So much of rapping is a power struggle. What better way to illustrate ultimate domination that the rain of granola that accompanies one’s life after they eat merely one of these breakfast snacks? There is no more safety. There is no more lighthearted fun. There is just a pervasive, never-ending existence of granola. Granola in your crotch, granola in your pencil sharpener, this same granola will even manage to get into OTHER granola that isn’t even in your apartment yet, but you will buy from the store in the future. Forget threatening weapons and menacing promises, forget bravado. Swagger is nothing. Granola is king of the hill—and we need rap songs about it.

IKEA Fully Embraces the DJ Hack…

ikea(Source: The Daily Swarm)

I know how these things go. NOW she’ll kick him out of the place.

 

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