Electric Light Orchestra fans were full of praise for an album which Jeff Lynne wrote to prove the band had a “tune”.
A post to the r/ELO subreddit saw fans praise one of the band’s earlier efforts, with an “appreciation post” seeing listeners share their fondest memories of Eldorado. One user wrote: “Words cannot express how much I adore this album. I feel like it doesn’t get enough credit. It has so many layers of brilliance that you just can’t appreciate them all at once. To me, the thing that stands out the most is that the album stays so uncompromisingly true to itself and Jeff’s vision for it.
“It’s cinematic, powerful, haunting, immersive, and everything in between. Truly an orchestral rock opera. What’s everyone’s favourite thing about the record?” One user has since pointed out a “gorgeous” song which manages to keep the “concept” of Lynne’s writing alive. They wrote: “Can’t Get it Out of My Head is a gorgeous song. And throughout the whole album, the orchestral strings are lush.
“The album definitely has its own unique sound and identity. I love a good concept album when done right, and Jeff pulled it off twice with Eldorado and Time. Eldorado sends an interesting message, and it’s an album you appreciate more when listening to it in one sitting than sporadically.” Another has called it their “favourite album” to listen through.
A third added: “Great album, really cool how different it is from Time production-wise even though there are parallels conceptually. The orchestral aspect of it really adds to the fantasy feeling throughout. Can’t Get it Out of My Head is one of there best songs ever, love Eldorado and Mister Kingdom too. Boy Blue and Laredo Tornado are also really good.”
Others added there were two songs featured on the album which marked the band’s best-ever work. One wrote: “Well, Can’t Get It Out of My Head and Eldorado are my two favourite ELO songs (and I love ELO). I agree that it’s a great album start to finish. It was my favourite album of all time when I first got into it (approx 45 years ago).”
One user pointed out one of the low ebbs of an otherwise excellent album, which was written by Lynne to prove his father wrong. One user wrote: “The only song I don’t like as much is Illusions in G Major. It’s a fine song, but it just feels out of place where it is. Abrupt.
“Eldorado was the first ELO album I ever listened to. I was spellbound. Mister Kingdom and Eldorado made me cry. Back then, I also listened to On the Third Day, Face the Music, and A New World Record. Later, when I knew much more about music, and had more of an appreciation for it, I was really able to do a deep dive into ELO and Jeff Lynne’s music, and appreciate the genius of the man.”
A separate thread from the group shared the reason Lynne wrote Eldorado. One user explained: “Jeff wrote the album out of dismay at his father’s opinion on his music. In 1973, after On The Third Day came out, Jeff was talking to his Dad about music. His dad was a huge classical music fan, and was extremely well-versed in it. As such, he wasn’t really pleased with how his son was (at the time) such a prog-head and making such experimental music.
Jeff’s father told him about this, and he specifically told Jeff that his music “had no tune.” Jeff, of course, was both insulted because he didn’t like the music, and dismayed because it was his own father telling him this. So, as he describes it, he got very worked up and decided to make an album to prove to his father that he could do classically inclined, serious music just as well as the greats. This sort of anger/sadness is likely where the tone of the album comes from.”
Eldorado is a fine album with some very good songs. My favorite ELO album is On The Third Day though.
One of my favorite albums out of the 500+ I had all those years ago. (I worked in a independent record store in LA and would go around to the various distributors to pick out “import” product for the store. And because I had lived in Germany just prior to that I was used to buying those versions rather then the “shorter” (less songs) US versions.