A Pair from the Past
These two tunes from the 80s have always resonated with me. And other than to say that the imagery is perhaps a bit dated and a touch overdone . . . that’s all I’ll say about them.
Except enjoy – perhaps with a tissue handy.
Category: Politics
Pretty much can’t go wrong with the Moody Blues.
From the same time period:
“What happened to the girl that you loved once and left young man, did you break her heart,
Did she live, and did she marry, did she ever think on your face again?”
I love their music. One of my top 5 bands, though is The Electric Light Orchestra.
What the Moody Blues did for me was introduce me to the Mellotron. It was a fascinating instrument that looked like a piano, but had a continuous tape loop behind each key, on which was recorded a stringed instrument, like a violin, etc. You could also record multiple instruments onto each loop. Anyway, when you pressed the “piano” key, it activated the tape head for that single loop, and it was sent to an amplifier and out through the speakers. It was a recoding of an actual instrument, vice one from a tone generator. It foreshadowed the modern digital keyboard which had digital recordings of actual instruments that the musician can select and play, and even layer.
But it introduced to me the concept of adding strings to my band, a supporting a new style of rock & blues, and I embraced it. It was expensive, and by the time I had enough cash, ARP came out with it’s own string ensemble at a much lower price so I bought that.
But everytime I head the Moody Blues, I think about the way they embraced that new technology, and used it to create a wonderful and unique style of music.
Thanks for the post, Hondo. I love these sorts of sidetracks. 🙂
The Mellotron was a really ingenious way to get strings from a keyboard instrument, although it added a sort of wheezy quality that set its sound apart from real strings. I do think that Mike Pinder of the Moodies got about as natural a sound from the Mellotron as anyone who eve used the instrument.
…”ever” used the instrument…
Never realized that there was a follow up to “Your Wildest Dreams.” I like it!
Not sure it qualifies precisely as a “follow-up”, NR Pax. It wasn’t their next single; in fact, it was on their next album and wasn’t released until slightly over 2 years had passed.
However, the second song – both musically and lyrically – is a direct sequel to the first. The same lady was used in both videos to portray the songs’ subject.
I don’t know if Hayward has ever publicly acknowledged who inspired him to write those two. But whoever she was . . . she certainly must have been someone quite special, at least to him.
I remember listening to them when I was young, they were a great band way back when.
I guess some are still alive and I think I heard that they were touring again.
I like this song too, from Mike and the Mechanics. That sounds like a movie title from Jason Stateham now, but it’s still a great song.
I love these Saturday morning off everything conversations.
OMG, Cyndi Lauper has over 108 million watching this video !!!
Just a good song that talks of happier times.
For some reason that song always screams 80’s to me. It’s one of the benchmarks of frivolous have fun music.
Thanks Hondo. First full symphonic rock album I owned was “Days Of Future Past”, 1967.
I really enjoyed watching “A Night At Red Rocks” concert. Shed a different light on some of the studio songs.
As long as we’re talking music from the past, how about this?
https://youtu.be/cX8GzhAFPeY
The military phrasing is a little off, but it’s a good story in a song…
https://youtu.be/TsPh-EgH65M