Face The Music
	Produced by Jeff Lynne
	Released on October 1975
	US CHART POSITION #8 . . . GOLD RECORD (1/23/76)
	Find it at GEMM
UA-LA546-G cover [high resolution photo]

T he mix of Beatlesque melodies, strings and disco production touches was fast becoming a signature sound for ELO. Where earlier albums featured one such hit single (often exceptions to the songs around them), Face The Music featured two: “Strange Magic” (which sounds a lot like The Bee Gees) and “Evil Woman.” The rest of the record is a mixed bag, opening with the chilling instrumental “Fire On High” (following a by-now familiar pattern of overtures) and closing with the languid “One Summer Dream.” I’ve always been less enamored of this record than, say, On The Third Day or A New World Record. Maybe it’s because almost half of the songs (the opening instrumental, “Poker” and “Down Home Town”) do nothing to advance the album’s cause. No concept is at work, so the songs stand on their own merits. “Waterfall,” “Nightrider,” “One Summer Dream” and the two singles stand as tall as earlier forays into post-Beatles pop (with Jeff Lynne’s guitar work taking on an increasingly George-geous tone), but the remaining trio feels like filler. Fans aren’t likely to mind the lapses into mediocrity because (like a certain little girl of some renown) when they’re good they’re very, very good. The power pop of “Poker” isn’t a complete loss, although if that’s Kelly Groucutt singing the lead, he manages to make Jeff Lynne sound good. Not a great album, but a good one, if arguably the weakest link in the Third Day to Discovery studio chain. It’s not an indictment against Face The Music so much as a testimony to the quality of the albums before and after.

UA-LA546-G back cover	UA-LA546-G lyric sleeve

TRACK LISTING

1. FIRE ON HIGH    5:29
2. WATERFALL    4:11
3. EVIL WOMAN    4:34
4. NIGHTRIDER    4:22
5. POKER    3:30
6. STRANGE MAGIC    4:29
7. DOWN HOME TOWN    3:53
8. ONE SUMMER DREAM    5:45
   
   All compositions by Jeff Lynne

CREDITS

BEV BEVAN -- drums and percussion, backing vocals
MELVYN GALE -- cello
KELLY GROUCUTT -- bass, vocals and backing vocals
MIK KAMINSKY -- violin
JEFF LYNNE -- guitar, vocals, backing vocals, string arrangements
HUGH McDOWALL -- cello
RICHARD TANDY -- piano, moog, guitar, clavinet, string arrangements
Louis Clark -- string arrangements
Brian's feet -- Brian's footsteps
Mack -- engineer
Richard -- engineer
Jimmy and Dave -- remix engineers
Fred Valentine -- cover & inside sleeve photos
Norman Seeff -- back cover photo
John Kehe, Mick Haggerty/Art Attack -- design & execution

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