Keep on rocking Jeff Lynne's ELO.

 Keep on rocking Jeff's Lynne's ELO.

It's only a week ago that Jeff Lynne's announced his withdrawal from his last ever concert at Hyde Park. He did so because he knew he was fighting a losing battle with a broken, damaged hand that would never be fit enough to perform with a guitar that became his essential livelihood and therefore Lynne's ELO wouldn't be able to perform before their  thousands and millions of loyal fans. 

It was with immense regret that Jeff Lynne had to cancel what he promised would be his swansong, his final bow on a major stage, a group of men who had established that warmest of rapport with all those who'd followed his band all over the world and enjoyed the most fervent hero worship. For the aficionados who had suspected the worst before the concert last week, this may have been an even more bitter blow. But sadly this was not to be and, of course, we all send the speediest of recoveries to this remarkably modest singer, musician, innovator, pioneer, prolific lyricist and song writer of the highest quality. 

For well over five decades now the Electric Light Orchestra have wowed their audiences with songs of the most avant garde originality, startlingly poetic lyrics and the kind of imaginative instrumentation that few of us had ever seen. They have travelled the world, broken down all of pop's occasionally one dimensional barriers and then given us both visually stunning graphics and futuristic science fiction optics. Their stage performances and dazzling stadium appearances that will continue to linger in the memory for ever. 

After a happy childhood growing up in Birmingham, Jeff Lynne was always single minded, fiercely driven and motivated. He knew he wanted to be famous, a celebrity rock guitarist with a freshly conceived and executed approach to the pop music industry. From his earliest days with Roy Wood's the Move, Lynne tells the story of how, waking up one morning, he told his mum quite emphatically that he never wanted to be subjected to the toil and drudgery of a job in his local factory.

He was now proud to declare that he was now a musician with hundreds and thousands of pounds in his pocket and would never have to observe the tedious nine to five routine of mundane work again. So his mum agreed and that was that. A star was born and some of us were convinced that works of art were about to be portrayed quite magically and simply. Of course there were the dark days of traumatic setbacks when the dream had to go on the back burner but eventually by the end of the 1970s, the ELO became one of the most distinctive and recognisable bands throughout the world.

And then overnight we were suddenly aware of some of pop music's broadest of canvases, the most astonishing revelation ever seen at any concert venue. The Electric Light Orchestra were a brilliant profusion of double basses, huge cellos, a massive ensemble of colourful violins and keyboards whose acoustics  provided an extraordinary accompaniment to Jeff's lively vocals. All around Lynne were a thousand sounds, dynamics and, increasingly prominent space ships of the most kaleidoscope range.

So the ELO had arrived with a vengeance, a stupendously ambitious musical project in every sense of the word. We must have felt enormously privileged to be associated with such ground breaking music. There were the masterful albums and singles, a gold and platinum plated global record phenomenon without any equal. And yet there was Lynne, a thickly bearded, denim jacketed, guitar man with so many key chord changes that at times it was all very fantastically bewildering.

When Mr Blue Sky was first played on every radio station throughout the world, we knew we were listening to something quite remarkable, a rock and opera masterpiece that took the commercial mainstream pop world by storm. Nobody believed you could possibly produce a single that encompassed everything that was so inventive and unique that it would blow away all the contenders.

Blue Sky took rock music by the scruff of the neck and revolutionised both the structure and content of any 45 vinyl single that had been released up until that point. It followed the developments of a beautiful day in the sun and an aching yearning for yet more sun even when the greyness of winter had hung over him for so much longer. To a conventional hard rock theme throughout, Lynne created fairground effects, dramatic violins of the most classical kind, a stimulating backdrop of yet more hard rocking guitars and double basses were carried across the stage with bizarre and mesmerising effect. 

And then there was Turned To Stone, Sweet Talkin' Woman, Telephone Line, the brilliant and much underrated The Diary of Horace Wimp, Livin' Thing, All Over the World, the magnificent Rock Aria and Roll Over Beethoven. There was something both sublime and exquisite about ELO, a visionary quality that saw much further into the future than had ever been thought possible. 

So it was that we expressed our natural disappointment about the cancellation of last week's ELO concert.  Lynne said that he was heartbroken and devastated at standing down from appearing in front of a Hyde Park audience who had last seen him in the same place 11 years ago. But we understood and extended the warm hand of compassion to a man who had elevated the rock music genre to an entirely new level. Thankyou Jeff Lynne, for those delightful voyages of discovery, Out of the Blue and those wonderful space crafts. Get better quickly and be sure that you'll always have our appreciation and understanding. Take a bow, rock legend.