Electric Light Orchestra - Prologue-Twilight

The Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) has two primary inspirational sources, the Beatles and classic music. It is very easy to hear the Beatles inspired rifts in songs like “Mr. Blue Sky” or “Kuiama.” The classic music inspirations are everywhere and readily noticeable, from their first album “10538 Overture” or the ending half of “Mr. Blue Sky.” “Mr. Blue Sky” is a very good example of everything ELO is about.

In the early days of ELO, a more acoustic sound prevailed, and this corresponds with Roy Wood’s creative contributions of the band. After only two years Woods left ELO and left Jeff Lynne as the sole primary song writer and clear leader of the group going forward. In short time Lynne would gradually transform ELO into a band experimenting with fancy science fiction like sounds that we have all come to love about progressive rock.

Unimportant side note, my best friend prefers some of the older days ELO songs where as I am fonder of the otherworldly sounds of the later days ELO. I find this interesting since we have the completely inverted opinions on the matter for Bob Seger, who did the exact opposite of ELO and become more folk rock as time went on.

Sometimes I feel like Jeff Lynne is an underrated guitarist and song writer; in most ways that we can judge such things, he is not; Lynne is praised by critics and highly respected by his peers, and ELO was inducted into the rock and roll hall of fame in 2017, so it is safe to say Lynne and his art is deeply appreciated. Nonetheless I see something a little different about his situation. The founding members of the supergroup, the Traveling Wilburys includes, Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty and Jeff Lynne. Lynne is by far the least recognized and famous out of that list, and maybe he should not be. Even if he is doomed to be the least famous in that impressive cast, casuals should probably recognize his work more. But I say something like this in about half of my reviews, so take that for what you will.

ELO would produce an album a year, every year, up to 1977 with the release of their most successful album ever “Out of the Blue.” This begins the saga of my three favorite ELO albums, “Out of the Blue” (1977), “Discovery” (1979), and “Time” (1981).

Like a lot of people, I am particularly fond of “Time.”

“Out of the Blue” is probably ELO’s best album, but “Time” is a close second. From the psychedelic cover art with the cosmic water and a planet droplet, to the trippy sounds contained within, “Time” is a pinnacle example of ELO and Lynne’s stellar creativity. From the opening “Prologue” and “Twilight” that brings the sci fi like experience to the front, to the ending with “Hold on Tight” and “Epilogue” that ends the musical space odyssey and brings us back to continuity. “Time” is more or less a concept album, I just have not figured out what the concept is just yet; probably time.

Among the most popular of ELO songs of all time is “Twilight” and it is typically paired with “Prologue” as the two songs flow together perfectly and intentionally. There are many progressive rock songs that feel like a space adventure, and many more that explore the concept of reality through the spectrum of dream and alternate timelines, but there are few that are as extravagant as “Twilight.” I hesitate to use the word bombastic, as that is a back handed compliment suggesting a lack of substance, and while “Twilight” is over the top, it does not lack in metaphysical analytical depth.

The song could be thought of an introduction to the concept of “Time” the album title and theoretically the concept that drives the album artistically, but the struggled expressed in “Twilight” is dream vs reality and how to determine which is which is difficult in the twilight moments of departing into slumber and stirring into wakefulness.

Prologue introduces this idea:

“Just on the border of your waking mind,
There lies another time,
Where darkness and light are one,
And as you tread the halls of sanity
You feel so glad to be unable to go beyond.”

A dream? An alternate world? A different time? Or some insanity? Very out there. Very progressive rock.

The intro to the choruses if probably my favorite lyric from the song

“With your head held high and your scarlet lies,
You came down to me from the open skies,
It's either real or it's a dream,
There's nothing that is in between.”

Something is either real or it is not, that is actually some decent philosophy thrown in there, whether it is intentionally or not.

It could be a frightful prospect, being unable to discern reality from dream, but “Twilight” is just so enthrallingly joyful. Everything about the narrator’s experience sounds more like an adventure, a high adventure of cosmic magnitudes. A fun visit meant to be temporary but being extended perhaps indefinitely comes across more like a vacation becoming a lifestyle, and there is nothing fearful about that. The prospect of going on an otherworldly trip has always appealed to me, like Prism’s “Take Me to the Captain” or The Moody Blues “Beyond the Threshold of a Dream,” and ELO’s “Twilight” taps right into that.

“Prologue” and “Twilight” have received a resurgence in new found popularity and I can point to exactly the reason; this video:

Daicon IV Promotional Animation:

Nihon SF Taikai is a science fiction fan expo in Japan and when it is hosted in Osaka it is nicknamed Daicon, it is a Japanese pun, I believe stemming from the exhibition centre that hosts the event in Osaka. In 1981, it was the third time Osaka hosted the event and they hired a group of amateur animators to produce a promotional video, and those animators called themselves Daicon, presumably in honour of the expo they were working for. They produced a nice video of a young girl growing a giant daikon which is also a spaceship. Charming. Get it, daikon is a vegetable, and Daicon is similar; of course you got it.

Two years later Nihon SF Taikai would be returning to Osaka, and Daicon, the animation studio, would be rehired to make another promotional video and this time they made it count. The young girl from the first video is now an all grown up anime playboy bunny, and she goes on a rampaging adventure which includes… everything? She has a light saber fight with Darth Vader, is attacked by the xenomorph from “Alien” who is wielding Discovery One from “Space Odyssey 2001,” she rides the Stormbringer sword like a flying surfboard, which is a sword from a fantasy series I have never heard of, and while doing so she flies past the Arcadia from the Captain Harlock series, and the SDF1 from “Macross.” From there we are bombarded with images of characters from anime, comic books, science fiction and fantasy literature. For comic books I spot Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Spiderman and Captain America. For fantasy literature I spot Conan the Barbarian and Gandalf. There is plenty of Gundam in there too. On top of all of that there is a bunch of stuff I do not recognize but can safely assume come from something. There is just, everything.

It is amazing they did not get sued; oh wait, they did, by ELO for using “Prologue” and “Twilight.”

It is amazing they were only sued by ELO.

I do not know the whole story, but I believe ELO won the lawsuit and that is why it is very difficult to find a high-quality video of Daicon IV. Still, the internet is an invincible beast and it cannot be denied, so Daicon IV will forever be online somewhere in some level of quality.

The rediscovery of Daicon IV is a relatively new phenomenon. The internet has unleashed the nearly lost promotional video and understandably fans of geek culture have rejoiced in its splendor. What a wacky video, so many unlicensed references, and that group of amateur animators who named them Daicon, they became Gainax, the studio that gave us Gurren Lagann and Neo Genesis Evangelion, how crazy is that? Now ELO’s “Twilight” is very well known, it is rapidly becoming ELO’s most famous song and it has everything to do with that unlicensed video from Daicon IV.

Now I am in no position to tell Jeff Lynne what to do, but my advice would be, embrace this. Let go of any lingering legal battles with the existence of the Daicon IV video and let it be promoted or promote it yourself. This is great publicity. Once you do that… then Disney and everyone else can get their turn to sue the video…. Nonetheless I still think it is a good idea.

I take joy in the fact I used to listen to “Twilight” before fans of geek culture thought it was cool. Pretty cool watching this explosion in popularity. It is nice to see Jeff Lynne and ELO getting some well deserved love for one of my favorite ELO songs.

- King of Braves