Bad Movies. Good Rum. ELO Concert

Movie Night here at home.

Spy, a Bad Movie that featured a lot of shots of Portland. The Wife[tm] wanted us to share reveling in shot of our beloved city while observing yet another script that came ot Portland to die.

Invasion:UFO, a Bad Movie that was an idea from the Minds of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson whilst enroute, artistically, from Thunderbirds to Space:1999. The star was Ed Bishop, a handsome young (at the time...this was 1969) fellow who could declaim with the best of them. This movie either led to or was a byproduct of the Anderson series UFO, which chronicled the secret struggle between Earth and ETs from an unknown planet who wanted to harvest human organs for transplant. They flew about in frantically-spinning ships which resembled cake-covers if they were designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, they breathed liquid, and they were nasty and ruthless.

The acting was almost-believeable, the f/x, imported from the Andersons' time producing the T'birds, were easily read but good looking enough that you forgave it and went along. The production had it's charm in the clothing styles, include in kitsch-sexy ensemble for the Moonbase personnel which included purple pageboyish wigs for the females.

The Wife[tm] on Commander Ed Straker, as played by Ed Bishop: "He sure does make a lot of speeches, doesn't he?"

The ELO Concert; in the hopeful atmosphere of the world before 9/11, Jeff Lynne revived the ELO concept, with a new lineup, a new album (Zoom) and a tour. ELO has long been my favorite band, and Jeff Lynne my favorite songwriter. I was hopeful that the tour would come close enough to Portland to attend. Sony had ginned up a band website (elomuic.com) and had a message board going. They were even going to relrelease the old catalog with bonus tracks and graphic goodies. It was looking like it was going to be fine.

Then the tour fell flat, and was cancelled after three dates.

The album garnered mixed reviews and didn't do well.

Sony suspended the relrelease after three albums.

And the fan base dengenerated into a huge argument over whether ELO was really ELO with only Jeff on board.

Well, at least I had the concert to look forward to, it was going to be shown on OPB in...November 2001.

So, last evening, at Hollywood Video, we found the Zoom concert DVD. The Wife[tm] graciously consented to our viewing. I did so later that night whilst drinking the rum (Cruzan, for the record). The performance was fine, Jeff was in good form.
Bittersweet because I realized that this is probably as close as I'm ever going to get to a ELO concert. If you loved ELO, Zoom is a fine album and you should get it, if you haven't yet (it's been out for a couple of years); the concert is worth viewing, Rosie Vela is a fine backup singer and is easy on the eyes, and there are two sexy female cello players. and, for the old guard, Richard Tandy is holding up the keyboard end (and it is a pleasure just to watch him play). The music tended toward very old (Ma-Ma-Ma-Belle) and new (songs from Zoom) with a couple of goodies from thier big late '70s run (even "Don't Bring Me Down") mixed in.

I give it 5 spaceships.