Discovery – ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA****

Shine A Little Love/Confusion/Need Her Love/The Diary Of Horace Wimp/Last Train To London/Midnight Blue/On The Run/Wishing/Don't Bring Me Down

By the end of the decade ELO had been transformed from an innovative experimental rock band to a pop hit making machine with some disco elements. Discovery features the UK top ten hits Shine A Little Love, Diary Of Horace Wimp, Don’t Bring Me Down and Confusion. (US:5 UK:1)

“It's just pretty pop catchy, sometimes with strings or keyboards or vocals that reference art music tangentially. There is also a distinct disco vibe on a number of tracks, adding a boring, metronomic pulse to some of the songs, making them seem even less arty than they already did.”

“As a whole this is a pleasant, easy-on-the-ear, certainly a radio friendly album, but its creator is not quite at his best and it is certainly over-produced. There are better discoveries to be made in Jeff Lynne's back catalogue than this one.”

“Electric Light Orchestra had been flirting with disco since Evil Woman, and on two songs from Discovery they just drop any pretence and go for it.”

“Now down to four main members, and with the band’s customary strings gradually giving way to synthesizers, this remains one of Electric Light Orchestra's best albums. They embrace disco with the likes of the opening Shine A Little Love and the wonderful, breezy Last Train To London.”

“Jeff Lynne takes his rock juggernaut and trains it on the lowlier ambitions of disco and lounge, plus a few odd trinkets. All of it ages well, as a technical marvel. But in terms of rock credibility, it was absent since the day it was released. Having lopped off the string section, he had set in motion a process where, in the end, he was the only person left in the band.”

“They now have a bit of a reputation with many people as an overproduced, disco-influenced abomination. Much of the reason for that came with Discovery, an album made up predominately of ballads and dance tracks.”

“Lynne made the bizarre decision to replace the string players with keyboards, a move influenced by disco music. I don't mind too much the sound Discovery, which surprisingly is not that different from their other albums. Strong point is undoubtedly the singles, which were not only excellent, but also vary versatile.”