Electric Light Orchestra

The Electric Light Orchestra or ELO is an English band formed by Jeff Lynne and Roy Wood in 1970. Jeff Lynne had started out in a band called The Idle Race in the 60s, which actually began in 1959 as Billy King and the Nightriders, and later met Roy Wood of the successful band The Move. Jeff Lynne and Roy Wood were both fans of The Beatles, and after The Beatles broke up in 1970, the two decided to pick up where The Beatles left off, and so ELO was created.
However, their first record was not very successful, so Roy Wood left the band and formed Wizzard. So from then on Jeff Lynne became the band's leader. They are a unique band in that they really were like an orchestra (a light orchestra being a small orchestra) that used Cellos, Violins and Woodwinds, over 3 years before Kansas had formed (for those unaware, Kansas is one of the only rock bands to use a Violin). 
ELO then became massive superstars later in the decade with hits such as Mr Blue Sky, Strange Magic, Evil Woman and Don't Bring me Down. Due to Jeff Lynne simply being burned out on being in ELO, he disbanded the band in 1986 and went on to be a member of the Traveling Wilbury's with George Harrison, Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan and Tom Petty.
ELO reformed briefly in 2000 and recorded Zoom in 2001 but then broke up again. However, Jeff Lynne and Richard Tandy (the keyboardist) reformed the band as Jeff Lynne's ELO in 2012, and have remained active since.
Strangely, despite their happy sound, in the 80s a bunch of stupid fucking dumbass fundamentalist christian nutjobs thought that their early records contained backwards satanic messages (they also said this about Styx, Pink Floyd, Queen, and The Beatles) so they made an album called Secret Messages which contained intentional secret messages just to fuck with them, as did most of the other bands on that list with the obvious exception of The Beatles who had broken up by then.
Category:Bands
Category:1970s
Category:Bands that never had a Consistent Lineup