Who is moody blues

Days of Future Passed remained on the Billboard album charts for the next five years and is considered one of the very first progressive rock albums. The early s saw the band evolve yet again, this time determined to create albums more reproducible in a live concert setting.

This website uses cookie data. Read our Privacy Policy for more information. By using this website you agree to our Privacy Policy. Buy Tickets. Become A Member. Know Before You Go. Exhibit Guide. Join Corporate Partner Virtual Events. Jul 22 The Moody Blues produced numerous hits that became staples of FM radio.

A major tour was quickly booked, and the band landed an engagement at the Marquee Club, which resulted in a contract with England's Decca Records less than six months after their formation. It was coming up with a follow-up hit to "Go Now," however, that proved their undoing.

Despite their fledgling songwriting efforts and the access they had to American demos, this version of the Moody Blues never came up with another single success. By the end of the spring of , the frustration was palpable within the band. The group decided to make their fourth single, "From the Bottom of My Heart," an experiment with a different, much more subtly soulful sound, and it was one of the most extraordinary records of the entire British Invasion, with haunting performances all around.

Unfortunately, the single only reached number 22 on the British charts following its release in May of , and barely brushed the Top in America. Ultimately, the grind of touring, coupled with the strains facing the group, became too much for Warwick , who exited in the spring of ; and by August of Laine had left as well.

For a time, they kept doing the same brand of music that the group had started with, but Hayward and Pinder were also writing different kinds of songs, reflecting somewhat more folk- and pop-oriented elements, that got out as singles, to little avail. At one point in , the band decided to pull up stakes in England and start playing in Europe, where even a "has-been" British act could earn decent fees.

And they began building a new act based on new material that was more in keeping with the slightly trippy, light psychedelic sounds that were becoming popular at the time. They were still critically short of money and prospects, however, when fate played a hand, in the form of a project initiated by Decca Records.

In contrast to America, where home stereo systems swept the country after , in England, stereo was still not dominant, or even common, in most people's homes -- apart from classical listeners -- in The result was the album Days of Future Passed.

The record's mix of rock and classical sounds was new, and at first puzzled the record company, which didn't know how to market it, but eventually the record was issued, first in England and later in America. It became a hit in England, propelled up the charts by the single "Nights in White Satin" authored and sung by Hayward , which made the Top 20 in the U. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Better still, the band still had a significant backlog of excellent psychedelic-themed songs to draw on.

Their debt wiped out and their music now in demand, they went to work with a follow-up record in short order and delivered In Search of the Lost Chord , which was configured somewhat differently from its predecessor. Though Decca was ecstatic with the sales results of Days of Future Passed and the singles, and assigned Clarke and Varnals to work with them in the future, the label wasn't willing to schedule full-blown orchestral sessions again.

And having just come out of a financial hole, the group wasn't about to go into debt again financing such a recording. The solution to the problem of accompaniment came from Mike Pinder , and an organ-like device called a Mellotron. Using tape heads activated by the touch of keys, and tape loops comprised of the sounds of horns, strings, etc.

Introduced at the start of the '60s as a potential rival to the Hammond organ, the Mellotron had worked its way into rock music slowly, in acts such as the Graham Bond Organisation , and had emerged to some public prominence on Beatles ' records such as "Strawberry Fields Forever" and, more recently, "I Am the Walrus"; during that same year, in a similar supporting capacity, it would also turn up on the Rolling Stones ' Their Satanic Majesties Request.

As it happened, Pinder not only knew how to play the Mellotron, but had also worked in the factory that built them, which enabled him over the years to re-engineer, modify, and customize the instruments to his specifications. The resulting instruments were nicknamed "Pindertrons. In Search of the Lost Chord put the Mellotron in the spotlight, and it quickly became a part of their signature sound. The album, sublimely beautiful and steeped in a strange mix of British whimsy "Dr.

Livingston I Presume" and ornate, languid Eastern-oriented songs "Visions of Paradise," "Om" , also introduced one psychedelic-era anthem, "Legend of a Mind"; authored by Ray Thomas and utilizing the name of LSD guru Timothy Leary in its lyric and choruses, along with swooping cellos and lilting flute, it helped make the band an instant favorite among the late-'60s counterculture.

The group members have since admitted at various times that they were, as was the norm at the time, indulging in various hallucinogenic substances. That album and its follow-up, 's On the Threshold of a Dream , were magnificent achievements, utilizing their multi-instrumental skills and the full capability of the studio in overdubbing voices, instruments, etc.

But in the process of making those two LPs, the group found that they'd painted themselves into a corner as performing musicians -- thanks to overdubbing, those albums were essentially the work of 15 or 20 Moody Blues , not a quintet, and they were unable to re-create their sound properly in concert. From their album To Our Children's Children's Children -- which was also the first release of the group's own newly founded label, Threshold Records -- only one song, the guitar-driven "Gypsy," ever worked on-stage.

Beginning with A Question of Balance , the group specifically recorded songs in arrangements that they could play in concert, stripping down their sound a bit by reducing their reliance on overdubbing and, in the process, toughening up their sound.

They were able to do most of that album and their next record, Every Good Boy Deserves Favour , on-stage, with impressive results. By that time, all five members of the band were composing songs, and each had his own identity, Pinder the impassioned mystic, Lodge the rocker, Edge the poet, Thomas the playful mystic, and Hayward the romantic -- all had contributed significantly to their repertoire, though Hayward tended to have the biggest share of the group's singles, and his songs often occupied the lead-off spot on their LPs.

Meanwhile, a significant part of their audience didn't think of the Moody Blues merely as musicians but, rather, as spiritual guides. Ironically, in , the group was suddenly competing with itself when "Nights in White Satin" charted again in America and England, selling far more than it had in ; that new round of single sales also resulted in Days of Future Passed selling anew by the tens of thousands.

In the midst of all of this activity, the members, finally slowing down and enjoying the fruits of their success, had reached an impasse. As they prepared to record their new album, Seventh Sojourn , the strain of touring and recording steadily for five years had taken its toll. Good songs were becoming more difficult to deliver and record, and cutting that album had proved nearly impossible.

The public never saw the problems, and its release earned them their best reviews to date and was accompanied by a major international tour, and the sales and attendance were huge. Once the tour was over, however, it was announced that the group was going on hiatus -- they wouldn't work together again for five years.