Telephone Line - ELO (1977) 4/3/22

For those of you who might not know, The Electric Light Orchestra was a British group. That has some bearing on today's "Great Song of 1977."

ELO was already having some Top 10 success in the US with songs like 1974's "Can't Get It Out of My Head" which we highlighted back on 2/20/22. (You can read the blog post below.)

Group leader/genius Jeff Lynne was always coming up with ideas...and with the 1977's "Telephone Line," he added something subliminal to hopefully spur some extra record sales in the States.

It occurred to Jeff that using the sound effect of an AMERICAN phone, which was apparently different from an English phone, might do the trick.

Here's how he did it: "We phoned from England to America to a number that we knew nobody would be at, to just listen to it for a while. On the Moog, we recreated the sound exactly by tuning the oscillators to the same notes as the ringing of the phone."

At the very least, it was a clever idea...and it appeared to work.

The song reached #8 in the UK, but #7 in the US. For the record, it topped the charts in France and New Zealand...so maybe it didn't matter. Or maybe it did. Of course, the doo-wop breaks and Beatlesque harmonies were pretty outstanding as well.

The bottom line? Whether or not Jeff's sound effect idea made a difference, "Telephone Line" by ELO was still a "Great Song of 1977!"

"Strange Magic" Blog Post: https://www.facebook.com/MichaelCuuuk/posts/508154950657957