Message From The Country

Hailing from Birmingham, The Move featured some of the city’s best musicians: Bev Bevan, Trevor Burton, Chris “Ace” Kefford, Roy Wood and Carl Wayne. In 1966, they secured management and headed down to London. Publicity stunts aside, they released several Top 10 singles, including psych classic “Flowers In The Rain” b/w “(Here We Go Round) the Lemon Tree” and poppier “Blackberry Way” b/w “Something;” the former was the first chart song played on the BBC’s Radio 1, while the latter was produced by Traffic’s Jimmy Miller and rose to No. 1 in the UK. The band took part in the successful package tour of late 1967 with Pink Floyd, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Nice and others. However, by 1970 Kefford, Burton and Wayne had left The Move and another Brum, Jeff Lynne, fresh from The Idle Race, had joined. Their next single, the heavy rocking “Brontosaurus” b/w “Lightning Never Strikes Twice,” rose to the UK No. 7, and a final album for Harvest, Message From The Country, arrived in June 1971. Like other albums from the band, it was split-both musically and compositionally-between Wood and Lynne. And therein lies the tale of two bands: Sharing only that signature big bass sound, Lynne’s Beatlesque pop of the title track, “No Time” or “The Minister” is sharply contrasted by the earthy rock ‘n’ roll of Wood-witness the punchy “Ella James” or eclectic “It Wasn’t My Idea to Dance.” Never mind, the band had run its course and the trio was already off to explore a fusion of classical string instruments and rock music by morphing into Electric Light Orchestra. In fact, the track “10538 Overture” from their debut album was recorded by The Move in 1970. Wood left during the recording of the second ELO album to form Wizzard, taking his 50s-inspired glam rock with him. Lynne would then turn ELO into one of the 70s great pop bands.