In Search Of That Lost Chord...

You're an ocean full of faces And you know that we believe We're just a wave that drifts around you Singing all our hopes and dreams JUSTIN HAYWARD

"The next thing to do was to prove that we could do it all again", says Graeme. "With the songs on 'Days', we knew that they would appeal to the public because we had played them live, but the songs we had for 'In Search Of The Lost Chord' hadn't been tried out in front of an audience so we had our reservations about them".

In Graeme's own words, 'Lost Chord' worked and took the Moody Blues to a larger audience.

"As well as taking us to a larger audience in a shorter time than 'Days', it also established a hard core following for us".

The major step that was taken with 'Lost Chord' was the decision by the group to play everything on the record themselves after having recorded 'Days' with Peter Knight and a studio orchestra. A popular misconception is that the Moody Blues and the session men on 'Days' were all in the studio together, but Justin explains just what happened: "It was all a bit of a rush job. As soon as we had recorded each track we rushed a copy over to Peter Knight and he wrote a link for the orchestra and then recorded it. When both parts had been recorded we went back to the studio and mixed everything."

So the Moody Blues did it again, and went to America for a three-month tour covering nearly every major city and ending in Vancouver in December 1968.

"It was horrible", says Justin. "As far as playing in America went, we were so raw and made so many mistakes. The biggest error was probably not taking any American road crew with us. It was just us and Peter Jackson and because we were traveling so light, we had trouble on 50 per cent of our shows.
"When we played the Fillmore East in New York we gave a demonstration of how to repair a Mellotron in 45 minutes with a bent coathanger and a screwdriver. Naturally the Americans didn't know what to make of us. They'd heard our records then they'd seen us on stage - and there's quite a gap between the two.
"California was the only State that really took to us. The rest? Most had mixed feelings- especially promoters, who weren't sure of our potential".

The Dream Gets Nearer Reality...

You'll see us all around Turning, spinning, catherine-wheeling Forever changing, there's no beginning You're so very far from home And so very much alone RAY THOMAS

Once again with their next album the Moody Blues looked for something new to add to their music. They decided that album sleeves had been too dull for too long, and wanted to break into new fields with 'On The Threshold Of A Dream'.

Graeme: "The artistic value of record sleeves was being grossly underestimated by record companies. A lot of space was being misused, especially with double sleeves. We wanted to make a record and its sleeve a complete thing, making what was happening on the outside as important and the music itself.

When we presented our plans to Decca they were wary, and it took us a long time to get what we wanted. In fact, getting the sleeve and the accompanying booklet together took longer than making the record".

When both were completed, they were received by the public with open arms and the Moody Blues became established as one of the World's most exciting and creative groups - but things still weren't easy.

Because the Moody Blues wanted to do something special, some critics felt that the group were pretentious and that their innovations were merely gimmicks. All of a sudden the punters and the pundits were split into two camps - the believers and the cynics.

Never the twain shall meet, but many people who felt the group were into hype have long since changed their minds, realising that whatever the group do is done with total sincerity and with a belief in their music and their principles.

"We are musicians and entertainers", says Justin. "We make and present music and hope to please as many people as possible. We realise that our music may not be everybody's cup of tea, but that's what we believe in and it's what we like doing. At the same time we realise the importance of the public, and never do anything with out music that is just to please ourselves".

To Our Children..And Other Close Relationships...

I'm going to sing my song And sing it all day long A song that never ends How can I tell you All the things inside my head MIKE PINDER

The first album on the Moody Blue's label, Threshold, was 'To Our Children's Children's Children', which was released in 1969, when, among other things, man first set foot on the Moon.

The Moon landing, in the middle of that strange summer, happened when Mother Earth was going through strange times, and the American space programme was strongly criticised for its cost as man had many problems on Earth which needed money to be resolved.

To a great extent, the knockers took a lot of glory away from those brave astronauts and this upset the Moodies who are all eager amateur astronomers.

"We really wanted to do an album about space", says Graeme. "We spent a lot of our time - and still do - gazing up at the sky through telescopes and we soon realised that all of us on Earth were insignificant compared with the vastness of the Universe. We wanted to express that with 'Children's Children'.

It was really Tony Clarke's baby, but it was a subject we all felt strongly about".

The sleeve of the album mystified a lot of people with its cave man theme, but Justin explains what it was all about:
"The hand on the front of the album is life size, but it's on the inside of the folder that we really tried to say something. There we were, gathered around a fire in a cave with a tape machine, and outside there was nothing. For us that was Utopia. Where were we? I don't know. We were trying to project the thought that we were on a planet that wasn't Earth - as I say, it was just Utopia for us".

After making 'Children's Children', the Moodies made another decision that many others were later to copy. They found that they were writing songs which were only suitable for inclusion on albums and were virtually impossible to play on stage.

"In the studio," says Graeme, "we have all kinds of instruments and technical effects which we can incorporate on numbers, but when you are playing on stage one man can only handle one thing. We made up our minds with 'Children's Children' that from then on we were only to record songs which were capable of playing on stage without any added instrumentation."

It's All A Question Of Balance Really.....

Just open your mind And you will find The way it's always been Just open your heart And that's a start GRAEME EDGE

It's now the summer of 1970 and a chart-topping single of that summer was 'Question', the title track from the Moodies' next album.

"The 'Question of Balance' album was the first we had recorded which didn't have a theme running through it", says Graeme. "It might not sound the right way to do things, but we went into the studio without any songs written and made it all up as we went along. In five weeks we had completed the album".

Once again the album was a milestone for the band. " 'Question' really brought us all together", explains Justin. "Instead of being five individuals contributing to an end product, we became more of a unit and musically the band became much stronger. With each album we faced a new challenge, and 'Question' was no exception. Because we were not writing to a concept, it was more difficult compiling the LP. We had nothing to work from at all, but fortunately everything fell into place".

During 1970 the Moody Blues played three American tours, covering the States with short bursts of activity throughout the year - and one factor was continually being discovered on these tours; the fans wanted to hear the old songs as well as the new.

"At the time we had about five songs in the act which we just couldn't leave out. As each album was released, the public would latch onto one or two songs in particular and would expect to hear them in the act. After 'Question of Balance' was released we found that, with our new material, we were playing for nearly two hours on every gig. We eventually cut the set down to 75 minutes and reached a compromise between the old and new songs - but it's still very difficult trying to get a balance".

1970 was the year when Graeme felt that the band had finally arrived as the knockers stepped up their activities.

"That was the year when I sat back and thought how we had missed out on being a well loved band, like the Beatles or some of our contemporaries. When we first started there was a hard core of people who wrote letters to the music press pleading for us to get the recognition we deserved, and we seemed to go straight from that to being labelled pretentious. Somewhere along the line we missed out on being loved.

If people have found our music pretentious, there is little I can say other than we are our music, and our music is all we have got".

Every Good Boy Deserves Something......

With the release of 'Every Good Boy Deserves Favour', the Moody Blues mystified their fans once again. As usual, the album was widely acclaimed but some people felt that the group were beginning to have a cosy look about them, but their sales figures killed those feelings.

For Graeme, 'Every Good Boy Deserves Favour' was the opening of a very interesting chapter which is still not closed - his experimentation with electronic drum kits.

"I'd been working on the idea for some time but found it difficult to get the sound and the quality that I wanted. After a lot of work on the project I found that I could use the kit on the album as part of the track 'Procession'. It did what it was required to do for the song, but quite frankly, it didn't work. There was nothing wrong with the principle of the thing, but....

So the album debuted Graeme's invention and once again, there was more to the title of the LP than one would first imagine.

The classical notation E.G.B.D.F. form an augmented chord and are the basic musical notes which are first taught to children when musical training is in its initial stages.

"To help children learn notes, teachers make phrases out of the letters. Some make it 'every good boy deserves flogging' but we wanted it to mean more than that".

The Seventh Son And Beyond......

The album 'Seventh Sojourn' was certified Gold in America before it was released and climaxed a period when the Moody Blues probably achieved their greatest success to date.

Somewhere on the West Coast of America, a DJ was closing each day's broadcasting with the Moodies' 'Nights In White Satin' - released five years earlier. The group had just completed a U.S. tour which had reportedly outsold Presley at the box office, and radio station programmers on the West Coast were picking up on 'Nights'. In the late summer of 1972 the record was being played throughout the States and this sparked off a chain reaction and, as 'Nights' climbed to the Number One spot in the singles charts, interest was being renewed in 'Days Of Future Passed' - the album that started it all.

Heads began to turn as both the album and single crashed to Number One - a fantastic prelude to the band's upcoming tour and album, 'Seventh Sojourn'.

'Seventh Sojourn' was released to coincide with the tour and the Moody Blues went Stateside on back of two Number One hits 'Sojourn' stayed at the top for five weeks and the Moody Blues became the world's best selling recording group.

For the first time, they played Madison Square Garden in New York in October, 1972 - and sold out two concerts on the same night. '72 was also the year of the big awards as the band picked up trophies from the National Association of Record Merchandisers, The American Society of Composers and Performers, two Gold Discs - for 'Nights' and 'Sojourn' - and an Ivor Novello Award for 'A Simple Game'.

Pretentious? Negative? Boring? These and other accusations are quashed by the fact that the Moody Blues are one of the biggest attractions in entertainment the world has ever known. This year the Moody Blues are making a world tour through Scandinavia, Europe, Great Britain, America and on to Japan to play to close to one million people.

Next year?

This Autumn 1973 Tour by The Moody Blues visits Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, France, Holland, Great Britain, The United States and Japan and will be seen by close to one million people.

A tour of this size needs many months of careful planning - arranging good venues, checking and double checking sound equipment, rehearsing the new stage act, making travel arrangements for the five Moodies plus several tons of equipment which will travel many hundreds of thousands of miles - these are just a few of the thousand things that have to be prepared.

So we though we'd show you some of the people who, along with Graeme Edge, Justin Hayward, John Lodge, Mike Pinder and Ray Thomas help to put the show together....

Nicky James has his roots firmly planted in music; back in the early Sixties he was an integral part of the Midlands musical scene, working with people like Mike Pinder, Roy Wood, John Bonham and Denny Laine. He formed a band around that time called the Nicky James Movement - who later shortened their name to The Move. Nicky felt the urge to do something else - to work full-time on his songwriting. He eventually teamed up with Graham Nash after Graham left The Hollies. Before he went to America to join Steve Stills and company, Graham and Nicky wrote together. All this past experience has given Nicky a definite direction for his music. He's put together a very fine band and together they have been working around Britain before joining this tour. With Nicky on lead guitar is Jon Weider, formerly of the Animals and more recently Family and who was featured on guitar on the early Stones hit 'Not Far Away'. On bass is Brother Fataar from South Africa - and he's the brother of Beach Boy Ricky Fataar. They were both originally with the Springbok band The Flames. The drummer is Chico Greenwood. Alan Fealdman is on keyboards and Barry Martin is the sax player - and the combination of these five excellent musicians combined with Nicky's superb voice and distinctive songs is outstanding. Together they have become one of the most distinctive bands to emerge for many a year.

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THE NICKY JAMES BAND





THE MOODY BLUES


Back cover of the Tour Book