LIVE AT WEMBLEY '78

At about the same time ELO released Live at Winterland '76, they released another archival recording of a concert held during the Out of the Blue Tour in 1978. This one was performed at Wembley in front of 8,000 fans, of which two were the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester (which Lynne thanks for attending). This concert also featured "The Spaceship," a £200,000 replica of the flying saucer on the Out of the Blue cover made out of aluminum and fiberglass. The roof of the saucer was apparently lifted by hydraulics to reveal the band rising from within the craft on individual platforms. This is clearly shown on this album's cover. For this show, the band was also introduced by the legendary Tony Curtis.

It sounds like it would have been quite a sight to see. I just hope the people attending got a better-sounding performance from the band than this recording. At best, the recording of this concert is bootleg quality. It almost sounds like parts of it were recorded in mono. The other problem I have with this is the lousy selection of material performed. But I guess that can be expected since this was 1978 and they were promoting their big hits of that year. Everything is from either Out of the Blue or A New World Record, except for Showdown and Roll Over Beethoven. At the very least they could've performed their Concerto for a Rainy Day in order, or perhaps taken a chance at performing The Whale.

Due to the very poor recording of this show, I can't recommend this to anyone but completionists. Don't let the colorful cover fool you or the long track list of hits. It should be stamped "official bootleg." It's too bad they didn't get this performance properly recorded, even with the lousy selection. One star.