Track Listing

Disc 1:

1. The Skeleton And The Roundabout
2. Happy Birthday
3. The Birthday
4. I Like My Toys
5. Morning Sunshine
6. Follow Me Follow
7. Sitting In My Tree
8. On With The Show
9. Lucky Man
10. (Don't Put Your Boys In The Army) Mrs. Ward
11. Pie In The Sky
12. The Lady Who Said She Could Fly
13. End Of The Road
14. Come With Me
15. Sea Of Dreams
16. Going Home
17. Reminds Me Of You
18. Mr Crow And Sir Norman
19. Please No More Sad Songs
20. Girl At The Window
21. Big Chief Woolley Bosher
22. Someone Knocking
23. A Better Life (The Weather Man Knows)
24. Hurry Up John
25. Lucky Man (Alternative Version)
26. Follow Me Follow (Alternative Version)
27. Days Of Broken Arrows (Alternative Version)

Disc 2:

1. Here We Go Round The Lemon Tree
2. My Father's Son
3. Imposters Of Life's Magazine
4. Knocking Nails Into My House
5. Days Of The Broken Arrows
6. Worn Red Carpet
7. In The Summertime
8. Told You Twice
9. Neanderthal Man
10. Victim Of Circumstance
11. Dancing Flower
12. Sad O'Sad
13. The Clock
14. I Will See You
15. By The Sun
16. Alcatraz
17. And The Rain
18. She Sang Hymns Out Of Tune
19. Bitter Green
20. We Want It All

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9048 in Music
• Released on: 2007-04-16
• Number of discs: 2
• Dimensions: .26 pounds

Uncut, June, 2007
**** A fascinating time capsule of schizoid acid pop. Once guitarist Jeff Lynne joined Brumbeat outfit The Nightriders in 1966, they became The Idle Race and soon moved with the happening, psychedelic times. Championed by famous friends like The Beatles, Bolan, Peel and Kenny Everett, the band still somehow never charted. Rounding up all their odd tracks and entire three-album output (the last after Lynne joined The Move), this collection makes it clear why this might have been. With heady floating sounds and melodies, (like "The Lady Who Said She Could Fly") that were sad, but often silly, the Idle Race were great, but maybe just too clever by half.

CD Description
Before making history together with the Move and then ELO, Roy Wood and Jeff Lynne both did time in the British psych-rock oddity the Idle Race. Though they were only in the band together briefly, the Race proved to be a testing ground formany of the ideas the two would bring to fruition--both together and separately--with their many subsequent projects. BACK TO THE STORY, originally released in 1996 and reissued over a decade later, collects the band's three studio albums,as well as alternate takes, demos, and rarities. It's a must-have for fans of Wood and Lynne, yet is also a key piece for those attempting to complete the vast and complicated puzzle that is British rock in the 1960s and '70s.

Customer Reviews

Before The Move and ELO Jeff Lynne wasn't "Idle"
Before Jeff Lynne joined The Move and formed ELO with Roy Wood, he was a member of this Biringham quartet that produced music inspired by the mix of jangly music hall sounds and psychedelic rock. While the band never broke through to top the music charts, their music continues to be appreciated by fans of 60's music. Evolving out of Mike Sheridan and the Nightriders (which featured a young Roy Wood as a member), The Idle Race only made three albums and a handful of memorable singles before disbanding. The splintering of the group would result in Lynne's tenure in The Move, Electric Light Orchestra and The Steve Gibbons Band.

Featuring all the commerically available recordings by the band plus three previously unreleasd alternate versions of album tracks, this two CD set is a terrific blast from the past. When it first appeared in 1996 this set was snapped up by fans of the band, Lynne and ELO. Unfortunately it went out of print within a year of being issued.

The first two albums are terrific as are some of the singles. The third album had its moments as well although the band clearly was going in a very different direction with their change in line up. I wasn't aware that the Idle Race had covered Hotlegs' "Neanderthal Man" (although why they would want to cover one Godley & Creme's worst novelty songs is beyond me)and it isn't signficantly different from the original version.

Lynne was the band's main singer/songwriter/guitarist with Dave Prichard playing George Harrison to Lynne's Lennon & McCartney for the band's first two albums. Lynne raced out to join The Move before The Idle Race began recording their third album and Prichard does a terrific job stepping into the gap providing the songs for the band's third and final album "Time Is".

The 2007 reissue comes without two tracks "It's Only a Dog" and "Your Friend" that were on the previous edition due to licensing issues with Polydor. These two tracks were recorded as The Nightriders and appeared on the previous edition of the album. Lynne played guitar (but didn't write or sing)on thse tracks as he had just joined the band. Other than that this edition appears to be exactly the same as the previous one.

I'm not sure if this is remastered (it doesn't have any mastering credit for the CD)and the new copyright date is probably because it doesn't include the two tracks that were on the previous album. Although the use of noise reduction isn't as heavy handed as some other EMI releases, it is there but isn't as distracting as some other releases remastered at Abbey Road. Although this isn't the perfect release everyone wanted, it's darn close to perfection simply because the sound is pretty good and we get the songs that Lynne wrote/performed on with the exception of the previous mentioned single. We get the booklet as with the previous release which gives us the history of the band and credits for the recording of the albums. There is a note in small lettering at the end of the booklet that states that the two missing tracks aren't there for "legal reasons"(i.e., they couldn't license them).

I'm glad that I was finally able to buy this the big question is why it took EMI so long to reissue it. Nevertheless this will be a delight for faans of psychedelic British rock music (which is quite different from psychedelic American rock music), Lynne, The Move and ELO. A very nice job of repackaging the material and while the two Nightrider songs are missed they aren't as essential as the bulk of the material included here.

Brilliant Music!!!
This set has been re-released by EMI (deleting two songs from the previous issue, neither of which Jeff Lynne wrote or sang). These CDs feature the same mastering as before so if you were lucky enough to to have bought it there's no need to get it again. The mastering isn't great but it's not as bad as we've come to expect from Abbey Road. The digital tape hiss removal (NR) isn't as artifact laden as I anticipated. This CD is quite listenable though the mastering would've been better without the NR and heavy handed EQ.

So good to see this available again...
I gave into temptation and e-bay'd my original copy some time ago for three figures. It was in a good cause!

Leaving the reviews for people who enjoy writing these things, but just to say I do agree that a lot of this stuff is too daft and almost embarrasingly twee to be listened to that much - in particular 'The Birthday Party' has too many cute songs to be a contender.

The second LP 'The Idle Race' though, has some moments of complete genius, and these are worth buying the set for. 'Please No More Sad Songs' is a beautiful Rubber-Soul-esque ballad with the most soaring of middle eights, it will make your hair stand on end.

'A Better Life (The Weatherman Knows)' is the most moving of songs, again Jeff Lynne's vocals in the middle section are absolutely stunning. The finale of that LP 'Hurry Up John' is the most excellent of psych-pop confections as well, wonderfully loopy in terms of production as well as performance. There are other great songs on that album which make this set a bargain, at any price.

The post Jeff stuff is disposable, however.