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I have to preface this review by stating that ELO has always been my favorite band, with the Beatles coming in a close second. Naturally I have all the previous albums on both LP and CD. And I had most of the earlier albums on both cassette and 8-track cartridges as well. I bought Zoom on CD when it came out back in 2001. I thought that particular CD had a rather dull sound to the mastering. In 2013 when it was remastered I got the newer version of the CD and found it to be a lot better sounding. This LP version to me seems to be a little darker sounding than the CD version, but still sounds better than the original CD 2001 CD release. My particular copy had a minor surface defect on side two of the first disk. It didn't cause a skip but there are several pops in a song each time it gets to that point. Other than that I'm pretty happy with the sound, and I must say this is the first LP I have bought in over 20 years. It was the ONLY ELO album that I didn't have on LP, so I bought it pretty much for the sake of nostalgia. Now, as for a review of the actual album itself... If you are an ELO fan, you will love this album. But if you are expecting another "Out Of The Blue", then you might be disappointed. Jeff started getting away from that particular style right after the release of Out of the Blue. And eventually started phasing a lot of the strings/symphonic sounds out. But Zoom is a great album in it's own right. To be honest...I agree with a lot of other ELO/Jeff Lynne fans in the opinion that this probably should have been released as a Jeff Lynne solo album, rather than an ELO album. But it does share enough resemblance to former ELO that it doesn't sound out of place in the ELO catalog. You have to remember that Jeff Lynne was the primary member of ELO. He wrote 5 of the 9 songs on the first album, and ALL of the songs on every other album they did except for a cover of "Roll Over Beethoven" on the 2nd album, and a cover of "In the Hall of the Mountain King" on their 3rd album. Jeff also produced all of ELO's albums (except for the 1st which he co-produced with Roy Wood). Jeff was the lead singer and played a majority of the instrumentation on most of their albums. On Zoom, Jeff takes even more or this role. Some songs, he's pretty much the only performer on. Past ELO keyboardist Richard Tandy does make an appearance on one song, and ex-Beatles George Harrison and Ringo Starr appear on a couple of tracks as well. The rest of the cast includes several other performers, but most of this album was recorded by Jeff (vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards, drums, cello). Standout tracks on here include "Stranger on a Quiet Street", "Moment in Paradise", "State of Mind", "It Really Doesn't Matter At All" and "Ordinary Dream". There's really not a bad track on here. Probably my least favorite would be "Easy Money", which is one of the 2 tracks that features Ringo Starr on drums. The original release featured 13 songs. This release has a couple of bonus songs. "One Day" which is a studio recording, and a live version of "Turn To Stone" (which was originally from the album Out of the Blue). I'm not real sure why this live track was included, except for the fact that the reissue of Zoom came out at the same time that a live album was released, and I suppose it's a commercial for that. Personally, I would have preferred to have had the bonus track "Long Black Road" which is only on Japanese releases.Read full review
The quality of the vinyl is outstanding no pops or skips. Songs are well written and catchy. I would recommend buying this album if you're serious ELO fan.
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
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