We all have guilty pleasures that we like to keep secret, we know deep down we shouldn't really enjoy these things but we can't help ourselves, for some it's pot noodles, for others it's watching reality TV shows. Well I'll admit here and now to one of my musical guilty pleasures a liking for 70's popsters ELO (Electric Light Orchestra). It's not that musically ELO were crap, quite the opposite, it's just that they were so pop chart orientated that they were dismissed as simple musical fluff and quickly lost their cool over the last few years. Despite this I'll own up, I still find myself humming along to their hits whenever a radio station is brave enough to play them. I think (if I can remember that far back) that an ELO was the first album I ever bought and as such despite changing musical tastes the band will always be a little special to me. So it's not surprising that when a friend of mine bought this album I (permanently) borrowed a copy of it.

Jeff Lynne is a bit of a musical genius, in the mid 70's he was the master of the pop song it came so easily for him that reputedly he was able to write and record a whole album in just a few weeks. Before he and Roy Wood formed ELO they along with Drummer Bev Bevan were also members of 60's group 'The Move'. TO begin with ELO were an offshoot of The Move the original idea for the band coming from Wood after hearing some orchestral arrangement of some early Move songs. The first ELO record was a moderate success but just as things were taking off Wood left to Wizzard leaving Lynne as the main creative force in the band. Lynne created new look ELO (including up to twenty different members at various times) and never looked back notching up a string of gold and platinum album in the 70's and 80's.

'All Over The World' is a straightforward compilation featuring a fairly extensive collection of all the ELO hits. As a starting off point for anyone who is interested in getting to know their music it is a fairly good collection. However there are some glaring omissions, the first ever ELO hit '10538 Overture', which best illustrated their early elaborate mix of orchestral style with pop is strangely absent from the track list. In fact none of the tracks off the first album make it on to this compilation. None of the songs off the second album including Roll Over Beethoven make it either and I feel this the early period of ELO is where the compilation feels to deliver. The catalogue of omissions continues to the third album 'On the Third Day' although one track 'Ma-Ma-Ma Belle' is included. In fact up until 1976 and the release of 'A New Word Record' the early ELO is sadly underrepresented.

I don't mean this is a criticism, there is considerable skill in writing pop lyrics, I just mean to emphasise that the songs are pure pop songs, with catchy tunes, great instrumentation and a great sing-a-long factor. Some might call them cheesy but if that's true this is not your cheap processed cheese but rather the high class fine matured Stilton of the cheesy music spectrum.

Despite the success of 'Face The Music' and 'A New World Record' the peak of ELO's musical output is surely their epic 1977 double album 'Out Of The Blue'. This is possibly one of the best pop records of the 70's a perfect mixture of quirky ballads, semi disco dance tracks and complex sing-a-long tunes all accompanied by an excess of orchestral strings. Thankfully on this compilation four songs from this pop masterpiece are included their most well known hit Mr Blue Sky rightly opens up the album the thumping beat of the intro perfectly setting the tone for the up beat songs that follow. 'Sweet Talking Woman' also from 'Out Of The Blue' is the closest ELO get to a proper dance track and is influenced by the disco boom that was around at the time in included at no 4 on the track listing making the start of this compilation very upbeat and just about faultless. In fact the track selection and running order is excellent (taking into account that some important tracks are missing from the early albums) unfortunately things start to go wrong around two thirds of the way (apart from a blip at track 12) in to the record with the inclusion of 'Xanadu'. This aptly parallel the decline of the band' fortunes in the release of their Albums. 'Xanadu' is an awful track; it is part of a soundtrack that Lynne produced for a film of the same name released in 1980 featuring Olivia Newton John and Gene Kelly with Cliff Richard making an appearance in one of the songs. To be fair ELO's contribution to the film/album is the best thing about this misconceived project but even Lynne's Midas touch can't rescue it. I suppose for completeness sake Xanadu, which was a hit had to be included but having left out better song from previous albums maybe this one could have been ditched instead. Despite following Xanadu with the infinitely better early hit Rockaria! (a strange order selection) the rest of the album never truly recovers and rather stumbles to an unsatisfying end with the mediocre 'Rock and Roll is King'. I admit that I find myself playing this compilation all the way through to track 17 'Rockaria! (skipping Xanadu!) and then losing interest.