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Roy Wood has long been regarded as one of the most important, if eccentric, rock musicians to have come out of Birmingham, England, primarily for his role as the leader/co-founder of both
the Move and
the Electric Light Orchestra.
Born in 1946,
Wood took up the guitar in his early teens, and the first "successful" band of which he was a member was Gerry Levene & the Avengers, which actually got to record a single. They broke up in mid-1964, and
Wood joined Mike Sheridan & the Nightriders. During this period,
Wood attended the Moseley College of Art, from which he was expelled in 1964. That same year, he organized
the Move, with
Bev Bevan (drums),
Carl Wayne (lead vocals), Ace Kefford (bass), and Trevor Burton (guitar). The band was fortunate enough to land a residency at London's Marquee Club, where they began to build an enthusiastic following.
Wood contributed most of the songs and eventually many of the vocals to
the Move. Their single "Night of Fear" rose to number two on the U.K. charts in early 1967. The group evolved over the ensuing three years, eventually becoming a quartet. Later, the group added guitarist
Jeff Lynne and passed through psychedelic, progressive, and heavy metal phases on albums such as
Shazam, Message from the Country, and
Looking On, which were popular in England but virtually unknown in America. Their sound embraced everything from old-time rock & roll, including
Duane Eddy and even some doo wop influences, but also displayed
Beatles-style harmonies and lyrical complexity.
By 1971,
Wood had developed ideas and ambitions that were too wide to be embraced by any one band, and proposed the formation of an offshoot of
the Move called
the Electric Light Orchestra. The group's eponymous debut was released on the Harvest label in England to strong critical approval and decent sales -- indeed, the new band seemed to attract more serious attention than
the Move had been getting. Originally
ELO and
the Move were to have existed side by side, but
ELO supplanted
the Move, and the latter ceased to exist.
Wood exited soon after, leaving
ELO in the hands of
Lynne and
Bevan, and went off on his own to form
Wizzard.
Wizzard's first single, "Ballpark Incident," combined
the Move's hard rock with a texture reminiscent of
Phil Spector's "wall of sound" productions, and rose to number six on the British charts. In April of 1973,
Wizzard reached number one with "See My Baby Jive," a success duplicated by the follow-up, "Angel Fingers." Unfortunately, the band's first album,
Wizzard's Brew, didn't fare nearly as well, being a highly experimental body of work. The group's fortunes, even as a singles band, faltered after this, partly because of
Wood's decision to continue recording and releasing records under his own name in addition to his work with
Wizzard. His
Phil Spector-ish "I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday" reached number four in England in 1973, and "Forever" made it to number eight the same year. The
Wizzard albums See My Baby Jive and Eddie & the Falcons were both critical and commercial failures, and the unsuccessful release of the latter led to the demise of the group. Meanwhile,
Wood's own solo albums,
Boulders (1973) and Mustard (1975), were too idiosyncratic to achieve major followings.
The Roy Wood Story (Harvest), released in 1976, summed up his career with EMI Records and performed well as a best-of. His subsequent records,
On the Road (1979) and
Starting Up (1987), failed to achieve anything like the success of his early-'70s work, and since then
Wood has become one of the more elusive active musicians of his generation, although he continued to record into the 1990s. ~ Bruce Eder