The Moody Blues - BBC Sessions, Volume 1 (1965-1966)

Next up with BBC sessions is the Moody Blues. The vast majority of their BBC performances have been officially released, but in my opinion they haven't been presented in an ideal manner, all together, so that's what I'm doing here. I've found enough for four volumes.

This first volume just deals with the years 1965 and 1966. At that time, the Moody Blues were a drastically different band than what they'd become just one year later, with the 1967 album "Days of Future Passed." In this early phase, the band's lead singer was Denny Laine, and they mainly played R&B music. Laine left in late 1966 for a solo career. He was replaced by Justin Hayward as the new main lead singer, as well as John Lodge. Hayward would go on to write and sing most of the band's hits.

The Hayward-Lodge band line-up is represented on this album, but just barely. They're only on one song, "Fly Me High," which was written by Hayward. It was performed on the very last day of 1966. I've included it here because I have a different version of the song on the next volume in this series.

It seems to me that the version of the band from 1967 until the current day would prefer to act like the earlier Denny Laine-led version of the band never existed. Nearly all of their compilations and archival recordings start from 1967. That's the case with their main BBC release, "Live at the BBC, 1967-1970." All the band's BBC performances prior to that have been included as bonus tracks on a deluxe version of the Laine-led band's sole album, "The Magnificent Moodies." So that's where 12 of the songs here come from.

But I didn't stop there. All of those songs are from 1965. The band didn't have any BBC sessions in 1966 at all, probably because of declining popularity due to a lack of new hit singles. I've tried to fill this gap with four unreleased performances done for French or German TV shows. (The early band was especially popular in France because "Bye Bye Bird" was a number three hit single there while not being a hit anywhere else.) I also found an unreleased performance of the band playing "Hey Bo Diddley" in concert in 1965 that sounded good, so I added that too.

This volume ends with a song that's kind of a quasi-bonus track. Technically, it's not a Moody Blues song at all, and it also doesn't fit the time frame, being recorded in the latter half of 1967. I'm referring to "Say You Don't Mind," a solo single by Denny Laine. I'm including it because I think it's a great song (written by Laine, by the way), that really should have been a hit. It fits here better than it would in Volume 2, since this volume focuses on songs sung by Laine. 

(Note there are some more songs Laine performed for the BBC as a solo artist, but I didn't want to go too far down that path here. I want to keep the focus on the Moody Blues, but this one song is too good to be ignored.)

By now, I must sound like a broken record, complaining about how BBC DJs talked over the beginnings and ends of some songs. That was the case here too, but it wasn't that bad this time, with only six of the songs needing editing. All of those have "[Edit]" in their titles.

This album is 51 minutes long.

01 Go Now (Moody Blues)
02 I Don't Want to Go On without You [Edit] (Moody Blues)
03 I'll Go Crazy (Moody Blues)
04 Hey Bo Diddley (Moody Blues)
05 From the Bottom of My Heart [I Love You] (Moody Blues)
06 Jump Back [Edit] (Moody Blues)
07 I've Got a Dream (Moody Blues)
08 And My Baby's Gone [Edit] (Moody Blues)
09 It's Easy Child [Edit] (Moody Blues)
10 Stop (Moody Blues)
11 Everyday (Moody Blues)
12 You Don't [All the Time] (Moody Blues)
13 I Want You to Know (Moody Blues)
14 Bye Bye Bird (Moody Blues)
15 Can't Nobody Love You (Moody Blues)
16 I Really Haven't Got the Time (Moody Blues)
17 Fly Me High [Edit] (Moody Blues)
18 Say You Don't Mind [Edit] (Denny Laine's Electric String Band)

https://www97.zippyshare.com/v/Hm9p8gpn/file.html

The cover art photo dates from January 1965, when the band made an appearance on the "Top of the Pops" TV show.