The Moody Blues Albums Ranked
The Moody Blues are a rock band formed in Birmingham, England in 1964, initially consisting of keyboardist Mike Pinder, multi-instrumentalist Ray Thomas, guitarist Denny Laine, drummer Graeme Edge, and bassist Clint Warwick. The group came to prominence playing rhythm and blues music. They made some changes in musicians but settled on a line-up of Pinder, Thomas, Edge, guitarist Justin Hayward, and bassist John Lodge, who stayed together for most of the band’s “classic era” into the early 1970s. The band’s most recent album was December (2003), a collection of Christmas music. It continued to tour throughout the first decade of the 2000s and still reunites periodically for events, one-off concerts, short tours, and cruises. The Moody Blues’ most successful singles include “Go Now”, “Nights in White Satin”, “Tuesday Afternoon”, “Question”, “Gemini Dream”, “The Voice” and “Your Wildest Dreams”. The band has sold 70 million albums worldwide,[which includes 18 platinum and gold LPs. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2018. Here are all of The Moody Blues albums ranked.
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10. Octave (1978)
“With the sound of synthesizers, rather than mellotrons and orchestras, things start off well with the fine “Steppin’ In A Slide Zone”, but nothing that follows really matches it. At times it sounds akin to a jazz lounge record (like the un-Hayward sounding, or rather, the un-any of them sounding, “Top Rank Suite”), and the last two songs, Mike Pinder’s “One Step Into The Light” and Hayward’s terrible “The Day We Meet Again”, really bring things crashing down at the end.”
9. The Other Side of Life (1986)
“The Moodys are easily one of my favorite groups so it is sad to see them come to this. IMO any song from their first 7 albums with Justin Hayward is easily better than anything here. What went wrong? One of the things that went wrong is that the Moodys got a hold of a drum machine (which is never a good thing), and music in general seemed to be hitting a major rut the year this came out. Things would get substantially better for them in a few years with Keys to the Kingdom though they never did ditch the drum machine and they would never match the quality music that they made in the late ’60s and early ’70s.”
8. Long Distance Voyager (1981)
“The songs off this album which have been featured on various compilations are actually the less impressive ones, or at least the ones pityingly trying to emulate the contemporary trends in pop (yes, pop, not rock anymore) music. And while The Voice and Talking Out of Turn retain the moody quality in spite of the slightly disco-ish setting, Gemini Dream is downright hideous. Fortunately one only needs to get deeper into the wood of the album to get mildly overwhelmed by the good old Moody Blues charm. In My World might be too light to hoist such a bombastic ending, but Meanwhile and especially Edge’s 22 000 Days (the massive harmonies are even more stunning here than on the Isn’t Life Strange chorus) are rather perfect. “
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7. A Question of Balance (1970)
“This is my favorite Moodies album. Mind you, I don’t much like prog or symphony rock. Why would I even bother listening to the Moodies, then, one might ask. Well, I didn’t know any better when I was a little kid and my parents had all their albums. There you have it.I think that the lyrics of this album have aged better than the lyrics of other Moodies albums. Very little to cringe at, other than “Minstrel’s Song.””
6. Every Good Boy Deserves Favour (1971)
‘The album starts off with the unforgettable intro”Procession.” This is one of my favorite album openers ever. It sets the desolate tone of the rest of the record and the instrumentation is fantastic. The song leads perfectly into”The Story in Your Eyes.” This has to be one of my favorite songs ever, and may just be my favorite Moody Blues song. From the timeless guitar, to the introspective lyrics, it truly is a great song. Next is ”Our Guessing Game”which is another catchy outing which you will probably have on repeat for a while.”Emily’s Song” is one of the band’s most personal efforts.”After You Came” is a real rocker, along with”Nice to Be Here” which will put a smile on most people’s face. One More Time To Live” is quite simply beautiful, and the same can be said for”You Can Never Go Home” which is not only one of Justin Hayward’s best songs, but one of the bands best too. The weakest song on the record is probably”My Song” which is still pretty good.”
5. Seventh Sojourn (1972)
“A remarkable album, the last of The Moody Blues’ classic era, and an appropriate bookend to the Moody orchestral masterpiece ‘Days of Future Passed’. ‘Sojourn’ (their 7th album) is the most cohesive and consistently good album since ‘Threshold of a Dream’, and the songwriting is strong from each of the Moody’s composers Hayward, Lodge, Pinder and Thomas. Every song is beautiful and powerful, whether the ominous “Lost in a Lost World”, the strident “You and Me” (both full of political allusions regarding hatred, revolution, the Vietnam War and the Arab-Israeli conflict), the charming little sea chantey “For My Lady”, or the refreshing “Land of Make Believe”, or the rousing, bass-driven “I’m Just a Singer(in a Rock and Roll Band)”. “
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4. On the Threshold of a Dream (1969)
“There are just too many so-so songs for me to give this album a soaring recommendation, but I still like it quite a bit. John Lodge’s “To Share Our Love” and Mike Pinder’s “So Deep Within You” both sort of have a macho swagger you don’t usually find on Moody Blues songs, but that isn’t the problem–they’re just not great tunes. Ray Thomas always seemed to write one very good song and one average song per album, and this album was no exception, as “Dear Diary” falls squarely in the former category and “Lazy Day” the latter. “Are You Sitting Comfortably,” a Thomas/Justin Hayward collaboration, has a nice melody but is maybe a little too sleepy for its own good.”
3. To Our Children’s Children’s Children (1969)
‘The band’s second best album in my opinion, which isn’t saying much as i don’t really rate The Moody’s brand of pop prog. “To Our Children’s Children” at least has a coherent concept, lacking from most of their other magnum opus’. For once the poetry driven track works and the album opens in great style with one of the band’s best rock tunes, the really rather good “Higher And Higher”, this high quality is kept up through Lodge’s beautiful, dreamy “Eyes Of A Child” and Thomas’ light and breezy, if a little twee (hey it is The Moody Blues), “Floating. Overall “To Our Children’s..” is an occasionally decent album, there’s too much filler for sure but it’s still one of this band’s best works.”
2. In Search of the Lost Chord (1968)
“I expected to hear something that I may have missed in the rock genre in this album. However, this was somewhat of a surprise. Every song on this album is carefully ordered and engineered to 1968 [release date] perfection. What a rare gem this album is for the latter part of the 1960s. It has not lost any of its listening appeal. This album is still very much accessible to the discerning listener’s ears — and mind. This album is thought provoking and yet remains somewhat of a musical experience. Two levels of listening pleasure happening at the same time. Now this is quite a musical feat for a rock band.”
1. Days of Future Passed (1967)
“Wonderful,groundbreaking album. I sometimes find the Moodies either middle of the road or just plain silly (listen to In Search of The Lost Chord) and at other times they write beautiful melodies that really catch the ear and transcend pop music. However this,their first album with all the later members is completely wonderful. The orchestrations are first class and the songs melodic,beautiful and uplifting. There are many extras like Justin Hayward’s Fly Me High on this disc that make the CD an excellent buy and I have really enjoyed repeated listening. At this stage, when the Moodies were still fresh ,Mike Pinder’s mellotron is still understated and his compositional facilities undoubted. HIs song Dawn Is A Felling is ,in my view,on of the great classic songs of the 1960’s .As is of course,Hayward’s Nights In White Satin.”