Almost Hits: The Moody Blues - Tuesday Afternoon (Forever Afternoon) (1968)

"Nights In White Satin" only managed to reach #103 on the Hot 100 in 1967. It didn't become a massive #2 hit until five years later, so its followup, "Tuesday Afternoon (Forever Afternoon)," became The Moody Blues' first top forty entry since a very different sounding band - with a future Wings member, Denny Laine, on lead vocals - made the top ten in 1965 with "Go Now."

"Tuesday Afternoon" was released as the second single from the quintet's sophomore album, Days Of Future Passed. It peaked at #24 on the Hot 100 in 1968. Both the song and the LP helped set the tone for almost all Moody Blues' records in the future.

The track was recorded by The Moodys' classic lineup that featured a fine, new, lead singer, Justin Hayward, who composed this soon to be classic on his acoustic guitar. John Lodge supplied backing vocals and bass, Mike Pinder played mellotron and piano, Roy Thomas played flute, and Graeme Edge was the drummer and percussionist. Pinder's mellotron is a featured instrument, just as it was on much of the British Invasion group's subsequent output. 

On the album the song is paired with Lodge's composition, "Time To Get Away," which stretches the track out to 8:23. On the album's back cover the title reads: "The Afternoon: (a) Forever Afternoon (Tuesday?) (b) Time To Get Away." Hayward wanted to name the single "Tuesday Afternoon" but the group's producer, Tony Clarke, changed it to "Forever Afternoon (Tuesday?)." However, when it was released it showed both titles with Clarke's name accepting secondary status in parentheses as seen above. The edited 45 rpm clocks in at only 2:16.

While making the album, each band member was assigned to write a song for a different time of the day. Feeling inspired, Hayward volunteered for the afternoon, and he wrote the song on a Tuesday afternoon in a park his mother took him to as a child.

On the album the two songs are joined together by conductor Peter Knight who wrote an arrangement for the London Festival Orchestra, who at the time was Decca Records' "house orchestra."

Both the single and the extended LP versions are below.
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Almost Hits is an occasional exploration into songs that failed to reach the top 20 on the American Billboard Hot 100. Many have become classics despite what their chart position would indicate.

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