Electric Light Orchestra — Rock n' Roll Is King

JUL 01 1983 · 12:00

Electric Light Orchestra — Rock n' Roll Is King (1983) Director: Mike Mansfield Era: Early MTV Era / New Wave Peak (1983) - The golden apex of UK synth-pop crossover, marked by high-energy performance videos and the global dominance of MTV as a promotional medium High curatorial value as a well-preserved official video document from the final chapter of ELO's original active period, capturing the band's deliberate rock-roots reorientation in 1983. The warm, high-saturation, fast-edited performance aesthetic provides a textbook example of early MTV-era UK pop promo production, and its commercial success across multiple territories makes it a significant artefact for both ELO discography research and broader study of 1983 Anglo-American pop culture. Context: Released in June 1983 as the lead single from ELO's tenth studio album Secret Messages, 'Rock n' Roll Is King' arrived at a pivotal cultural juncture: MTV had launched in 1981 and transformed the music video into a primary commercial tool. The song represented ELO's conscious pivot back toward guitar-driven rock after the synth-heavy sci-fi concept album Time (1981), signalling a deliberate return-to-roots gesture amid a pop landscape dominated by synthesisers and New Wave. The Secret Messages album itself was originally conceived as a double LP but was reduced to a single disc by distributor CBS Records, a compromise that contributed to Jeff Lynne's growing disillusionment with the band, which he would dissolve by late 1983. The video's warm, high-energy performance aesthetic reinforced the song's nostalgic rock 'n' roll message at a moment when the genre was battling for space against synth-pop dominance. Director notes: No production credits are formally logged for this specific video on IMVDb or IMDB. Attribution to Mansfield is inferred from his well-documented directorial relationship with ELO across their 1979–1981 video catalogue and his active presence in UK pop promo production in 1983, the same year he directed videos for Kim Wilde (Love Blonde) and Ozzy Osbourne (Bark at the Moon). No confirmed source directly credits him with this specific video.