Their first album, The Magnificent Moodies, yielded a #1 UK hit (#10 in the US) with "Go Now." The album also featured Thomas singing lead vocals on a cover of George and Ira Gershwin's "It Ain't Necessarily So", which was originally from the musical Porgy and Bess.
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The name of the band, chosen by Pinder, was "The Moody Blues", chosen from initials which were part of a hoped-for sponsorship from the M&B Brewery (which failed to materialise) and also as a subtle reference to Duke Ellington's "Mood Indigo."
Thomas Jefferson | Ray Charles | Thomas Edison | Ray Bradbury | X-ray | Thomas | Thomas Hardy | Thomas Mann | Thomas Aquinas | Man Ray | Clarence Thomas | Thomas Gainsborough | Dylan Thomas | Thomas Pynchon | St. Thomas | Saint Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands | Satyajit Ray | Thomas Carlyle | Stevie Ray Vaughan | Thomas the Tank Engine | Thomas Moore | Thomas Cromwell | Thomas Becket | Thomas the Apostle | Thomas Merton | Ray Milland | Ray Liotta | Thomas Tallis | Thomas Paine | Ray Davies |
James appeared on solo albums by Moody Blues members Graeme Edge and Ray Thomas, including From Mighty Oaks (1975) and Hopes Wishes and Dreams (1976), where he worked with noted film composer Trevor Jones.
In the 2006 DVD documentary The Classic Artists Series: The Moody Blues (DVD UK, released October 2006), Mike Pinder, the former keyboard player of Birmingham R&B band The Moody Blues, states that the inspiration for the song actually rests with an incident that happened to them — a groupie climbing into an open bathroom window in the band's home and spending the night with band member Ray Thomas.