Rewind
Reissues: Tyrannosaurus Rex
Marc Bolan’s reputation as one of the 20th Century’s greatest pop stars is forever tied to the material he released as the frontman of T.Rex, one of the finest glam rock bands of the 70s. Of course, much like his contemporary, David Bowie, Bolan’s journey to the crown prince of sequinned pop stardom had been …
Not Forgotten – The Unicorns – Who Will Cut Our Hair When We’re Gone?
Just from the pencil-crayon artwork of the CD cover, you sort of know that Who Will Cut Our Hair When We’re Gone? is going to be a chaotically shambolic album, with lots of scratchy sounds, off-kilter keyboards, a generous serving of indie harmonies and an almost non-existent production job. Although firmly rooted in shabby indie territory, Who Will …
Not Forgotten – Arcade Fire – The Suburbs
Arcade Fire’s debut Funeral was the sound of a band coming out of nowhere to claim their place as the next big thing in a manner no one had quite experienced before. Neon Bible was a doom-laden and apocalyptic state-of-the-modern-world address which affirmed that Arcade Fire were big on concepts but short on laughs. So where does The Suburbs take us? …
Not Forgotten – Kate Bush – Hounds of Love
The rules for being a successful prog rock act were seemingly set in stone. You had to be a band, predominantly male, you were not allowed to have hit singles after 1974 and the majority of your songs had to clock in at at least twice the length of the average pop single. …And then …
Not Forgotten: Julian Cope – Fried
Recorded at a point where the popular music press were largely of the opinion that Julian Cope was struggling to relocate his muse following the detonation of The Teardrop Explodes, Fried is the album that found the Arch-Drude at the mid-point between the music industry’s realisation that he wasn’t going to be the easily mouldable popstar that they wanted …
A Buyers Guide to Warren Zevon – The Asylum Years
Warren Zevon is one of those songwriters who is unfortunately best remembered for one song which overshadowed the rest of his career. This is a great shame, as Zevon’s output is one of considerable depth which underwent repeated twists and turns in terms of commercial success which lead to a relatively stop-start career punctuated by …
Not Forgotten: Jethro Tull – War Child
Released in 1974, War Child found Jethro Tull at a crossroads in their career. Having had their previous album, the dense and generally grumpy A Passion Play, critically mauled and a subsequent mis-step by management that saw the band apparently announcing their retirement without their knowledge, War Child was the opportunity for the band to …
Not Forgotten: Neil Young – Rust Never Sleeps
Neil Young has always struck me as a somewhat schizophrenic artist, rattling between noisy guitar-rock which could be either thrilling or dragged out beyond all reasonable endurance and his softer acoustic side, which could either be touching and well-judged, or bland and uninspired. The two sides of his muse rarely acknowledged the existence of the …
Not Forgotten: Ian Hunter – All American Alien Boy
He could have taken the easy route and trotted out facsimiles of his brilliant eponymous solo debut, but Ian Hunter is a smarter cookie than that. He knew that if he was going to really establish himself as a solo artist, he’d have to distance himself from preconceptions of him that had developed when he …
Not Forgotten – Talking Heads – Stop Making Sense (1999 Special Edition)
It starts with audience noise, David Byrne scrolls out and utters immortal opening lines. “Hi. I’ve got a tape I wanna play you.” A basic electronic drum pattern starts up, there’s a sharply strummed acoustic guitar and then the bare-bones live version of “Psycho Killer” blows the studio original clean out of the water. Just …