Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsTwin Peaks!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 26 March 2014
In this big, serious box set the Tanx album is given prominence and comes first in the selection of discs. Though it is a great album, it represents the ‘tail-end’ of the Bolan’s manic fame-phase that lasted from 71-73. It is a rich, startling sound experience, with Bolan’s melodic gifts greatly in evidence. The playing from the members of the original T.REX is superb, ably assisted by saxophonist Howie Casey and Tony Visconti, that many-talented producer and instrumentalist, who contributes mellotron and recorders to the sumptuous mix.
Where Bolan falls down sometimes is in his slavish need to give another hit to the ‘kids’ and many tracks here could easily have been hits: Shock Rock, Country Honey, Rapids and The Street And Babe Shadow could all have be released as singles. In fact the album is expanded with many great singles such as 20th Century Boy and Children Of The Revolution. All of the tracks on this album are without doubt the apex of pop-rock, perfectly produced and performed. The sense of giving up on the fame-game is perhaps most fittingly illustrated by the silly ending to Left Hand Luke And The Beggar Boys, the original album closer. When Bolan, perhaps drunkenly, spits out the final syllable, he unwittingly gives the clear impression that Tanx is a bit of a throwaway collection.
Zinc Alloy, however, is Bolan's greatest album, an album so brimming with confidence and ideas it's almost bursting at the seams, it's his Sgt Pepper, his Smile, his Exile On Main St, and every song is mesmeric. The ferocity of his guitar playing, and it's amazing fluidity and grace makes every song endlessly fascinating. Even shorter, throwaway tracks like Spanish Midnight/Jive To Stay Alive are filled with his superb extemporisation, with vocal and musical inventiveness in abundance.
Some of the tracks hark back to the old T.Rex boogie machine, such as Nameless Wildness and Painless Persuasion Vs The Meathawk Immaculate, other tracks are extremely futuristic and sublime like Sound Pit and Explosive Mouth. Many tracks could have been released as singles, especially opener Venus Loon, despite it's at times gruesome lyrical subject matter. Teenage Dream was the official single, and it is Bolan's Day In The Life, his Good Vibrations, his Life on Mars. The lyrics are verbose and poetic, leaning towards a melancholia only understood by the first rock generation realising that their dream of rock n roll transforming the world into some kind of rebel paradise was never going to happen. Every time I hear the closing track Gardenia (and The Mighty Slug) I am reminded that only Bob Dylan himself ever wrote anything remotely as weird and surreal, whilst at the same time deeply moving.
The only trouble with this Tony Visconti remaster, though it sounds spectacular and beautiful, is he has still repeated the mistake of the Bolan fan club (who reissued the album on cd in the 80s) and included the horrendous 'bootleg'-style ending to Teenage Dream, which did not appear on the original album. This is not how Bolan intended the song to end! On the plus side, he has included Squint Eye Mangle, The Groover, Truck On, Midnight, Blackjack, Sitting Here and Satisfaction Pony as bonus tracks, as Edsel did, but leaving that stupid drunken ending on the end of Bolan's greatest lyrical masterpiece is a crime. C'est la vie, I suppose, he’s the producer and it’s his choice what is used.
The discs of outtakes and demos are revealing and insightful, some very stark versions of the songs, others full-band workouts, and great songs in their own right. The dvd that comes with the set has that great TOTP performance of Teenage Dream, with saxophones instead of strings and some different guitar parts, and is a bit of a treat for all Bolan fans. Marc really belonged on that star.
The notes by Visconti himself are always insightful and I loved seeing his original musical scores reproduced - also, the biographical journalism by Mark Paytress is well written and informative. What a great set!