Said Marc Bolan in 1971, quoted in "The Timeless Glam Perfection of T. Rex: Why Marc Bolan Still Casts a Spell/The new Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductees have been a guiding spirit for cosmic dancers from Prince to Harry Styles" (Rolling Stone).
Born in 1947, the son of a Hackney lorry driver, Marc Feld grew up as a mod on the London scene. As a broke young poseur, trying to hustle into showbiz, he got hired one day to paint his manager’s office with another kid. Marc introduced himself as “King Mod,” and declared, “Your shoes are crap.” The other kid was David Bowie. These two rivals would torment each other for years to come. In February 1969, after Bolan blew up on the U.K. charts, he invited Bowie on tour — as a mime. “Marc was quite cruel about David’s as-yet-unproven musical career,” producer Tony Visconti recalled later. “I think it was with great sadistic delight that Marc hired David to open for Tyrannosaurus Rex, not as a musical act, but as a mime.” (What could make it even sweeter for Bolan? Bowie got booed.)I went looking for a Marc Bolan/Hall of Fame article after Bolan came up in the first post of the day, the one about "Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo." That post quoted Marc eating potatoes with Ringo and saying "Ooh you, boogaloo." In the comments over there, I said:
He goes into the the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame... it was just announced a few weeks ago. I should do a post on that. I am a big Marc Bolan fan from back when his band was called Tyrannosaurus Rex.A couple years later, Marc was much more accessible, and everyone loved...
As a college kid in 1969, I would make anyone I could get to put up with it listen to the album "Unicorn."
Anyone else here a fan of "Unicorn"?
Here's the whole album. Just imagine yourself captive in 18-year-old Althouse's dorm room!...
The toad road licked my wheels like a sabre
Winds of the marsh lightly blew
Stone jars stacked with stars on her shoulders
Hunters of pity she slew...
Are you listening?!!!
... didn't they?
Posts
43 comments:
For the annals of copyediting: "paint his manager’s office with another kid"
Jeepster!
From the same program: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sAzS-kif6k
I want my MTV!
John Henry
This is how you boogaloo.
Ann beat me to it...
Why wouldn't Bowie punch the stuffing out of a little pipsqueak like Bolan?
So it WAS Bowie blackballing Bolan from getting into the Hall of Fame all those years. The revenge of the Mime. Mods were such bitches. (Lest we forget, it was the Rockers who would've painted the walls with someone they didn't like.)
Well, I sure did...up until I watched that video, now I'm somewhat embarrassed!
Get in on. Truly a masterpiece of writing. I liked the beat, but is seemed like it too slow. Like a 45 record being played at 33. Also, glad to see a post about some old Rock n Roller that's not an obituary.
I had a housemate back in those days who was very into Marc Bolan. I didn't feel it. His music was just OK to me. T-Rex did some good stuff but I never bought it. I probably had Unicorn playing in the background of my life back then without any lingering effect. Or...it couldn't break through the haze like others could for me then.
Can't see them as a Hall of Fame group, or Bolan as that level, but it's pretty subjective.
Just know the T-Rex hits, but Bolan seemed to write automotive similes into his songs more than Springsteen.
Get It On
Well you're built like a car
You've got a hubcap diamond star halo
You're built like a car, oh yeah
Jeepster
Girl, I'm just a Jeepster for you love
Just like a car
You're pleasing to behold
I'll call you Jaguar if I may be so bold
'Cause you're my babe
Yes, you're my love
Girl, I'm just a Jeepster for you love
Just came from an article about how the Dave Matthews Band and followers are pissed that they were not voted in. I didn't know this award was so coveted.
I liked Marc Bolan and T Rex back in the day. However, it strikes me that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has a serious problem. They have to keep inducting performers into the Hall and the pool of "classic era" rock stars keeps getting smaller. If T Rex is in there with the Beatles and the Stones and Chuck Berry, being inducted into the Hall really doesn't mean anything, does it?
Gil McDougald, the second baseman for the Yankees in the 1950's, was a very good player. He's not in the HOF with Mantle and Berra because a lifetime BA of .276 doesn't get you in the HOF. I'm sure he made a lot of great plays and fans enjoyed watching him, but great he was not.
Pretty soon they'll be putting Shocking Blue and Mungo Jerry and other one hit wonders into the Rock and Roll HOF. Ah, well, it's only rock and roll.
But I like it!!
I lost a little respect for Ringo when he said he was a big fan of Marc Bolan (and, no, we didn't all love "Get It On, Bang A Gong, Get It On").
Never heard of him. Of course in 1969 I was in the Navy in the Med. Those days we didn't have internet so didn't hear much from the states. Was he an East Coast thing?
In the future everyone will be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for 15 minutes.
That song was so boring.
Gay rock, gah.
David Bowie: The Mask (A Mime) (1969)
5min | Short, Music | Video 1969
IIRC the Stones had a mime open for them at a show in 1972...?
oops
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9869108/
This is what I love about the internets -
"Opening Acts for The Rolling Stones Since 1962"
1972 North American Tour: Stevie Wonder, Martha & the Vandellas, Robert Shields (mime artist).
The measure of a Hall of Fame isn't based on who is in it, but who isn't.
I agree with exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil, if they are in the R&R HOF, who else will they let in?
Funny guy and although I enjoyed the hits back in the day, I didn’t have much appreciation for their style of music, too bubble-gummy. But I sure find them a hoot to watch now. All the craziness back then and dying much too young in a car accident...
“ Pretty soon they'll be putting Shocking Blue and Mungo Jerry and other one hit wonders into the Rock and Roll HOF. Ah, well, it's only rock and roll.”
Hey, Mungo Jerry followed “In the Summertime” with “Have a Whiff On Me”...
Marc Bolan was a frickin Rock Star. This country hippie guy lurves him some Glam.
Exiled notices the thing I notice- you can't induct everyone for it be a Hall of Fame, and yet they do seem to be on course to eventually induct everyone who had a hit song or album in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s.
I lost any interest in the R&R Hall of Fame when they inducted Green Day.
I don't recall ever hearing of them.
One purpose of a Hall of Fame (musical or otherwise) is to recognize individuals who made huge contributions to some area of human endeavor. Clearly in this, the RRHOF is needed.
Marc Bolan and T. Rex invented a whole genre of music, glam rock, and influenced pop music for decades.
T. Rex may be barely known in the US where "Bang A Gong" was their only hit, but they were massive in the UK. Entirely deserving entry to the RRHOF.
I think a respectable RnR HOF would induct artists/bands who not only had a decent amount of commercial success, but - more importantly - also had an impact and an undeniable influence on the music of those that followed them.
Yes, Hunter, agree.
Life inside and outside the womb.
So many great T Rex songs beyond Get it On. I've got the Metal Guru/Lady and Ride a White Swan/Summertime Blues 45's. It's really something how little of glam rock translated to a US audience. Slade is honestly quite good too. I've heard it said that it was all too fun and the US was in a darker place than the UK because of Vietnam and Watergate. I was a child, though, so it's just a mystery to me why so little of that UK scene broke stateside.
Yes, a ground-breaking act can merit induction with a small catalogue of success. T-Rex might qualify since they were ground-breaking and more successful outside the US than in.
That old record sounds like Donovan without the tunefulness.
Didn't know who you were talking about, but instantly recognized the song. Must have enjoyed Get It On when it showed up in the rotation back in the day.
My first roomate, a sweet Mississippi debutante, was forced to listen to Whipping Post from The Allman Brothers Band over and over and over again. I'd study a while and then have to get up and dance for a while.
The Allmans came to Vanderbilt that fall for Homecoming. I only saw half the concert because my blind date from Duke was bored. Grrrr! Wasn't surprised to find out later that he was the scion of the Grand Dragon in North Carolina. Well, I was surprised, but glad of another excuse for my dislike.
The Allman Brothers were inducted in 1995.
" I've always been a wriggler"
"Wiggle Wiggle" by Robert Allen Zimmerman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wi0ZGj3rEn4
Wriggle vs Wiggle:
As verbs the difference between wriggle and wiggle is that wriggle is to twist one's body to and fro with short, writhing motions; to squirm while wiggle is (intransitive) to move with irregular, back and forward or side to side motions; to shake or jiggle. As nouns the difference between wriggle and wiggle is that wriggle is a wriggling movement while wiggle is a wiggling movement.
I watched a magician open for Julian Lennon in San Antonio in 1985.
Is that like a mime? It wasn’t David Bowie, sadly.
FWIW, the cover of Bowie's "Heroes" album has a definite mime vibe to it.
THEOLDMAN
Thought GIO, BAG, GIO was a silly song.
...When I was a kid, up here in the 'North' of England, one of the the things I shared with my mother was a love of music - she loved T.Rex, Marc Bolan. As well as the Four Tops, Diana Ross, anything that could make her dance - she couldn't dance but she wanted to. "Jeepster" was her favourite song. So I can understand the cynicism of the young (though that's bad) but Marc Bolyn was a little beauty (I can say that because I'm only 5'5") for my mum and her generation.
For us it was just 'us' singing our songs, dancincing our tunes, innocently boogieing.
But I and my generation, went for this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kLK8eCgmy4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnEc91KRKrc&list=RDf2QqbYiNy5U&index=2&pbjreload=10
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