Roxy Music
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With startling, boundless creativity, Roxy Music’s juiced-up debut record put a subversive spin on mid-’70s conventions, embracing glam-pop and artsy electronics while harboring a deep love of classic rock songcraft. Brian Eno’s stamp is all over the record, driving songs like “Re-Make/Re-Model” down strange, atonal avenues. Bryan Ferry’s nightclub glamour-boy persona and wandering vibratos help make timeless epics out of molehills like the (originally non-album) track “Virginia Plain.” Eno stuck around for one more record, 1973′s For Your Pleasure, leaving Ferry and the band to embrace their less avant-garde leanings. This unpredictable, dangerous record might b… More >>
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One of the most powerful and important debut albums of all time,along with The Velvet Underground And Nico,The Stooges, and Beefheart’s Safe As Milk. Roxy Music brings an edge with sophistication to the music. Part progressive,part early rock n’ roll,part experimental, this material is almost unclassifiable.”If There Is Something” is powerful and hypnotic.”Virginia Plain” is like quirky new wave pop that brings to mind XTC,Devo,and The Cars, 5 years before such a thing existed. Phil Manzanera shows he can make some ear splitting noise on guitar, equivalent to Robert Fripp, though with his own trademark on cuts like “Chance Meeting” and “Ladytron”. Andy Mackay may well be the coolest rock n’ roll sax man of all time. Paul Thompson’s drumming is powerful and solid throughout. Your 80′s loving yuppie friends that think Roxy Music is about smooth product like Avalon need to hear this one instead; it will probably clear the room!
Rating: 5 / 5
In 1972, when groups like Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones were dominating the American charts and stadiums, another British rock band named Roxy Music released its debut album to an unsuspecting public. “Roxy Music” is the first of two albums to feature sound wizard Brian Eno, and it’s quite a listening experience like no other. The album can best be described as art rock with a few ambient touches, with often brilliant results. Eno’s electronic mastery, coupled with Bryan Ferry’s piano and distinct voice, are well-backed by fellow musicians Andy Mackay, Phil Manganera, Paul Thompson, and Graham Simpson. “Ladytron” opens with a wash of eerie synths before it blasts into a full-blown rocker; “Chance Meeting” is a piano-flavored ballad perfectly set Ferry’s pained vocals, and “2 H.B.” is as smooth as Italian silk. From track to track, “Roxy Music” boils over with class and sophistication, making them peerless in the arena of avant garde rock. Those whose first Roxy album was “Avalon” might be in for a shock when they pick this CD up. But when listened with an open mind, its rare riches will win you over. A classic ahead of its time.
Rating: 5 / 5
Nothing before or since sounds like Roxy’s debut effort. It lurches all over the map, including bits of loud rock, odd tape samples, heavily ironic takes on pop music, 50′s rock-n-roll & some stuff you can’t even identify. Some times, all in the same song. Roxy Music probably paid a heavy commercial price the rest of their career for this album, since it indelibly tagged them as arty weirdos long after their sound changed completely. Nonetheless, it is terrific on its own merits. Anyone with a taste for the unusual (but not atonal) should consider this a must-have.
For those whose image of Roxy is the Siren-to-Avalon dreamy mood, this does not even resemble that band. Eno’s influence was at its zenith on the debut. Not the ambient Eno, but the madcap cut-&-paste pop pastiche Eno. Plenty of loud guitar, greasy sax & Paul Thompson pounding the drums to leaven the mayhem. All in all, lots of fun interspersed with a serious dose of “what in the world was that?”
Rating: 5 / 5
I am a 23 year old fan of Roxy Music. Before i turned 21 i was listening to contemporary rock such as Radiohead, Suede, Placebo, Talk Talk, Doves and older favourites David Bowie and The Beatles among many others. I had never heard of this band with such an unusual and mysterious name until hearing David Bowie drop it during a concert appearance.
I went to my local cd store and realised that the entire Roxy catalogue was re-mastered and selling for $12.99 Australian. I thought i’d start with the first Roxy albumn, arguably an unwise choice for the uninitiated. I bought the albumn without hearing a single cut or having any pre-knowledge on this band. The albumn cover and sleeve notes did appear misleading. First judgements would suggest that this band was all about style, what with the fashion model, the band members in their glamorous attire with acknowledgments made to the hair/makeup and clothing designers. I was proven wrong from the first moment i heard the energetic piano chords that begin Re-make Re-model and that voice that ripped through my soul and out the other side. The emotion that was exuded was incomparable with any other music i had ever heard. I loved the music from my first listen and it only got better as time went by.
It still blows my mind that this music still sounds so contemporary, yet original and quirky and some might say weird (in a good way) after 30 years since its original release. Sure it isn’t easy listening by any means and it’s really an aquired taste, like anchovies! The one problem you may confront when you fall in love with this albumn, is that it will literally haunt you and make you feel small beyond belief. Depeche Mode and Talk Talk (Spirit of Eden and Laughing Stock albums in particular) are also two bands that create this feeling in me. These songs will become part of your life, just as they have become for the generation of fans who grew up in the 70′s, and i was a teenager in the 90′s! But be careful when trying to introduce this music to your mates. It might end up creeping them out. Its that mind-blowingly weird and original. I initiated my girlfriend who is only 21 into the Avalon period Roxy and only Virginia Plain and Amazona (Stranded -1973) from the early Roxy. My other friends cringe when i play the early stuff, but start dancing and smiling when their later stuff is on. I love both periods, but if you want to take a daring leap into the unknown start right here with this “little beauty”. You won’t regret it. Roxy Music will change the way you view music forever and beyond. Just remember this album is just the first step, there’s more in store….
My favourite track on the album is “Ladytron”. Everytime i hear it, i’m speechless. My friend Andrew was in the car with me the other day and i had it up loud and he enthusiastically uttered to me “Well, thats a damn good song isn’t it?”
Hope this review helps someone appreciate Roxy.
Rating: 5 / 5
I’m not too experienced with listening to music, so if any of this is cheesy, blame me!
A very interesting, and creatively stimulating, album. Brian Eno’s bubbling, raw electronics are equalled only by his first solo album. Some of the tracks are slower and more blues-inflected than Roxy’s next album, but this lends itself to a smooth, mellow flow from one track to the next, despite its rapid tempo and melody shifts. It makes perfect background music when I’m doing art. It feels like a massive, detailed album (although I hear they didn’t spend as much time working on it as later albums). The first couple times i listened to it, it was a little difficult to tell when one track ended and the next one began, as these choppy transformations occur so rapidly in each individual song. I like this consistent inconsistency.
The melodies aren’t as catchy and developed as on later albums, buried below jerky changes in instruments and synthesizer, but this gives it a very ambitious and enthralling sound. Certain tracks, like The Bob (Medley), are very startling to hear at first; the booming, echoing tape loops simulate a war sound, then transitioning into a gentle and trickling sound before turning into a pop song snippet. With these challenging instrumental loops combined with Ferry’s pop singing, it sounds like a condensed version of Frank Zappa’s “Brown Shoes Don’t Make It”, minus the pedophilic subject matter. “If There Is Something” is Ferry’s most desperate-sounding song, with his voice becoming hoarse and strained at parts, along with a slowly-developing, haunting melody. In “Sea Breezes”, Bryan Ferry’s voice and the instruments are layered over becalming seaside ambience, (indicative of Eno’s later vocal ambient pieces), and “Bitter’s End” concludes the album with a strange, apathetic doo-wop song (ironic to the title?). The lyrics are sometimes ambiguous to their meaning, making it all the more thought provoking.
I prefer Roxy Music’s next album, “For Your Pleasure”, which fits more into an accessible art-rock format, with a darker emotional depth. However it’s hard not to enjoy the musical creativity spilling out of each song on this album.
Rating: 5 / 5