Dressin' fine, makin' time

I'm still not 100% sure why, but I listened to a lot of Roxy Music and, indeed, Bryan Ferry whilst laid up in hospital; morphine painkillers make you do strange things, that's all I can say. One song I kept coming back to time and again was a solo single Ferry brought out in 1974 on the Island label. I remember buying it as an ex-jukebox 45 (with the middle missing) from Grantham Market fifty years ago, can you believe. If memory serves it cost me the princely sum of 25p; money well spent if you ask me. At the time I couldn't get over the sheer ferocity of the riff that runs all the way through it - guitar, keyboard and horns joining forces to make up a relentless wall of sound.

Imagine my delight when I discovered (still in hospital) Ferry and his band recreating the track note for note at one of the BBC live sessions they used to put on regularly at St. Luke's in Shoreditch, central London. And what a band it is. Look left and you'll see ex-Womble & Sex Pistol Chris Spedding and look right, just behind the fabulous backing singers, you'll spot a young and ridiculously talented guitarist bunking off from school, seemingly. His name is Ollie Johnson and he helps bring The In Crowd to a new audience whilst the ever urbane front man just stands there leaning on his mic stand looking amazing in his made to measure sparkly black jacket*.

Bryan Ferry - The In Crowd (Live from 2007)

* He's come a long way since his retro pilot chic days. Here he is playing the very same number at a Roxy gig in 1976 c/w Phil Manzanera on guitar.

Lovely Rita

Rita Hayworth, legendary actress and dancer, was, without doubt, the favourite pin-up girl for American GIs during WW2. Often described a sex goddess, five times married Hayworth led a troubled life. Her second husband Orson Welles once said "All her life was pain." Early onset of Alzheimer's was misinterpreted by friends as alcoholism and her latter days were spent mostly isolated from the outside world.

Hayworth was, I think we can agree, the muse for Bryan Ferry's idea of how the first Roxy Music should look. He's never denied it.

★

Rita Hayworth (1918-1987)

Hey, Kari-Ann

You may not know the name, but you'll recognise the boat race. Former model and actress Kari-Ann Moller was the pin-up adorning the cover of Roxy Music's eponymous 1972 debut album. Her fee to lend her image to a bunch of then unknowns? Twenty quid. A steal. 

Two years later she can be found on Mott the Hoople's seventh and final album, The Hoople. Her fee? Unknown, tho' probably a tad more than Ferry and Co. gave her. 

By proxy

In a long and hugely successful career Linda Thompson has written, sung and recorded scores of seminal tunes - many of which are now considered folk rock standards. These days, however, Linda has lost her most personal of instruments: having being diagnosed with spasmodic dysphonia she is no longer able to enchant audiences with her instantly recognisable voice; the voice that shaped and defined not just her solo albums but those on which she collaborated with her ex, Richard Thompson. 

Earlier this year she curated a collection of new songs she'd co-written with her son Teddy Thompson under the title Proxy Music (see what she did there?) With a star studded roster of guest musicians (many family members) including a brace of Wainwrights, the Unthanks, the Proclaimers and Eliza Carthy to name but a few, the resulting album is nothing short of beautiful. One of my personal favourites is a song she bequeathed to John Grant. Linda loves John Grant. I think the feeling is mutual. 'John Grant' is track six (18:10) - the whole album is here...

Christos Hatzis · Proxy Music by Various Artists.Friends sing the songs of Linda Thompson

No dummies

In common with most, if not all1, artistes, Roxy Music had a (very) small window when they couldn't put a foot wrong. I mean when the press, their fans, friends and peers all blew smoke up their arse and praised them to the hilt. Purists will say this window remained open for about three years: between 1972 & 1975 (though in all honesty this mythical window had already started to close as early as 1973 after their third album, Stranded.)

Odd then that, somewhat belatedly, I have fallen headlong in love with an album they brought out when the window had long since been removed by the builders and subsequently bricked up. Manifesto, from 1979, came out when I was still knee deep in the new wave. However, even new wave was becoming a somewhat oxymoronic label three years after New Rose and Anarchy. If Bryan Ferry and Co. had been listening to anything by the Damned or the Pistols it certainly didn't show2 - not when you hear the singles they culled from the album - Angel Eyes and Dance Away. Which, if I'm perfectly honest, was all I'd heard from this particular period of post-Eno Roxy. Both of which I felt were insipid and left me rather cold3. 

That is until a couple of album tracks started to appear on those pesky Spotify playlists that get shared around, and this entered my psyche. It's the album opener which for its first two minutes you think is a blistering instrumental, and then at 2:30 Ferry limbers up and announces his arrival. How had I missed this?

Roxy Music - Manifesto (1979)

Ferry has intermittently got the band back together over the years for live reunions (their 40th & 50th anniversaries in particular) but there's been no new product, no new songs since 1982's Avalon. Tho' they did come close in 2010 when the old gang, including Phil Manzanera, Andy Mackay and Eno, collaborated with Bryan with a 'y' and recorded some new material. However BF bagged them for himself and put out another solo effort; Olympia - the last Roxy album that never was. 

1The Beatles would have to be excluded from any such list. Wouldn't they?

2However, the intro to Manifesto reminds me of Squeeze's Take Me I'm Yours.

3Not any more - when heard in context, and in order, they make perfect sense. Does that make sense?

Two of a Kind

I have absolutely no idea if today's highly unimaginatively titled post will be a blink and you miss it one-off or a jumping-off point for a feature I'll wheel out on high days and holidays. Or, even, Mondays. 

I've been going through my photographs and theming them. At the risk of telling you how to suck eggs they can be by subject, location, time, colour, texture; you name it - it may even just be a feel. So what I thought I'd do today is give you a couple of photos I took in Nottingham recently. The first is a tunnel which is cut into the sandstone not far from the city centre; it's still one of the best kept secrets that many Nottinghamians are blissfully unaware of. This shot is quite literally the light at the end of the tunnel.

Tunnel Road, Nottingham NG1 (2021)

Its photo buddy for purposes of today's 'Two of a Kind' was taken in the pub (quelle surprise) last week. The light streaming thru the open door was too good an opportunity to miss.

The Abdication, Daybrook, Nottingham NG5

...

To round up this one-off/feature (watch this space) I'm also looking at two records that are thematically linked. This brace are both well known Top 10 UK singles from the 70s and have been joined at the hip thanks to a rather lovely pub quiz question. I'm sure you all know the answer, tho' I will slip it in at the bottom of the page*.

Roxy Music - Virginia Plain (1972)

And then a mere seven years later these lads from Deptford in South London came up with a perfect three minute kitchen sink drama. From the Difford & Tilbrook songbook -

Squeeze - Up the Junction (1979)

And finally, a further bit of connectivity that joins the dots between Roxy and Squeeze - both Chris Difford and Phil Manzanera have recently been guests of David Hepworth and Mark Ellen on their splendid antidote to lockdown, Word in Your Attic. Give them a coat of looking at if you get a spare minute.

* The title of both songs are mentioned only once, and in the final line.