Number Two: Marc Bolan

Not as big an influence on me as I had previously thought he was, Marc Bolan still occupies a place in my mental pantheon that's not to be ignored. There's nothing in any of his songs I can really relate to, with the possible exception of 20th Century Boy. He knows how to put together words that don't make any fucking sense ("The President's weird- he's got a burgundy beard").But despite his shortcomings of being completely unable to write a bridge and adding so much echo it sounds like Batman was his producer, the music is so completely infectious that I am still taking antibiotics to stop it. He layers his fascinatingly inane rhymes and lyrics over a crunchy groove so tasty that the phrase "Mince pie dog-eye Eagle on the wind" seems profound. He's just this wild-haired elven god of dandyish pomp. I'm watching a video of him performing Get It On on VH1 classic right now and he makes me want to put on a satin tunic and frolic in the woods.

I learned about Marc Bolan in 10th grade while talking to my friend Dylan (A constant companion and wellspring of musical information due to the fact that his dad owns the largest independent record store on the east coast) about a new sensation I had just learned about from a girl that I was desperately trying to wife. The sensation was not Marc or his band T.Rex but was actually fiery androgyne David Bowie. Obviously I started talking about both the girl and David Bowie almost nonstop to Dylan. As usual, he knew more about music than me and as usual he gave me some other directions to branch out in. It was a momentous conversation that I still remember today, for a number of reasons. It went something like this:

"And she was like 'I'll put on a little space oddity.' and I pretended to know what she was talking about because she was really excited about it- and then the song started and it was SO COOL. So I said 'who is this' and she said 'HOW DO YOU NOT KNOW DAVID BOWIE?' (Extensive/boring recap of the rest of the quasi-date here, and then...) ...So anyway, it was real cool, I think I have to hang out with her again if only to listen to more Bowie."

"Yeah, Bowie's real good. But it was really T. Rex that started Glam Rock, they were the originals."

Key words have been emphasized, comic book style, to show you how momentous a conversation was. (If life were a comic book, this issue would be fetching high dollar amounts as the first appearance of several things that would become my trademark obsessions much later.) I sort of pushed T.Rex out of mind as I had no money and this was before I knew how to steal from the internet to get what I wanted- so purchasing music was not the most important thing on my shopping list (That spot continues to be occupied by "Ghostbusters Memoribilia").

Flash forward another year or so and I have been told by the cool people I know (At the time it is likely older women or the consistently hip/unhip fluxing Dylan Roth) that proper music listening is conducted using Vinyl Records- which my father has a proper stock of. So I head upstairs and sticking out of the record box like the sword in the stone (Or like the Lady of the Lake was holding it, if you prefer) is The Slider, T. Rex's second glam-era album and one of their top three, if not THE top. I remember looking at Marc being some confused Mad Hatter and deciding that nobody else has ever worn a top hat to rock and not looked like a tool. I still hold that opinion, actually. I listened to it and fell in love. I had been missing out. Again, though- didn't know how to steal from the internet. Wasn't using wikipedia for any/everything to find out which T.Rex albums I should be looking for. My parents bought me the album on CD for christmas my freshman year of college (Along with Hunky Dory, what a glammy christmas) and the tearing, echoing blues sound of it kept me going for months until I finally figured out how to steal from the internet and got the discography. That's when the obsession truly began.

I watched Born to Boogie at least five times (Along with Velvet Goldmine, of course) that summer and brought the gospel of Bolan back with me to my sophomore year of school. He was inspiring onstage. Bowie was a laser on stage, not doing one thing that he didn't intend. Marc was another story. He had a sloppy, churlish magnetism that was completely entrancing. Here's him performing Jeepster, from Born to Boogie.



I brought that churlish magnetism with me back to school and in the fall, T. Rex was the soundtrack to me being a proper twit. It fit the mood magnificently.

His style's a classic, of course. The top hat hasn't been done as well since. His first splashes of glitter on Top of the Pops are eternal. I love that he wore ballet shoes all the time. All of the glitter blazers with the huge lapels make him look like some woodland nymph devoted to rock and roll and making everybody feel cool.

That was longer than I intended it to be. here is my favorite picture of him.
The guitar is his boner.