T. Rex - Get It On

 

 

Much of the discussion at an all boys grammar school in the mid-70's centred on 'best guitarist' which meant deciding whether Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton or anybody else was most competent or expressive on the instrument some actually thought was called 'lead guitar'. As time went on, the search for more convincingly researched, abstruse answers led to Robin Trower, Steve Hillage without many mentioning the raw but admirable work of Rory Gallagher, the fast fingers of Alvin Lee or such a more sensitive musician as Richard Thompson.

I found it difficult, being no musician myself whatsoever, and so sided with Jan Akkerman because I had an album by Focus, and Jimmy Page because Led Zeppelin were obviously very good in spite of, rather than because of, his dark fantasies. Eventually, I had to be honest and said that Marc Bolan was my favourite guitarist and was laughed out of court by one or two who knew better but, 45 years later, while we can accept that Jimi Hendrix was the right answer then, he was replaced by Prince in the 1980's. But none of that makes me want to alter my decision.

Genius isn't anything you can learn and it might not even be something you can be born with. It has to be self-taught, made up, something nobody else has done before or else it can't be 'genius'.

You will have to go a long way down into lists of 'greatest guitarists' to find anybody listing Marc but it was by no means anything like his main job. His main job was to be a pop star and it mattered little to him, after his teenage modelling career, whether that came about by being the new Chuck Berry, Cliff Richard, Bob Dylan or whatever it took.

And it took several years, through disastrous projects like John's Children, the underground years of sitting on the floor alongside a bongo player like an Indian musician he'd seen, with Tyrannosaurus Rex and doing an apprenticeship as long as but not much like that the Beatles did in Hamburg. In those days, there was time, and it was worth the wait.

In the same way that purist Bob Dylan fans disapproved of the move to electric guitars and the abandonment of the folksy poet idea in favour of something better, John Peel, who had nurtured Tyrannosuarus Rex and been devoted to them, decided he didn't approve of Get It On. And so, that was that and Marc dropped John in a reciprocal arrangement once he'd served his purpose. 

It was not the first time or the last that a change of direction brought commercial success to an act that had been trying earnestly but not so profitably before hitting the jackpot by selling a lot more records. Hawkwind were never really Hawkwind any more after Silver Machine, Aswad weren't the same again after Don't Turn Around and Spandau Ballet, Simply Red and even Queen might have seemed interesting at first before realizing that 'professional' means earning money and that's the first priority.

In 1971, being interesting and being able to sell records weren't mutually exclusive. David Bowie was, by all means, the consummate artist that one had to admire but Marc was the one you could love, at least partly for his sheer nerve. It wasn't entirely obvious at the time if it was a joke or not whereas with chart rivals, Slade, with their mis-spelt titles and Nod, never mind Dave Hill, it clearly was. But with Marc, the words were spell-binding poetry, he was completely gorgeous to girls and he played music that might have been suspected of being novelty 'pop' at the time but is more respected now than it was at the time. Not the least of the credit for that should go to Tony Visconti, the producer who made the string of hits from Ride a White Swan to Metal Guru such masterpieces. That work only becomes obvious once Marc becomes so taken up with himself that he thinks he can do it all himself, sacks Visconti and he immediately stops being anywhere near as good as he had been.

None of that prevents Get It On being one of the monuments of 1971 which always seemed pop music's best year, possibly because it was a 'coming of age' year for me, being nearly 12, but it's a proposition supported by a sage like David Hepworth, who even though born in 1950, still puts 71 ahead of 1966. Pop music had learnt it all by then with its Hunky Dory, Electric Warrior, Motown in its last stage of majesty and, as we see in the Top 30 of September, could hardly put a foot wrong. There have certainly been brilliant things since but it's been very gradually downhill all the way since as, like most artists do, pop music itself eventually ran out of ideas, had to repeat itself or re-invent itself less convincingly. But, for those of us who were there, nobody can take 1971 away from us.