If you were at school during
the early 1970s, chances are
that you too were caught up
in my generation's pop stand-off. Forget The Beatles
versus The Stones...forget
Oasis versus Blur, between
1971 and 1973 you were only
allowed to express a
preference for one band or
the other and never the twain
should meet - T.Rex or Slade,
which side were you on?
I was firmly on the side of
the guy who wasn't no square
with his corkscrew hair. My
first proper album was 'The
Slider', first live show
T.Rex at the Edmonton Sundown
in 1972 and for about 18
months I listened to no-one
else.
Gradually though, I realised
that there was life beyond
Marc Bolan's Les Paul and began checking out other
things as well - including
Slade, but of course I had to
keep that piece of
information from the kids at
school!
Over the subsequent years, I doubt I've listened to Slade quite as much as T.Rex, old allegiances die hard, but a few of their records did become firm favourites. Here's two of them. Happy birthday Noddy!
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6 comments:
I have to say I'm knocked out by this post. It's a generational thing, obviously, but my first 'proper' album was The Slider and I was totally on the side of T. Rex. You saw them in '72? I'm utterly envious. I didn't catch them live until Marc's final tour in '77. Having said all that, I was a big Slade fan as well. Bought all the early singles from 'Cos I Luv You' onwards but never saw them in the flesh. 'How Does It Feel' is my all time Slade fave. Simply brilliant. Thanks for this post, sir.
I'm a sixties guy and a bit older for all this enthusiasm but saying that Bolan did it for me, Slade were no slouch either and you have to like Noddy. He has even got nuts named after him...now that is class!
SB, having heard the bootlegs and the official live album, I dearly wish I'd seen T.Rex on the Dandy in the Underworld tour, so I'm envious too! I caught Slade a couple of times in the 1980s and I'm glad I did, although I'm not so keen on their later stuff.
OPC, there must have been some classroom pop music stand-offs in the 60s, or were schoolkids more open-minded back then? I have to say that the T.Rex/Slade thing seems ridiculous in retrospect, but at the time it was all taken very seriously!
Of course the Beatles and the Stones but I liked them both....did have arguments how I thought Dylan was better than Elvis but again I loved them both. Made it difficult to make a real stand....but I know what you mean!
Ah, I was just a teensy bit too young to be aware of the T Rex / Slade stand-off, but Mr SDS tells me about it. He was firmly in the Slade camp (although he had originally bought 'Ride A White Swan' when it came out). My sister, who is same age, was a T Rex fan, but then Bolan was always going to be more of a pin-up subject than Noddy et al! I remember her bedroom wall plastered with posters of Marc and Mickey Finn, on whom she had a massive crush. I just thought that Marc looked like the girl who lived down the road (I'm not sure who would be the most offended...)
It was Sweet v Slade at my school. Marc Bolan was for girls; just ask my cousin Suzie.
My old next door neighbour, funnily enough, was at The Albert Hall in Nottingham c1970 when Bolan went electric. Seems he got as much stick for it as Dylan had done only a handful of years before him.
That said, you've gotta love the 20th Century riff have you not?
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