Octo_Russ

Various Artists [Glam Slam - The Definitive Glam Rock Collection]

A long time ago, back in 1973, i bought my very first vinyl 45 [Life On Mars by David Bowie], this began the start of my obsession of collecting music, not long after came the Glam Rock revolution in the British charts, i think it started with T Rex, but soon bands like Slade, Sweet, Wizzard, and Gary Glitter joined in, and i bought many vinyl singles by Slade, Wizzard, and Sweet, it also found a market in the United States, with acts like Kiss and Twisted Sister, even the Punk Rock image is like an outrageous form of the opposite of Glam, and even today people like Marilyn Manson owe their image to the Glam Rock revolution, all those vinyl 45's are long gone, so this is like an ideal collection of all those singles i used to own, i got this disc in 1997, and it's proved a regular feature in my disc player.

My favourite Glam Rock act were Slade, they weren't merely an image and a bygone era, they wrote classy songs too, ok Dave Hill had some outrageous costumes, and they were visually over the top in their platform soled shoes, but underneath they were musical craftsmen, and they tended to get better with age, Noddy Holder's megaphone voice was straight out of what would now be termed as Glam Metal, and songs like 'The Banging Man' really were Metal, but at the other end of the spectrum they could be really refined and melodic.

Their best track was 'Cum On Feel The Noize', complete with misspellings [even the the band name is a misspelling], and it's good that it's on this disc, the other two tracks that i really enjoyed were track 8, 'Angel Fingers' by Wizzard, and track 13 'Sugar Baby Love' by The Rubettes, 'Cum On Feel The Noize' starts with Noddy screaming 'Baby, baby, bayyybe', and then after a short introduction '...Yo!', the verses are sooo good, thumping bass, nice rhythm guitar, and great drums, the chorus really is a chorus of all band members, what really makes the song is the sheer tuneful invention of the verses, which rightly has three verses, makes the song miles better, and Noddy Holders wonderful full throated voice, got to No1 in 1973 for four weeks, beats the Quiet Riot version any day.

Here's Slade singing 'Cum On Feel The Noize' on YouTube, recorded on Top Of The Pops.