Roxy Music - One of the Many Gaping Holes in my Collection

[WeatherWiseCDC]

First five albums are essential. Avalon as well depending on your tolerance for pop. It is VERY different from the early stuff but still a classic.

Avalon is my favorite of the albums. It's a very cohesive album with a strong atmospheric vibe. Very highly regarded.

[markwoll]

Not at all. It's even more paranoid and unhinged than the original. Maybe this will turn some folks on to the Melvins, too:

Oh Hell Yeah!

[mogrooves]

What do I need? What should I start with? Don't say 'all of them' ...

If only one, make it For Your Pleasure. Then get the first.

[olivetti]

^It deserves a deluxe re-release. What is there is fantastic- they were a heavier group than in the studio.

First two are coming
Steven Wilson remixes! :-)

/ and the box, complete studio recordings,
is the best "remaster" (flat transfer some say) work I've heard so far!

[kayfabe58]

the first three are the lightning in a bottle...Country life is the beginning of decline although Viva is great great...Stranded is the pinnacle in terms of mixing the first two albums quirky appeal with the perfect blend of commercial gloss and outstanding approach.

[Scrotum Scissor]

70 year olds should just not be doing this shit, but it's the f*****g Melvins in a bar!

At my age, I ain't gonna miss a legendary, influential band like that in a bar!

You shouldn't worry about a thing. The Melvins are great fun no matter what, and you should certainly get to to see them if at all possible. They're one of those post-70s groups everyone should try to catch at least once, along with Slayer, Sonic Youth and a handful of others.

Earplugs, tho' ?

As for Roxy Music, I'd start with their first three and then go with Avalon and a couple of the Eno solo classics. Brilliant minds, brilliant band. Even their lone global schlager, "More than This", stands out as something altogether very, very special in terms of intendedly "commercial" pop music.

[Trane]

Start with the first two with Eno- the eponymous debut and 'For Your Pleasure'.

just that one!!

all you need, really!!!

[Kavus Torabi]

The Bogus Man is one of my favourite tunes by anyone.
When I first heard it I became fixated over it. I couldn't stop listening to it. It was as if I was trying to get inside the tune somehow. It has such a casual air of total strangeness. A real curious magic and resonance for me.
Really love the first two. I've always meant to investigate the later material which I'm sure I'll like. Maybe this thread will prompt me to finally do that.

[bob_32_116]

I quite like the music on Avalon and some of the other albums, but Roxy music is one of those bands where I cannot get past the vocals. Japan is another.

I find something very off-putting about Bryan Ferry's voice. I'm sure it's nothing he can help, but he always sounds to me as though he's singing with a peg on his nose. Same with David Sylvian.

[Steve F.]

It's even more paranoid and unhinged than the original.

This was a hoot. And yes. Unhinged!

[Steve F.]

Really love the first two. I've always meant to investigate the later material which I'm sure I'll like.

Well worth hearing the 3 studio albums that came after [ Stranded, Country Life, Siren]. Not quite as weird, but still very arty and very good.

[Mr.Flower]

Like Scrotum Scissor said above - well worth checking out some solo Eno (particularly Here Come the Warm Jets and Another Green World) if you like the first two RM records.

A little aside here - but Steve, was thinking of you the other day when i saw the movie (from 2014) Good Vibrations - about a record store owner/record company boss, Terri Hooley, who worked in Belfast in the 70s and put out independent punk singles during the Troubles (including The Undertones). Have you seen it or are aware of it?

[Steve F.]

A little aside here - but Steve, was thinking of you the other day when i saw the movie (from 2014) Good Vibrations - about a record store owner/record company boss, Terri Hooley, who worked in Belfast in the 70s and put out independent punk singles during the Troubles (including The Undertones). Have you seen it or are aware of it?

I was not even aware of it. Thank you.

Trailer looks great!

I've never been that drunk OR that enthusiastic though, I must warn you.

[Mr.Flower]

I was not even aware of it. Thank you.

Moving, inspirational and funny ... a bit like your good self. I'm sure you'd find it interesting.

[ItalProgRules]

Besides the key albums, you should get the DVD called The Thrill of it All - 1972-1982

Just wish it had more Wetton, who's barely there, but it's great anyways.

[Sturgeon's Lawyer]

Ian,

I'm going to go against the flow and recommend you *NOT* start with the first two albums. While they are fantastic, their "experimental" nature and "experimental" production make them, well, not easy to listen to; at times I find them unlistenable...and experimental does not generally scare me off.

There are two good entry points - no, three:

1. Pick up a live album, preferably "Viva!" and see what they were *really* all about. (There are some great ROIOs out there too, if that's your bag.)

2. If you really like "Out of the Blue," pick up "Siren" or "Country Life," which for me are the pinnacle of the main period of Roxy.

3. "Manifesto" is the beginning of real "pop Roxy" (pardon the pun), but for all that it's a killer album that got dismissive reviews because it wasn't what people wanted from them. The title track alone is worth the price of admission.

"Avalon" is actually my favorite Roxy album, but it's barely a Roxy album; it's more like a Ferry solo album with Andy and Phil in the backup band.

[progeezer]

(Very) slightly off topic, but if find yourself enamored of Bryan F's decadent lounge singer style (as I am), you may like his solo album of Dylan covers, Dylanesque.

To say that he made the songs his own is an understatement.

[miamiscot]

The first five and Avalon are all essential.

Manifesto and Flesh + Blood did nothing for me though.

Terrific band. No one sounds like Roxy Music.

[JJ88]

The problem with 'Manifesto' and 'Flesh And Blood' as albums is that they are neither fish nor fowl- they are in transition from the earlier, darker sound to a new slicker sound, and don't cohere. 'Avalon' works far better as an album because it's cohesive and knows what it is aiming for.

The title track of 'Manifesto' is one of the very best things they ever did. But following that is the iffy comeback single 'Trash'.

[JJ88]

(Very) slightly off topic, but if find yourself enamored of Bryan F's decadent lounge singer style (as I am), you may like his solo album of Dylan covers, Dylanesque.

To say that he made the songs his own is an understatement.

I can never understand why such an original writer has recorded so many covers. But that first cover he did, 'A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall', is one of the great Bob Dylan covers.

[Mister Triscuits]

I can never understand why such an original writer has recorded so many covers. But that first cover he did, 'A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall', is one of the great Bob Dylan covers.

Ferry's early solo career was really perverse. He hogged all the writing credits with Roxy Music, throwing a bone to the other band members by giving them a B-side here and there (and about five minutes to get it done, so those Roxy B-sides are usually half-baked instrumentals). Then when he started up a parallel solo career, the albums were almost entirely made up of covers! So then he breaks up Roxy, and makes In Your Mind, consisting entirely of Ferry originals, retains Paul Thompson, Phil Manzanera, and two of the former Roxy bassists (including Wetton), and the result is essentially a watered-down Roxy Music album.

[interbellum]

1. Pick up a live album, preferably "Viva!" and see what they were *really* all about. (There are some great ROIOs out there too, if that's your bag.)

"Viva!" was a long time my only Roxy-album. Got it when it was released in '76. Especially the heavy symphonic approach did it for me. The studio-albums sounded too "thin" for me. But when I finally bought them in the fine box-set from a few years ago, I could appreciate them too.

[Scrotum Scissor]

The Bogus Man is one of my favourite tunes by anyone.
When I first heard it I became fixated over it. I couldn't stop listening to it. It was as if I was trying to get inside the tune somehow. It has such a casual air of total strangeness.

Yes.

I think one of the main reasons is the segment it makes with the other two tunes on that LP side 2. I absolutely love the completely transcendent foulness of "Bogus Man", but when it shifts to the utterly Dave Lycnh'ian "Grey Lagoons" I can't but help thinking that we're perhaps into some Wayne Gacy umbrella-drink holiday heaven. I guess it's somewhat disturbing then that I feel side 2 of FYP to constitute one of the best side 2s of any UK mid-70s "progressive" release. Title track is beyond this world.

[NogbadTheBad]

I guess I better explore a bit.

[Blah_Blah_Woof_Woof]

I love Ferry's cover of Sympathy for the Devil- It sounds like Bela Lugosi reading the lyrics.

Country Life and Siren came out at the time when I first saw them live. I had not heard In Every Dream Home... before I heard it live. I went out and bought For Your Pleasure and it became my favorite Roxy song. Saw the Manifesto and Avalon tours, too.

The mid-period is the stuff I listen to the most. Love the first couple Manzanera solo and 801 releases, as well as, Another Green World and Before and After Science. First couple Ferry albums were very popular in the UK. I liked Bride Stripped Bare as well.