Tanx for the memories

Review Score: (8/10)
In 1973, in the summer of my 13th year upon this fair planet, I acquired a friend's 8 track of T.Rex's the Slider, which completely monopolized my music listening routine for the next two months. I was totally infatuated with Marc Bolan's oddball poetry and recycled Chuck Berry riffs, varnished by Tony Visconti's Spectorish production. It was obvious-I had to have more! I went out shortly thereafter and purchased his most recent (at the time) release: Tanx.When I got it home, I ripped off the shrink wrap, stuck the poster which came inside on the wall (yes, Virginia, long players used to come with big sheets of paper with pictures of the artist(s) on them; you could decorate your walls while you decorated your head...another reason to mourn the demise of vinyl), cued up the first track Tenement Lady, and some forty-odd minutes later I sat back in a stupor, completely confused. It said T.Rex on the cover, and that was definitely Marc Bolan singing, but something was very wrong...the confident and flashy Slider sound was gone, replaced by a set of ragged, sloppy, ungainly and unkempt tracks which I wasn't so sure that I liked very much! Fortunately, something compelled me to keep listening, and Tanx grew on me, kinda like the plain girl that you wouldn't date on a dare but eventually becomes your soul mate. Tanx is the ugly duckling of Bolan's canon, written at a time when personal excess dulled his edge and the wane of T.Rextasy left him scuffling for a sound to replace it and keep him in the good graces of teenyboppers (and truly hip adults) everywhere. He apparently felt that working r&b and gospel influences in was his best bet and the result is a very schizo record, best represented by Tenement Lady which is two songs in one, literally...other standout tracks, to me, are Electric Slim, which most successfully assimilated the R&B, Broken Hearted Blues (sad and forlorn, with sax accompaniment), and the weirdo Street and the Babe Shadow, with a Bowie sax solo, so the legend goes... Also, whoever compiled the CD reissue did us all a favor, since it has the best collection of 1972-73 singles and b-sides at the end...20th Century Boy, Solid Gold Easy Action, Sunken Rags, and Children of the Revolution are all excellent mid-to-late period singles. I also get a kick out of the Xmas Message, done for a 30 second radio spot, I suppose, and how it segues immediately into 20th Century Boy, providing a little holiday punch, if you will.

All in all, this isn't the best T.Rex album, and one would be advised to buy the self titled album, Electric Warrior, and the Slider first. But if you like those, or sloppy rock n'roll in general, you'll want to make room for this ugly duckling as well.

More Reviews:

• Bolan Expands the T.Rex Sound
• No Sign of Decline
• in retrospect...great!
• Yes, I was misled....
• WARNING: TIME-TRAVEL MAY OCCUR WHILE LISTENING
• Grew on me.
• Life is strange indeed
• The Third of Three Great T-Rex Albums
• T.Rex Musical Departure still stands strong
• This album made Marc a legend.
• Tanx
• T.Rex At Their Blazing Best