I was late to the table with Roxy Music, I am loathe to admit.
My first interaction with them came during a summer in the early 80’s when I was a teenager living in a three-story group house out on Long Island with my step-father. While I was sequestered in what was ostensibly the attic, the owner of the house’s daughter -– who, for the sake of this narrative, I’ll call Penelope -- lived a floor below mine. While Penelope and I had known each other as tiny kids, she’d grown into a gorgeous young woman, prone to walking around the house wearing next to nothing. I was either entirely invisible or so like a not-at-all threatening “little brother” to her, despite being the same age. I, of course, was rendered mute by all this, and found her enigmatic. The only concrete thing I could latch onto was her pronounced affinity for Roxy Music.
Around the communal stereo downstairs (where I’d occasionally spin records by The Dead Boys and The Misfits to absolutely no one’s enjoyment but my own), she had stacks of LPs by this strange band, all fittingly swathed in sleeves festooned with similarly gorgeous models (seek ye, of course, the iconic sleeve of Country Life). Penelope was more inclined to Roxy’s later records, so tracks like “More Than This,” “Dance Away” and the amazing “Love is the Drug” became my indoctrination -– all a very far cry from my otherwise-steady diet of “Sonic Reducer” and “Mommy, Can I Go Out and Kill Tonight.”
About a year or so later, meanwhile, a friend of mine sent me a VHS tape of vintage British punk footage, a key portion of which featured the band Spizzenergi prefacing a performance of their signature novelty hit, “Where’s Captain Kirk?” (which is always fucking excellent) with a sloppy bash through a curious song called “Virginia Plain.” In short order, I gleaned that this was a cover of Roxy Music’s first single, demonstrating a wholly different sound and aesthetic to the Roxy Music I’d gotten to know as the silky bump’n’grind soundtrack Penelope had unwittingly introduced me to. This prompted me to more fully invest in the Roxy Music oeuvre.
Anyway, you don’t need me to tell you how amazing those records are, whichever era of theirs you prefer. I’m also a big fan of solo Eno and Bryan Ferry, notably the latter’s burly cover of “The ‘In’ Crowd,” which is entirely goddamned awesome, regardless of what genre you’d care to pin it to.
If, at this late stage of the proceedings, you find yourself similarly in the dark, as I was, to the majesty of Roxy Music -- now poised to be inducted into the meaningless Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, you should check out Bill Wyman’s recommendations in Vulture. Normally, I blanche at these sorts of articles -– figure it out for yourself, why don’t you? --- but this breakdown of Roxy’s various iterations is well done.
Recent Comments