T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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All eight original T. Rex studio albums, plus two bonus CD of non-album tracks, in card wallets in a box, with a 16 page booklet. Recorded between 1970 and 1977, Marc Bolan’s best-known favourites are included, including “Get It On”, “Metal Guru”, “Telegram Sam”, “Children Of The Revolution” and “20th Century Boy” are included.

~ amazon

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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Tyrannosaurus Rex's transformation from oracles of U.K. hippie culture to boogie-friendly rock stars began with the album A Beard of Stars, released in early 1970 when the band picked up electric instruments, and by the time the year was out, Marc Bolan had pared their name down to the more user-friendly T. Rex and dropped their first album with the new moniker. Oddly enough, while the songs on T. Rex bear a much stronger melodic and lyrical resemblance to what would make the band famous on Electric Warrior in 1971, the tone of the album is a bit more pastoral than A Beard of Stars; on most of the tunes, the electric guitars are more successfully integrated into the arrangements so they lack the jarring immediacy of "Elemental Children" or "Pavilions of the Sun," and Mickey Finn still wasn't using a full drum kit, so the tunes don't quite have the kick of a full-on rock band. But Bolan himself sounds like he's ready for his close-up, as his vocals – mannered yet quietly passionate and full of belief – suggest the glam hero he would soon become, and numbers like "Beltrane Walk," "Is It Love," and "Diamond Meadows" (with its wink-and-nudge refrain "Hey, let's do it like we're friends") are just a few paces away from the swaggering sound that would make him the U.K.'s biggest star. If Bolan was reaching for the big time with T. Rex, he also sounds like he was letting out the rock star that had always lurked within him, and there isn't a moment here that doesn't sound like he's singing from his heart and soul. T. Rex is the quiet before the storm of Electric Warrior, and it retains a loopy energy and easy charm that makes it one of Bolan's watershed works.

by Mark Deming, AMG

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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The album that essentially kick-started the U.K. glam rock craze, Electric Warrior completes T. Rex's transformation from hippie folk-rockers into flamboyant avatars of trashy rock & roll. There are a few vestiges of those early days remaining in the acoustic-driven ballads, but Electric Warrior spends most of its time in a swinging, hip-shaking groove powered by Marc Bolan's warm electric guitar. The music recalls not just the catchy simplicity of early rock & roll, but also the implicit sexuality – except that here, Bolan gleefully hauls it to the surface, singing out loud what was once only communicated through the shimmying beat. He takes obvious delight in turning teenage bubblegum rock into campy sleaze, not to mention filling it with pseudo-psychedelic hippie poetry. In fact, Bolan sounds just as obsessed with the heavens as he does with sex, whether he's singing about spiritual mysticism or begging a flying saucer to take him away. It's all done with the same theatrical flair, but Tony Visconti's spacious, echoing production makes it surprisingly convincing. Still, the real reason Electric Warrior stands the test of time so well – despite its intended disposability – is that it revels so freely in its own absurdity and willful lack of substance. Not taking himself at all seriously, Bolan is free to pursue whatever silly wordplay, cosmic fantasies, or non sequitur imagery he feels like; his abandonment of any pretense to art becomes, ironically, a statement in itself. Bolan's lack of pomposity, back-to-basics songwriting, and elaborate theatrics went on to influence everything from hard rock to punk to new wave. But in the end, it's that sense of playfulness, combined with a raft of irresistible hooks, that keeps Electric Warrior such an infectious, invigorating listen today.

by Steve Huey, AMG

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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Buoyed by two U.K. number one singles in "Telegram Sam" and "Metal Guru," The Slider became T. Rex's most popular record on both sides of the Atlantic, despite the fact that it produced no hits in the U.S. The Slider essentially replicates all the virtues of Electric Warrior, crammed with effortless hooks and trashy fun. All of Bolan's signatures are here – mystical folk-tinged ballads, overt sexual come-ons crooned over sleazy, bopping boogies, loopy nonsense poetry, and a mastery of the three-minute pop song form. The main difference is that the trippy mix of Electric Warrior is replaced by a fuller, more immediate-sounding production. Bolan's guitar has a harder bite, the backing choruses are more up-front, and the arrangements are thicker-sounding, even introducing a string section on some cuts (both ballads and rockers). Even with the beefier production, T. Rex still doesn't sound nearly as heavy as many of the bands it influenced (and even a few of its glam contemporaries), but that's partly intentional – Bolan's love of a good groove takes precedence over fast tempos or high-volume crunch. Lyrically, Bolan's flair for the sublimely ridiculous is fully intact, but he has way too much style for The Slider to sound truly stupid, especially given the playful, knowing wink in his delivery. It's nearly impossible not to get caught up in the irresistible rush of melodies and cheery good times. Even if it treads largely the same ground as Electric Warrior, The Slider is flawlessly executed, and every bit the classic that its predecessor is.

by Steve Huey, AMG

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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By 1973's Tanx, the T. Rex hit-making machine was beginning to show some wear and tear, but Marc Bolan still had more than a few winners up his sleeve. It was also admirable that Bolan was attempting to broaden the T. Rex sound – soulful backup singers and horns are heard throughout, a full two years before David Bowie used the same formula for his mega-seller Young Americans. However, Tanx did not contain any instantly recognizable hits, as their past couple of releases had, and the performances were not quite as vibrant, due to non-stop touring and drug use. Despite an era of transition looming on the horizon for the band, tracks such as "Rapids," "Highway Knees," "The Street & Babe Shadow," and "Born to Boogie" contain the expected classic T. Rex sound. The leadoff track, "Tenement Lady," is an interesting Beatlesque epic, while "Shock Rock" criticizes the early-'70s glam scene, which T. Rex played a prominent role in creating. Other highlights include one of Bolan's most gorgeous and heartfelt ballads, "Broken Hearted Blues," as well as the brief, explosive rocker "Country Honey." Tanx marked the close of what many consider T. Rex's golden era; unfortunately, the bandmembers would drift off one by one soon after, until Bolan was the only one remaining by the mid-'70s.

by Greg Prato, AMG

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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By late 1973, Marc Bolan's star was waning fast. No longer gunning out those effortless classics which established him as the most important figure of the decade so far, he embarked instead on a voyage of musical discovery, which cast him so far adrift from the commercial pop mainstream that when his critics said he'd blown it, he didn't even bother answering them back. Or that's the way it appeared at the time, and today, too, it must be acknowledged that 1974's Zinc Alloy & the Hidden Riders of Tomorrow is not classic Bolan, even if one overlooks the transparency of its title. After all, hadn't Bowie already done the Fictional Someone & the Somethings from Somewhere routine? Indeed he had, as his fans kept remarking at the time, and when the knives began slashing Zinc Alloy to shreds, that was one of the fiercest wounds. Time, however, has healed almost all of them. Indeed, hindsight proves that, far from losing his muse, Bolan's biggest sin was losing his once-impeccable sense of occasion. The world wasn't ready for this latest T. Rex, and the fact that it wasn't interested in the old T. Rex either is just another object lesson in the fabled fickleness of pop fans. How faulty was Bolan's timing, though? As it transpired, he was out by no more than a year, maybe less than six months. The era of disco was coming, and with it the wholesale transformation of a wealth of rocking talents. But while David Bowie was barely dreaming of young Americans' fame, and Bryan Ferry was still road testing the pharmaceutical properties of l'amour, Bolan was up to his neck in American radio, pulling out an album which exceeded his assumed capabilities no less than it shot right over the heads of the kids who once bought all his hits. "The Groover," the spring 1973 single which many regarded as the first sign of Bolan's fall from grace, marked the birth of this new fascination, a simple but solid slab of funk-inflected rock which did, indeed, groove. (The track is one of five bonus tracks appended to the album's Edsel reissue). The yearning, heavily orchestrated hit "Teenage Dream" hit notwithstanding, the heart of Zinc Alloy, then, simply followed in "The Groover"'s footsteps, an abandoned romp through the R&B influences which Bolan had always acknowledged, but never truly explored – the solid James Brown drive of "The Avengers (Superbad)," "Interstellar Soul," "Liquid Gang," and the implausibly slight, but impressively groove-ridden "You've Got to Jive to Stay Alive." Into the same bag, one can also throw the period b-sides "Satisfaction Pony" and "Sitting Here" – both of which have also been added to the album. Deeply soul-soaked songs like these aren't simply a new direction. They are the very signposts which would soon be guiding so many other English rock talents down some very unfamiliar alleyways. Zinc Alloy was released in March, 1974. Bowie began rehearsing his Philly Dogs tour in July. Yet, even with such credentials to uphold it, this isn't quite Bolan's soul album. Those demons would be exorcised on a second record cut with singer Sister Pat Hall and elsewhere in his collaborations with girlfriend Gloria Jones. Besides, the production here was just a little too cautious to truly convince the wary listener. Neither can it be neatly categorized in the same fashion as, say, Bowie's Young Americans – Bolan looked across the spectrum for his influences, but he never once went to Philadelphia. Rather, it straddles that same pop/rock, funky R&B landscape as early Funkadelic, Sly Stone and Co., neither fish nor fowl, dead fish nor foul, but something somewhere in between. Approach it with caution. But get in there regardless.

by Dave Thompson, AMG

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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Having reinvented himself as a bionic soulboy across the course of 1974's Zinc Alloy, Bolan's Zip Gun was less a reiteration of Marc Bolan's new direction than a confirmation of it. Much of the album returns to the understated romp he had always excelled at – the delightful knockabout "Precious Star," the unrepentant boogie of "Till Dawn" and the pounding title track all echo with the effortless lightheartedness which was Bolan at his most carelessly buoyant, while "Token of My Love" is equally incandescent, a playful blues which swiftly became a major in-concert favorite. But the essence of Zip Gun remains firmly in the funky pastures which characterized Zinc Alloy, with the only significant difference lying in the presentation. Out went the plush production which so diluted the earlier set, to be replaced by a sparser sound which emphasized the rhythms, heightened the backing vocals, and left rock convention far behind. "Light of Love," "Golden Belt" and the heavyweight ballad "I Really Love You Babe" may not be Stax-sized attractions, but they have an earthy authenticity nevertheless, while bonus tracks on the Edsel remaster include single-only stabs at "Dock of the Bay" and "Do You Wanna Dance," further indications of just how seriously Bolan was taking his new role – and how far he'd moved from the bopping elf of three years earlier. The difference was, in 1972, Marc Bolan was a God. By 1975, he was barely even a minor deity. It was, of course, the old, old story. When he made records that sounded like the old ones, the kids all complained he'd stagnated and lost it. When he made records that didn't sound like them, then they moaned even louder that things just weren't the same. So he made ones that fell smack between the two poles, and that wasn't right either. And yet, played back to back alongside the "classics," there ain't much wrong with any of them. Whatever was the fuss all about, then? Decades on, each of Bolan's latter day albums retain a hint of their original controversy, but hindsight lends them an impact (and, for what it's worth, a credibility) which contemporary listeners could never have imagined. And Zip Gun, an album which scored the worst reviews of all, hits as hard as any of them.

by Dave Thompson, AMG

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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The most blatantly, and brilliantly, portentous of Marc Bolan's albums since the transitional blurring of boundaries that was Beard of Stars, almost seven years prior, Futuristic Dragon opens on a wave of unrelenting feedback, guitars and bombast, setting an apocalyptic mood for the record which persists long after that brief (two minutes) overture is over. Indeed, even the quintessential bop of the succeeding "Jupiter Liar" is irrevocably flavored by what came before, dirty guitars churning beneath a classic Bolan melody, and the lyrics a spiteful masterpiece. While the oddly Barry White-influenced "Ride My Wheels" continues flirting with the neo-funk basics of 1975's Bolan's Zip Gun, the widescreen sonic majesty of Futuristic Dragon was, if anything, even more gratuitously ambitious than its predecessor. "Calling All Destroyers," "Sensation Boulevard" and the magnificent "Dawn Storm" all bristle with lyrical splendor, while "Casual Agent" revisits some older glories with its near-slavish re-creation of the old "Rip Off" vibe. But if the other tunes pursue Bolan's new-found fascination for pomp over pop with barely disguised glee, he wasn't above slipping the odd joke into the brew to remind us that he knew what he was doing. "Theme for a Dragon" is an all-but Wagnerian symphonic instrumental – with the sound of screaming teenyboppers as its backdrop, and the punch line lurking further afield among the handful of obvious hits which he also stirred in. The first of these, the big-budget ballad "Dreamy Lady," scored even before the rest of the album was complete. It was followed by the idiotically contagious "New York City," a piece of pure pop nonsense/genius which so effortlessly returned him to the British Top 20 that, for a few weeks through mid-1976, the idea of seeing "a woman coming out of New York City with a frog in her hand" really didn't seem as silly as it sounded. And when he followed that up with the rhythm'n'punk swagger of "I Love to Boogie," few people would deny that Bolan was on the way back up. That particular gem would be featured on his next album, 1977's Dandy in the Underworld; the Edsel remaster of Futuristic Dragon does, however, wrap up three further cuts from the era, the single sides "Laser Love," the languid "Life's an Elevator" and, best of all, "London Boys," a piece of undisguised childhood nostalgia which was allegedly written about David Bowie, one of Bolan's teenaged running mates. The song, incidentally, was drawn from a proposed concept album, ambitiously titled "London Opera" (one of two Bolan was then considering, the other was the sci-fi themed Billy Super Duper). The project was never completed, however – for something else was stirring in the capital's bowels, that snarling monster which emerged as punk. And the moment Bolan saw it, he knew precisely what it represented. He began work on a new album right away.

by Dave Thompson, AMG

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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Marc Bolan welcomed the advent of punk rock with the biggest smile he'd worn in years. The hippest young gunslingers could go on all night about the influence of the Velvet Underground, the Stooges, and the Ramones, but Bolan knew – and subsequent developments proved – that every single one of them had been nurtured in his arms, growing up with the ineffable stream of brilliant singles he slammed out between 1970-1972, and rehearsing their own stardom to the soundtrack he supplied. With tennis racquet guitars and hairbrushes for mikes, they stood before the mirror and practiced the Bolan Boogie. Of course, most punks only knew three chords. That was all Marc ever taught them. Dandy in the Underworld, released early in 1977, confirmed Bolan's punkoid preeminence. Still retaining its predecessors' demented soul revue edge (most successfully via the yearning "Soul of My Suit") but packed solid with powerful pop (the previous summer's hit "I Love to Boogie" included), Bolan's personal predictions for the punk scene literally exploded out of the grooves. The title track and the churning "Visions of Domino" all bristle with revitalized energy, while "Jason B. Sad" cheekily medleys Bolan's own "Bang a Gong" and "Telegram Sam" melodies into a dead-end drama utterly in keeping with the new wave's own belief that the future was futile. By the time the album wraps up with the rock'n'armageddon-flavored "Teen Riot Structure," Bolan was not simply wearing the mantel of punk godfatherhood, he was happily sticking safety pins through it and preparing his next move, the driving "Celebrate Summer" single – absent from the original album, but included now as one of five bonus tracks appended to the Edsel remaster. Riding in on buzzsaw guitar and thundering bass, it packed a killer chorus and an uplfting message ("Hey little punk, forget that junk and celebrate summer with me") and it really was the greatest record he'd made in years. It was also his last – a month after its release, Marc Bolan was dead. Sorrow immediately imbibed Dandy in the Underworld with a dignity that, had Bolan lived, it probably wouldn't have otherwise deserved – it is not, overall, one of his strongest albums, and the demos and outtakes included on the later volumes of the Unchained series suggest that his proposed next album would have left it far behind. But conjecture, like hindsight, can be a dangerous gauge. At the time, Dandy not only seemed bloated with promise, it was pregnant with foreboding as well. Listen again to the lyrics of the title track – self-mythologizing autobiography and not a happy ending in sight. Just like real life.

by Dave Thompson, AMG

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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T. Rex - The Albums Collection (2014) [10CD Box Set]

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