Re-Make/Re-Model

When I saw the title, I had expected it to be the musical journey of Roxy Music. I was rather disappointed therefore while half way through, it was still not getting there. I was thinking at several points that if I were the author, I would have be discussing the emerging music scene around that time, or at least a brief summary of it, to give the claim of Roxy Music's 'uniqueness' a more solid musical context. But apparently, this was not what the author had in mind.

But what makes the book less an great read is some of the claims repeatedly made by the author. Well, we all know Roxy Music, don't we? But some of the claims made need more evidence to prove.

The book however is nevertheless a great read, especially if we could adjust our expectation a bit. It is like an oral history that tries to trace the coming into being of an musician who practised the idea of creating pop art in every aspect of it, leading the way of performer being an artistic product in its own overall presentation.

Having recently read a biography of a woodcarver from the 18th century North East England, which includes a good description of the region, the first chapter in the Re-Make/Re-Model feels like a continuation of that discussion, albeit with a jump of two decades. The chapters on the artistic scene in both Reading and London are interesting as well, and provide a lot of historical and cultrual context of the era of great changes.

As my boss is a great fan of Bryan Ferry and hence we would be listening to him 'dancing away his pain' always every few days through her mini speakers connected to her iPod. It was a shock therefore when I played my collection of Roxy Music, and found that it was not until their third album was on that I started to recognise some of its tunes, and their Avalon before I heard all the hits coming out from my boss's iPod.

Listening to them chronologically did seem to prove some of the points critics have made: with the departure of Eno soon after album no 2, how the band had gradually become less avert garde and more of a personal project of leader Bryan Ferry, and by Avalon, the complete merge of the two: a Roxy Music project and his own personal vision/style.

Critics haven't been particularly kind to Bryan's sole project, and my experience of watching his performance in Opera House in Newcastle six or seven years ago with an overcrowded stage packed with 'sexy babes' had more or less damaged his image as a cool artist when you listen to his 'mannered' voice through sound system only. Since the book finishes at the point soon after the release of their first album and the arrival of fame, it has not shed much light on the transformation of the last three decades of an 'artist' who appeared to be leading a musical/artistic revolution of the late 1960s and early 1970s. But what the book has achieved is no small feat nevertheless, though I would have appreciated it a lot more if those interviewed were not so self-important at some points.