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Mambo Sun
Cosmic Dancer
Jeepster
Monolith
Lean Woman Blues
Get It On
Planet Queen
Girl
The Motivator
Life's a Gas
Rip Off
You could not have a more fitting title than Electric Warrior. Marc Bolan sheds his hippy skin, reinvents himself as a golden god with a gleaming, screaming electric guitar, and writes his two biggest hits in one fell swoop.
Jeepster and Get It On – pimped out for car and cola commercials for 30 years now – are virtually the only T. Rex songs many Americans have ever heard. These two tracks often overshadow what is otherwise a stellar collection of sun-dappled narco-rockers like Planet Queen and The Motivator, as well as lighter, dreamier fare, like Monolith and the autobiographical Cosmic Dancer. This album influenced everyone back then. Still does.
Electric Warrior became Bolan’s coronation. The iconic sleeve (and free poster,) effectively serving as a big, gold sign saying Worship Me For I Am The New Rock God, was soon ubiquitous. He was Hendrix and Dylan and Jagger rolled into one. Ringo Starr’s endorsement held water with the snootier members of the press; pin-ups of Marc were of more interest to readers of Jackie magazine.
Morrissey has declared: “Marc was the first pop artist who seemed to be telling us that the future was more important than the past. Nothing dates those songs.”
Every week, Album of the Week Club listens to and discusses the album in question, votes on how good it is, and publishes our findings, with the aim of giving people reliable reviews and the wider rock community the chance to contribute.
Other albums released in September 1971
- Future Games - Fleetwood Mac
- From the Inside - Poco
- Imagine - John Lennon
- Second Album - Curved Air
- Welcome To The Canteen - Traffic
- Cahoots - The Band
- Judee Sill - Judee Sill
- Colosseum Live - Colosseum
- Fly - Yoko Ono
- Faust - Faust
- Grateful Dead - Grateful Dead
- Tucky Buzzard - Tucky Buzzard
- Harmony - Three Dog Night
- Granite Creek - Moby Grape
- April Wine - April Wine
- Bark - Jefferson Airplane
- Charlie Daniels - Charlie Daniels
- Free Live! - Free
- Genesis - Elvin Jones
- James Gang Live in Concert - James Gang
- The North Star Grassman and the Ravens - Sandy Denny
- Pilgrimage - Wishbone Ash
- Rock Love - Steve Miller Band
- Santana III - Santana
- Street Corner Talking - Savoy Brown
What they said...
"The music recalls not just the catchy simplicity of early rock'n'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." (AllMusic)
"It’s dead easy to knock T.Rex today – it’s everyone’s favourite bloodsport – but Bolan stomps and stamps on. Whether or not you feel that he has butchered the spirit of Tyrannosaurus Rex, you must admire his composure and concede his sincerity." (NME)
"As an acoustic warrior, back when he spelled out his group's first name and did concept albums about unicorns, Marc Bolan was considered 'progressive,' which meant he was as foolish as Donovan but not as famous. A freak hit turned him into a singer of rhythmic fairy tales for British pre-pubes, exactly what he was always suited for, and the great "Bang a Gong" extends his subject matter into the rock myth itself, which has its limits but sure beats unicorns." (Robert Christgau)
What you said...
Dale Munday: Christmas, 1971. Electric Warrior and Deep Purple In Rock. My first two albums, both of which will always be cherished by me for that reason alone.
Disregarding that, Electric Warrior still sounds fantastic. There was still a lot of great music to come in the shape of the Slider and a big handful of superlative singles. However, this was Bolan pre-ego at his peak.
John Davidson: In the early '70s, bands/artists were either album-oriented or aiming for the pop charts. Marc Bolan and T. Rex were regularly in the singles charts in the UK, alongside Slade, Sweet and plenty more. Cosmic Dancer, Jeepster, and Get It On are three that I remember, even though I was under 10 when they came out.
But the question this week is: Was the album that spawned them any good?
Sadly, the answer is not really. The three singles are the best versions of a limited template of songs that mix glammed-up rock'n'roll, rockabilly and blues with cosmic, hippy/starchild lyrics.
The hits are genuinely good, but the rest are forgettable. 6/10.
Robby Jackson: Pure sonic velvet. Electric Warrior is just the perfect mix of heavy crunch and acoustic swagger, and the way the tracks just effortlessly flow right into each other is incredible to my ears.
Adam Ranger: My favourite T. Rex album, first heard at the age of 13 in 1979. I loved it then, and I still have very fond memories of it. But is it any good so many years on?
It has Jeepster and Get It On, two of T. Rex's biggest hits. The rest of the album is a little slower in pace. Apart from the slightly chaotic closer Rip Off. But that's OK.
Two of those slower tracks have always been two of my favourite T.Rex songs, and Cosmic Dancer and Life's A Gas still sound great.
A lot of the album may sound a bit dated. The '70s glam rock era doesn't always pass the test of time. But I will score this album highly. Still love these songs.
My own compilation of T.Rex would be better, but since that does not exist as a recorded album. I can confidently declare this the best and most consistent T. Rex album.
Chris Elliott: When I bought my first (second-hand) record player around 1979, it also contained an 8-track tape deck - probably the only one in West Yorkshire. It only played the first track/side, and John Denver and Electric Warrior are the only ones I remember - or played.
Great album: Bolan's career highlight by a long way. This and Greatest Hits are all the Bolan you really need
Michele Weber Massaglia: Outstanding album. Love every track.
Greg Schwepe: For me, T. Rex might be Ground Zero for glam rock. And while the Ground Zero album might be Electric Warrior, it's definitely Bang a Gong (Get It On) for the song.
And now for my usual extended back story about the album and band we're reviewing! The older brother of a friend across the street had the 45 RPM record of Bang a Gong. When he bought Electric Warrior he no longer needed the 45 and gave it to me. The 11 or 12-year-old me played the heck out of it back in the early 70's. And many, many years later, after hearing another T. ex song on a Def Leppard covers album, that kick-started my need to revisit that childhood song, the album it came from, and the rest of their catalogue.
Now, they say don't judge a book by its cover. But if you look at the cover of Electric Warrior, it just oozes rock'n'roll. I mean, Marc Bolan with a Gibson Les Paul strapped on in front of a Marshall amp? I'm sold before it hits the turntable.
And once you get to the album, you find the strength is in its simplicity. Whether it's the mellow acoustic strumming of Cosmic Dancer or the grooving electric romp of Jeepster, you find that a pared-down sound really gets the point across. And Bolan’s sometimes nonsensical lyrics are fun to try to figure out. "Hmmmm… hubcap diamond star halo? OK, whatever!"
Listening to this album for the umpteenth time, I'd be tempted to rename it Addictive Grooves. These grooves stick with you as you progress through the album. Bang a Gong, Planet Queen, The Motivator... they keep coming.
9 out of 10 on this one for me. Feathered boa not required wardrobe when listening, but it will make the vibe that much better!
Kevin Stewart: The first album I ever bought with my own money. Loved it then (1972-ish), love it now... and it mostly still stands up as a classic.
Brian Hart: I’ve heard a lot about Marc Bolan and T. Rex due to the great influence he had on Def Leppard’s Joe Elliot, but I never really did a deep dive into any of their releases. I went into Electric Warrior with an open mind, but I really couldn’t get into it. Other than Bang A Gong and Lean Woman Blues, I found this album boring and lacking any energy (Rip Off does bring the energy, but it didn’t take me anywhere). Admittedly, I’m more of an 80s/90s child, but I believe part of my problem with this album is the 70s production. I really wanted to like it, but the album was just too boring for me.
Philip Qvist: The golden era of glam rock was well and truly over by the time I started to take an interest in music in the late 70s. As a result, I have only had a passing interest on this genre, focusing more on glam compilations and greatest hits albums.
Of course I have heard more than my fair share of songs from T.Rex (or to be more specific Marc Bolan), and his big hits do appear on my playlist from time to time.
Needless to say, this is my first listen to Electric Warrior, and after my first spin I came to the conclusion that this is probably the nearest to being a greatest hits record without actually being one.
It has Jeepster and Get It On, probably two of his best known songs. That said there are a few other songs here that are well worth listening to, such as Mambo Sun and Lean Woman Blues.
It will never fit in my list of essential albums, but I really enjoyed listening to Electric Warrior. Is it really 55 years old, though? Time really does fly. An above-average score from me this week.
Mike Canoe: As was often the case in the late 1970s, I had read and heard about and looked at the album cover for Electric Warrior in record stores long before I heard most of the music on the album. Based on the title and album cover, I was expecting guitar heroics on the level of Jimmy Page or Ron Asheton of the Stooges. I was surprised to hear much less "electric" than I expected and certainly nothing that conjured images of "'warrior."
It feels like I write this every week, but time has allowed me to succumb to the ambling, shambling charms of T. Rex and Marc Bolan, in particular. Bolan comes across as a rock'n'roll messiah who had to have influenced David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust persona more than a little bit. Bolan's voice floats, flips, and flutters, never particularly powerful but always intoxicating.
The album sounds great, whether it's Bolan's songwriting, Tony Visconti's production, or the full sound that the additional musicians provide, especially the always amazing Flo & Eddie on backing vocals. As is usually the case, probably a mix of all three.
Get It On is still an absolute gem and I still love it even if I've heard it a million times and change. I also enjoy the slinky Planet Queen and choogling Mambo Sun and The Motivator. Closer Rip Off is surprisingly gnarly and snarly compared to what came before. On the other hand, I'm sure that Cosmic Dancer is one of the songs that horrified me upon first listen and it's still a little too hippie and histrionic for me.
We've had a fair amount of ringers this year (Machine Head, If You Want Blood, Avalon, Never Mind..., etc.) and Electric Warrior fits in well with that company.
Final score: 8.39 (66 votes cast, total score 554)
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