Electric warrior

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Electric warrior
T. Rex studio album

Publication
(s)

1971

Label (s) Ariola (D), Polydor / Fly / Cube (D), Fly / Cube (UK), Reprise (US)

Format (s)

LP

Genre (s)

Glam rock

Title (number)

11

running time

39 min 02 s

occupation

production

Tony Visconti

chronology
T. Rex
(1970) 		Electric warrior The Slider
(1972)

Electric Warrior is the second official album by the British band T. Rex , released in 1971 , which has since abbreviated its original name "Tyrannosaurus Rex".

album

Electric Warrior is the first LP on which the group - expanded to a quartet - uses the instrumentation of a classic rock band : vocals , guitar , bass and drums . In addition, saxophone , flugelhorn or piano were added to the recordings of some songs . She is still considered the classic of the T. Rex group to this day.

In Great Britain the album occupied first place in the album charts for 8 weeks, in Germany it reached number 14.

With the two single releases Get It On and Jeepster as well as the “ groovy ” Mambo Sun, the album contains a number of danceable songs, but also some ballads such as Cosmic Dancer , Life's a Gas or the girl accompanied on acoustic guitar and flugelhorn .

Get It On was an international hit and was released in the US under the name Bang a Gong (Get It On) to avoid confusion with another song of the same name by the group Chase . Bang a Gong (Get It On) was the only top 10 hit single for T. Rex in this country.

Cover

The two-tone front of the album cover shows the silhouette of Bolan printed in metallic gold with an electric guitar in front of a guitar amplifier on a black background . The photo is from Kerian "Spud" Murphy . In addition to the album information, the song lyrics are also printed on the back of the same color.

The English edition has a single cover, the innersleeve shows a drawing on each side with the motifs of Bolan and Finn. The drawings are by George Underwood . The German edition came as a gatefold cover, with the Underwood drawings on the inside: here, however, gold-on-black (in contrast to the brown-on-white of the UK innersleeve).

Only the first editions in Great Britain and Germany included a black and white poster. The photo was also shot by Murphy, the motif is classic: it shows Bolan sitting in the foreground in the armchair in his apartment, his bandmates Finn, Currie and Legend are in the background. The German poster is identical to the English one and was also printed in the UK, only to be recognized by the fact that it was folded differently (UK = 8 parts / D = 6 parts). The poster is rare and in great demand these days: well-preserved complete albums with posters are now 4 to 5 times the price of the original LP without a poster.

Label change

Without Marc Bolan's consent, the record label Fly / Cube released Jeepster as a follow-up single . Because the contract with Fly / Cube already expired at the end of 1971 and should have been extended and because Bolan did not agree with the record label's release policy, Bolan switched to the British EMI in 1972 , where he started his own label T. Rex Wax Co. received extensive control over its publications.

This also led to a change in the distribution rights for T. Rex records in the Federal Republic of Germany, which Ariola had had since the beginning of 1971 . It was agreed that the entire Fly / Cube catalog, including the small former record label Regal Zonophone from Tyrannosaurus Rex times, would be sold again by Polydor from 1972 , while future recordings on EMI and the sub-label T. Rex Wax Co. Ariola's hand remained.

For this reason there were in West Germany of Electric Warrior and the single Jeepster / Life's a Gas in addition to the original Ariola editions from 1971 and the early 1972 published by Polydor.

Track list

  1. Mambo Sun - 3:40
  2. Cosmic Dancer - 4:30
  3. Jeepster - 4:12
  4. Monolith - 3:49
  5. Lean Woman Blues - 3:02
  6. Get It On - 4:27
  7. Planet Queen - 3:13
  8. Girl - 2:32
  9. The Motivator - 4:00
  10. Life's a Gas - 2:24
  11. Rip Off - 3:40

all titles written by Marc Bolan

Electric Warrior - Remastered / Extra tracks

Among the numerous CD releases there is an edition with 6 bonus titles and an interview that appeared in 2003 on the Import Label ( Megaphon Importservice ) or Rhino / Wea :

  1. There Was a Time - 1:00
  2. Raw Ramp - 4:16
  3. Planet Queen (Acoustic Version) - 3:00
  4. Hot Love - 4:59
  5. Woodland Rock - 2:24
  6. King of the Mountain Cometh - 3:57
  7. The T. Rex Electric Warrior Interview - 7:35 pm

all titles written by Marc Bolan

Others

Some Electric Warrior tracks were also used as the soundtrack for the feature film Billy Elliot - I Will Dance , which is set in the mid-1980s.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ everyhit.com, number 1 albums 1971/72 UK
  2. ^ Taurus-Press, Hit-Bilanz, Deutsche Chart LP's 1962–1986, ISBN 3-922542-29-8
  3. ^ Joel Whitburn, The Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits, ISBN 0-8230-7690-3
  4. ↑ George Underwood, Album Cover Gallery
  5. ↑ rateyourmusic.com, Jeepster Polydor cover 1972

Web links