T Rex had something in common with Status Quo. They had a lot of hits in the UK but only one here…Get It On. I’ve been going through their catalog and listening to their singles…I need to work on the albums. With Status Quo, I thought they should have played more here. With T Rex…I think yeah, they should have had hits here.
They were considered glam rock by 71 and some people say that glam didn’t make it in America. Well, that doesn’t hold much water when you see what David Bowie did with Ziggy Stardust. I looked at some of their tours of America and I can see some problems. They opened up for Blue Öyster Cult, Lynyrd Skynyrd, ZZ Top, and Three Dog Night. Let’s think about this a second…all great bands yes…but not a hotbed for glam rock.
Bolan had a knack for taking a title and making it into a catchy song. Look at their titles…Jeepster, Telegram Sam, Metal Guru, and 20th Century Boy. All have a rhythm just in the title and he was very good at getting good songs out of that. Ride a White Swan was written by Marc Bolan.
Before this single was released…they were known as Tyrannosaurus Rex, two years of their single releases had yielded just one appearance in the UK Top 30, with One Inch Rock. This stand-alone single was the duo of Marc Bolan and Mickey Finn’s first under the newly-abbreviated name T Rex, and the first for the Fly label, newly formed by David Platz with the support of Track Records’ The Who management team of Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp.
Here is an excerpt from the book Bolan:The Rise and Fall of a 20th Century Superstar by Mark Paytress.
The new songs spoke loudly of transition and wish-fulfilment; one in particular managed to encapsulate everything Marc Bolan had been looking for. At one session in July 1970, he asked Tony Visconti to start rolling the tape. He wanted to put down a new song, ‘Ride A White Swan’; “Let’s call it ‘Swan’,” Visconti called back from the Trident Studios control booth, unaware that the next few seconds would reveal the key to Marc Bolan’s glorious future. With his cherished Gibson Les Paul around his neck (stained orange in homage to Eddie Cochran’s six-string), Marc formed an open E shape chord above the capo he’d strapped over the fourth fret, and kicked out a clipped rock ‘n’ roll chord just like James Burton on those old Ricky Nelson B-sides. Almost the instant Visconti flicked a switch, adding a small amount of reverb on the guitar track, Marc shouted back emphatically: “I want that sound!”
‘Ride A White Swan’ not only sounded simple; it was simple. The ingredients were few – that clipped, three-chord-trick guitar, Marc’s cautious vocal (sung from a sheet hastily typed by June), handclaps on the offbeat and a rudimentary Bolan bass line (played on Visconti’s Fender Precision bass), offset by a modest, Visconti-arranged string section and that trademark Tyrannosaurus Rex falsetto backing drone. The lyrics – just twelve short, sweet lines – were similarly economical, even by Marc’s recent standards. And the crucial parts that Dib Cochran and The Earwigs lacked – a genuine voice, and a rock ‘n’ roll backing – were here in abundance.
“When we heard what we got,” recalls [Marc’s music publisher] David Platz, “it was simply so exciting that we knew we had a potential Superstar on our hands. It had such a different sound, and was exactly right for that particular time.” Releasing ‘Ride A White Swan’ as the band’s next single seems in retrospect to have been an expertly judged calculation, but at the time its success took almost everyone by surprise – even Marc whose memory was already saturated with misplaced hopes. In fact, the route to number two in the British charts in November 1970 was tortuous and complicated, with several factors contributing to the success of ‘Ride A White Swan’.
The song peaked at #2 in the UK, #48 in Canada, #9 in New Zealand, and #76 on the Billboard 100 in 1970.
Elton John: “The perfect pop star, his songs were great, his records rocked, he had attitude, he had performing skills, he looked fabulous, he dressed the part. At a time when I was still becoming Elton John, he was a great role model. I thought: ‘This guy doesn’t give a fuck, he’s just being who he is and he’s loving every single minute of it.’ And that had a great effect on me.… He was sitting there in a cloak covered in stars, writing songs that sounded like Chuck Berry, very simple songs. What?”
The Edge: Marc Bolan was magical, but also sexually heightened and androgynous, with this glitter and makeup, I’d never seen anything like it: ‘What the hell is this? Real lads are not into this kind of stuff – this is clearly music for girls.’ But when I picked up a guitar a year later, ‘Hot Love’ was the first song I learned to play.“I’ve no doubt every aspect of how he presented himself was just an outpouring of his understanding that things could be magical, things could be heightened. Out in the ordinary world, he managed to cast a spell over all of us.”
Ride The White Swan
Ride it on out like a bird in the sky waysRide it on out like you were a birdFly it all out like an eagle in a sunbeamRide it on out like you were a bird
Wear a tall hat like a druid in the old daysWear a tall hat and a tattooed gownRide a white swan like the people of the BeltaneWear your hair long, babe you can’t go wrong
Catch a bright star and a place it on your foreheadSay a few spells and baby, there you goTake a black cat and sit it on your shoulderAnd in the morning you’ll know all you know, oh
Wear a tall hat like a druid in the old daysWear a tall hat and a tattooed gownRide a white swan like the people of the BeltaneWear your hair long, babe you can’t go wrong
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