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Three very distinct albums. The first was in essence was
a cobbled very much souped up r&b affair as Thompson their A& R man
recounts.
'Teenage Depression' was assembled using some new
songs, some old, a new recording of (the now Lew-less) Horseplay and
a couple more songs from the Marquee show.
But it came at just the right time with its cover and
eponymous lead track a premonition for the Punk zeitgeist.
In Sounds 6.8.77 the band stated their aim.
Barrie Masters: The problem is...no one's
really written any memory pieces and that's what we're aiming for,
rock n' roll classics. Douglas: It's
encapsulating a mood in three minutes.
'Life On The Line' came pretty close and is the jewel in
the crown featuring the additional guitar and compositions of Graeme
Douglas and manager Ed Holis that was their biggest album success and
featured their biggest hit 'Do Anything You Wanna Do.'
'Thriller' is a different kettle of fish. Ed Hollis had
gone. Time had moved on and the Hot Rods were virtually starting from
scratch but with nothing left in the tank. It was all over bar the
shouting.
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Teenage Depression (Island 1976) So Malcolm McLaren might have invented the term, but this album,
which appeared before the Sex Pistols hit the scene, tuned straight into a
young, music-loving public who were fed up with the self-obsessed and
pretentious rock sound of the mid seventies. I was a Feelgood fan, but then I
heard this album: how could the beat be so fast, the lyrics so anarchic? The
title track says 'I'm spending all my money and its going up my nose' in an
unashamed reference to the glue-sniffing that was epidemic at the time 'My
probation man says 'you know you oughta quit', I say don't you hang me up now
with none of that sh**t!'. Its commonplace now, I know, but at the time it was
mind-blowing. The energy
of the playing wasn't bettered through the whole of the punk revolution and I
always thought of the Sex Pistols as just jumping on the already-rolling
bandwagon.
Pangolin (Aylesbury, UK) Amazon
Review |
Life On The Line - (Island 1977)
Living On The Faultless Line *****
THE RODS' debut long player, Teenage Depression, was pretty straight
forward /straight ahead In its intentions, a class party album.
Since then the band have added the playing and writing talents of
Graeme Douglas and Produced the classic single of 1977, i la 'Do
Anything You Wanna Do'. Apart from generally beefing up the sound,
Douglas' incisive soloing counteracts neatly with Dave Higgs' primal
chord work. The success of 'Do Anything You Wanna Do', proved that
the Reds can progress forward musically without losing their raw
energy appeal. Both factors contribute largely to the brilliance of
this majestic vinyl pancake. Like a mate said after copping an
earload of this, "The Reds have gone a step up the ladder". And he's
right, this album has the depth and dynamics to appeal to anyone who
likes energised music.
LISTEN!
The album kicks off with the aforementioned single featuring Jess
Yates' clone on keyboards at the intro, and from then an there's no
stopping them. By the time you've finished listening to this, you'll
be falling about the flow, frothing at the mouth like a rabid hyena,
with eyes bulging set like twin telescopes and enjoying it!
There's nine cats executed at breakneck speed (the tracks all go
into each other, giving you even less time to breathe) demonstrating
the commercial sass of this band. Now when I say `commercial suss' I
don't mean sell out, it's just a natural perception they have to
what audiences want to hear. They don't alienate themselves from any
potential audience with a pat on image. They reflect the same roots
of today's heavy metal kids who were Into bands like Sweet, the Sabs
and Hawkwind.
I'm sure my ol' pal Beefy' Barton will be clicking his heels and
banging his head against the wall to this one in unison with yours
truly.
"What"! you may be exclaiming, that the Rods only do standards and
twelve bar boogie woogie," Listen chief, is my retort, this has got
some dizbustin' metallic rock that would make Steve Tyler's make up
melt and make Nugent's bearskin muffs recede in fear. For a start,
the production is rod hot, capturing the band's tightness, solid
fail frontal assault But it ain't all on one level, there's a lot of
light and shade, capturing some tight harmonies, a well balanced
sound.
Playing wise the group have improved immeasurably since the first
album. Paul Gray's bass bounces along vigorously with Steve Nicol's
frantic drumwork, an inventive team in the grand tradition of Steve
Preist and Mick
Tucker and (for older readers) Entwistle and Moon. Like I've already
said the guitars are blistering, and there's plenty of fine soloing
to satisfy axe fiends. Masters' vocals have also matured, more
gutsy.
Cripes! there's even an instrumental on this entitled `We Sing ...
The Cross' (featuring son of Stanley Holloway on intro) which will
undoubtedly turn a few heads. It's got a selection of choice
material (all original) showing the wide scope of the band. Tracks
like 'Telephone Girl' have that same latent Texan `BOOOOGIE!'
backbeat a la ZZ Top, getting even more frantic during `Ignore Them
(Still Life)'. Then there's `Life On The Line' (an anthem to phone
freaks?) rock'n'roll, Rods style.
This album has all the potential ingredients of breaking the band in
the States. This album's a dizbuster of the highest order, right up
to the raging powerdriven closer, `Beginning Of The End' where
Masters' vocals rage over the group attack -'W e were almost young,
when you pushed us out of the WAAAAAAAAAAAYYY!' (someone said it
reminded them of Daltrey's vocal attack in 'Drowned'). This ain't
pretentious but it also ain't a single dimension job. The Rods have
got their fingers on the proverbial pulse and it's beating. This is
the Rods doing what they wanna do, the best way they can and it's
bloody good.
Like they say in `Ignore Them'.
'Don't take no shit from no-one/Just keep on havin' fun.'
They are and you will. Natch.
PETE MAKOWSKI. Sounds 29.10.77 |
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"GRAEME DOUGLAS appears courtesy of CBS," it says
here. Well, he doesn't actually appear - his mugshot being
conspicuous by its absence on the excellent gatefold sleeve, due to
some bitchy inter-company wrangle - but he sure makes his presence
felt.
Out of the nine tracks present, Douglas wrote the music for six. His
fellow guitarist, Dave Higgs, who wrote all the eight originals on
"Teenage Depression", gets just one credit on "Life On The Line".
What's more, Higgs' playing role on almost every track is restricted
to rhythm guitar, while Douglas' wordsmith on most numbers is not
one of the other Rods, but manager /producer Ed Hollis.
 If
"Do Anything You Wanna Do" didn't already forewarn you, that should
make it crystal clear: this is not the same Eddie and the Hot Rods
that used to whack out "Wooly , Bully" down the Marquee last year.
The intended transition would seem to be from high energy R&B to
high energy rock - the theory being that R&B, while it works great
in clubs (and, surprisingly, in large halls too, judging by the
Rods' and Feelgoods' Quo-like following this past year), doesn't cut
it on record.
They haven't gone heavy metal, as comparisons elsewhere with Sweet
(huh?!!) might lead you to believe; instead they've attempted to
fill that most elusive of gaps - how the hell do you define it? -
where the heady feel of beat music meets the drive of hard rock. "Do
Anything You Wanna Do" epitomises it. Unfortunately, the rest of the
album falls slightly short. Close, but not quite.
Primarily, that's down to the material. There's certainly nothing
else that hooks you the instant you hear it and stays in your head
forever - but then songs like "Do Anything You Wanna Do" are
exceedingly rare. Still, the other songs don't quite come to grips
with its basic formula anyway, tending to stay closer to the old
zooming R&B rhythm, and not being blessed with such a widescreen
production potential.
They also fall slightly short of target in performance. Although his
playing is furious and dynamic, Douglas never quite hits off a real
killer solo - possibly because, in trying to retain the raw
enthusiasm which explodes out of every groove on the record, he has
deliberately avoided the more sophisticated guitar tones that might
make for more memorable solos. Paul Gray's bass is generally ace, if
a little twangy at times, while Steve Nicol motors admirably
throughout though he does overdo the frantic stickwork occasionally.
Dave Higgs, because of his somewhat reduced role, is now almost as
inscrutable as he looks - though presumably he's primarily
responsible for the zesty drive that propels the set (the one slowie,
an instrumental called "We Sing . . . The Cross", doesn't feature
either him or Barrie Masters).
And Masters? Just great. More than anyone, he maintains his single
performance throughout the album. The others on this showing are a
good band - but he's turning into a really excellent singer, which
is what really counts most. Whether he can handle anything beyond
youthful bluster remains to be seen, because unfortunately, he
hasn't got any decent words to sing.
All my previous criticisms only apply in the context of this being a
really infectious, enjoyable album - a fact which maybe I haven't
emphasised enough; they may not have quite hit the bull's eye, but
at least they're scoring high and on the right board. But the words
. . .
Endless reruns of "Do Anything You Wanna Do" - which, were it. not
for all that dopey stuff about not wanting no politicians to tell me
what to be, would itself have been a far worthier candidate for
classic-of-the-year. That song was so exhilarating musically that it
' got away with it, but there's about six tracks here larded with
earnest instructions to ignore your elders, your teachers tell you
lies, don't believe your history books, open your mind, etc, ad
nauseum.
Even when they do get off that tack, there are far too many words
stuck in just to make a rhyme, and not a single lyric worth
listening to twice. It just makes you remember that when Graeme
Douglas left The Kursaal Flyers he also split with a highly skilled
lyric writer.
Still, don't let any of that detract from the fact that this is a
superb effort for a band who looked dangerously like a prematurely
spent force before Graeme Douglas joined. Any one track has got more
sheer energy than most bands muster in a year, and now it's being
deployed with great flair in a style that is fresh and exciting.
If they'd had the songs to match their newfound potential, this
album could have made almost everything else, even in this "amphetamined"
year, look positively dozy. Ten out of ten for star quality and
presentation, seven for content.
Phil McNeil NME 12.11.77 |
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Thriller - Island 1979
Although not as well received, or as successful
as The Hot Rods previous two albums "Thriller" is a lost classic
album showcasing the powerful vocals of frontman Barrie Masters and
the brilliant guitar playing of Graeme Douglas with strong support
from the rest of the band.
The first track is "The Power and The Glory"
probably the best song on the album, but there are more great songs
to come that highlight the diversity of the band at the time,
compare the heavy r'n'b of Dave Higgs "Out to lunch" (complete with
harmonica and piano), the spacey rock of the Douglas/Higgs
composition "He does it with mirrors", the good-time rock of the
Douglas/Masters tune "Take it or leave it" and the 100mph energy of
"Living Dangerously". If that's not enough check out the guitar playing
on one of the bonus tracks "Horror through Straightness"
hotrods2008 "Ian"
- Amazon
Review
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