In my previous post I looked at the chart singles of 1975. I acknowledged that there was a lightweight component to the hits of that year. This was in part a product of the fact that the dominant form at this point was not the single but the album. When you look at 1975 from an album perspective there is no room for doubt; it was a vintage musical year. Just take a look at these artists and albums; Bruce Springsteen- Born to Run, Bob Dylan- Blood on the Tracks, 10cc- Original Soundtrack, Elton John- Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboys, Queen- Night at the Opera, Joan Baez, Diamonds and Dust, Rush- Fly by Night, The Eagles- One of These Nights, Pink Floyd- Wish You Were Here, Led Zeppelin- Physical Graffitti, Patti Smith- Horses, David Bowie- Young Americans, Parliament- Mothership Connection and Paul Simon- Still crazy after all these years.
What that list has in common with the singles successes is
diversity and eclecticism. Folk, Heavy Metal, Funk, Country Rock, Progressive
music, Philly style soul and, in Springsteen and 10cc, music that defied
obvious pigeon-holing.
With these, as well as other albums and artists, there are a
number of themes emerging, including a willingness to experiment and artistic
self-confidence.
Experimentation
We are all familiar with the chameleon like nature of David
Bowie’s image and music. Even so, Young Americans was an abrupt hand-brake turn
from the hard rock of Diamond Dogs and before that Ziggy Stardust. It sprang
from Bowie’s discovery of the Disco scene, which he described as the folk music
of the great cities, welling up from the streets rather than imposed from
above. It bears a relationship to Parliaments Mothership Connection, a weighty
slab of industrial funk powered by George Clinton, with bass, horns and
syncopated drums up in the mix.
Surprisingly, Bowie was not the only established act to be
influenced by funk. Led Zeppelin’s offering for this year was Physical
Grafitti. It includes Kashmir, cited by band members as the archetypical
Zeppelin song, which bears the influence of Arab music. But also on Grafitti is
Trampled Underfoot, which is powered by a driving funk rhythm, all springy bass
and supple guitar licks. It is all a long way from the pure Blues wail of You
Shook me or Dazed and Confused.
Experimentation of a different kind can be heard on Original
Soundtrack. 10cc had built themselves a solid following through a series of hit
singles, ranging from sixties pastiche (Oh Donna) semi-humorous storytelling
(Rubber Bullets, the Dean and I) to conventional rock (Wall street shuffle).
With Original Soundtrack they were playing with a number of ideas, one of which
was the concept album. As the title suggests, film history was on their minds,
especially Film Noir. ‘one night in Paris, is like a year in any other place’
these lyrics were allied to subtle musical tones that harked back to the past.
Also on the album was a song that transcended anything the
band had done before; I’m not in Love. This song, with its lush production,
including a string section, marked their emergence as mature talents. The
lyricism on this song is remarkable. The narrator makes a series of statements
claiming that he doesn’t have any feelings for the object of his attention,
which cumulatively build up to leave the listener in doubt that, actually, he
is head over heels in love with her. Like the best songs, it doesn’t belong to
the era it was made in, but is timeless, never going out of fashion. (By
contrast, Life is a Minestrone, which harks back to songs such as the Dean and
I, feels out of place on this album, being the last glimpse of their previous horizons).
Artistic Self-confidence
A number of established artists released albums that
demonstrated their musicality, their lyricism and their willingness to plough their
own furrow. Paul Simon, for instance, with Still Crazy after all these years,
moved even further from his folk roots and towards a world music sound. Joan
Baez, another folkie, came up with Diamonds and Rust. The title track of that
album shows a mature woman expressing herself emotionally and musically with
total confidence.
Perhaps the most confident disc of all was Night at the
Opera, Queen’s move into the big league. Their hard rock sound had already been
infiltrated on Sheer Heart Attack by songs like Killer Queen, lyrically clever
and musically subtle. On Night at the Opera this process went so much further. You’re
my Best Friend, for instance was entirely keyboard led, whilst 39 could have
been a Lindisfarne song. The culmination of this of course is Bohemian
Rhapsody, a swaggering tour de force that broke the rules and defied
pigeon-holing. The band famously stuck to their guns when the record label
baulked at releasing it as a single and were triumphantly proved right.
Close behind Night at the Opera was Wish You were Here, Pink
Floyd’s follow up to Dark side of the Moon. This was a record that made no
concessions to any-one, the record company, the radio stations or even the
audience. It was the band doing what they wanted and demanding acceptance. The
result was music that, like most of Floyd’s output since Dark Side, really
doesn’t belong to a year or an era. Shine On You Crazy Diamond was the concept
album track on steroids, whilst the title track was played at the Olympic
Opening Ceremony in 2012 by an up and coming musician called Ed Sheeran (It did
his career no harm at all).
So this year, that was merely a dip, a pause between greatness, a time of decline, has given us some enduring music by a wide range of artists. As I said at the outset, eclecticism is the hallmark of 1975. And no artist or album personifies the true worth of this year more than Bruce Springsteen and Born to Run. His third album saw Bruce refine the sound of the East Street Band, making it at once sparser and more epic, with nods to the past (the Duane Eddy guitar on Born to Run), great storytelling (Meeting Across The River, Jungleland) and a masterclass in lyricism (Thunder Road), that managed to be a concept album, (as Springsteen expresses it, imagine the action in the songs playing out over the course of a single day) a glimpse of the future and an appeal to romance and freedom.
Of course, I’m biased. I was fourteen in ’75; at that age
music tends to burn its way into your mind and make you feel things you’ve
never felt before; rebellion, desire, anticipation, a sense of possibility and
growing awareness of your independence from your parents. Still, objectively, I
feel I have made my case. Feel free to comment and disagree……..
David Bowie: Young Americans Young Americans
10CC: Original Soundtrack- I'm not in love: I'm not in love
Led Zeppelin: Trampled Underfoot: Trampled Underfoot
Bruce Springsteen: Thunder Road: Thunder Road
Pink Floyd: Have a cigar
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