Fifty years is a long time. But Roxy Music, the band's eponymous first album from 1972, seems like a teenager.
From The Wall Street Journal:
Released 50 years ago this month in the U.K., and in November in the U.S., Roxy Music's eponymous first album ignored bubblegum-pop, prog-rock and blues-rock formulas prevalent at the time. Instead, the record was thoroughly original and kaleidoscopic, featuring one jagged abstraction folding into the next with Mr. Ferry's lyrics and music conjuring dreamscapes rather than stories.
Well received by British critics after its release, "Roxy Music" reached No. 10 in the U.K. but failed to chart in the U.S., largely because it sounded so different. Further hampering U.S. album sales were an absence of catchy singles and the band's camp attire that was alien to most rock fans still enamored by hippie fashion. "I've always thought that if you're going to present yourself on stage, you should dress up," Mr. Ferry told Steve Turner of Beat Instrumental magazine in October 1972.
[via The Art of Noticing]
