Ride it on out like a bird in the sky ways
Ride it on out like you were a bird
Fly it all out like an eagle in a sunbeam
Ride it on out like you were a bird

This is a little early as Ride A White Swan was released as a single on 9th Oct. (later in the US), but I have something else planned for that day. And it was reviewed in Melody Maker dated 3 Oct., so…

This was the one where Tyrannosaurus Rex became T Rex, the one that finally shuffled fame-hungry hustler Marc Bolan out of the twilight of the hippies and onto a million girls’ walls. The batshit lyrics are still there, as is the catch in his voice, but the directness of this made it pop magic. It still is.

Wear a tall hat like a druid in the old days
Wear a tall hat and a tatooed gown
Ride a white swan like the people of the Beltane
Wear your hair long, babe you can’t go wrong

Melody Maker 3 October 1970

Teeny-bop and glam were real things back then, and underneath the rampant commercialism and one-hit wonders there was real music happening.

This is, on the surface, a conventional record–three verses with a repeat to play out, and a bridge on a Gibson electric guitar, but not any of that sweaty guitar-hero stuff. What differentiates it is the sound of it, its infectiousness, its inadvertent brilliance.

It’s easily forgotten how quickly serious bands and musicians adopted the trappings of glam rock, possibly driven by the realisation that it was a good way to attract groupies in search of a bit of stardust, even if it was just glitter plastered onto the drummer’s eyelids. Roxy Music came out of this, as did David Bowie’s Ziggy persona (and let’s consider some of Yes’s stage gear shall we?)

But right there at the beginning was Marc riding his white swan. This wasn’t music to play through your HiFi and stroke your beard to while digging the significance and wondering why there was a picture of a cow on the album sleeve on which you were skinning up; this was music for dancing and finding a lumber down the club with the outside chance of a snog and a knee-trembler on the way home. That’s why girls got its brilliance straightaway. And they were right.

Catch a bright star and a place it on your forehead
Say a few spells and baby, there you go
Take a black cat and sit it on your shoulder
And in the morning you’ll know all you know, oh