Album Club: 25.10.2011: Big Star - #1 Record

[Alex_UK]

Hi Chris - no knowledge of it/them at all (but then with my "history" on the Album Club albums, that probably isn't a surprise!) Work is crazy mad at the moment, and also had a couple of days off "toddler sitting" - so not yet had the chance to give it a go. Hopefully tomorrow or over the weekend.

[The Grand Wazoo]

I'm looking forward to your impressions Alex.


Meanwhile here's what some other people said about the album.

Perhaps a trifle over enthusiastic(!), was Billboard magazine's assessment of the album on September 9, 1972:
"Each and every cut on this album has the inherent potential to become a blockbuster single. The ramifications are positively awesome."


Going back to an earlier comment -

QUOTE: Audioman
The love for Big Star beats me based on this listen. I felt I had heard most of these tunes before. Alex Chilton was a master plagueriser 25 years before Oasis. Mr N Gallagher at least can cobble together more memorable tunes. Looks like they tried to take bits of late 60's to early 70's british psych/pop and rock and mashed it all together.

Maybe this one explains some of what's going on in Paul's mind:

The problem with coming in late on an artwork lauded as "influential" is that you've probably encountered the work it influenced first, and so its truly innovative qualities are lost. Thus, if you are hearing Big Star's debut album for the first time decades after its release (as, inevitably, most people must), you may be reminded that Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers or R.E.M., who came after, that is, if you don't think of the Byrds and the Beatles, circa 1965.
What was remarkable about #1 Record in 1972 was that nobody except Big Star (and maybe Badfinger and the Raspberries) wanted to sound like this -- simple, light pop with sweet harmonies and jangly guitars. Since then, dozens of bands have rediscovered those pleasures. But in a way, that's an advantage because, whatever freshness is lost across the years, Big Star's craft is only confirmed. These are sturdy songs, feelingly performed, and once you get beyond the style to the content, you'll still be impressed.
William Ruhlmann, The All-Music Guide to Rock, 1995.


Approximately eleven jillion awful pop bands/songwriters try to pull off this combination of acoustic guitars, confessional/melancholy lyrics, artfully stacked harmonies & orchestral touches. Chilton & Bell, effortlessly talented, skirt the extremely fine line between perfect melancholy & totally maudlin. Good enough that they make every aching sweet song seem like your favorite, until the next one starts and it's your favorite instead. What kind of a person could hear 'The Ballad of El Goodo' and not want to give somebody a great big hug?
Weirdo Records


Alex Chilton could have been the biggest thing in music. He never quite got there.
I mean, he did have a number one hit at sixteen, all hunched over and spotty, singing the sixties classic “The Letter” on TV with the Box Tops. The song is amongst the standards of pop music, covered numerous times, most famously by Joe Cocker. But Chilton would end up being even better and more influential when he joined an existing trio and recorded with Big Star. The band invented the rules of power pop, an underrated and magnificent subset of rock and roll that favours melodies and harmonies over distortion and feedback. The band would produce three near perfect records in a short span before breaking up. All three records are fantastic. But this one is just that step closer to pop perfection. Plus it has three songs that if I were on a desert island, I’d be missing terribly.
From a Mess to the Masses


Chris Bell and Alex Chilton share songwriting credit, though each brings a remarkably different sensibility to the band: Bell creates pure pop nuggets ("Feel") while Chilton swaggers with reckless melancholy ("Ballad of El Goodo," "Thirteen.").
It's too bad that Big Star didn't create more albums, but thank God they made the ones they did.
There's a lot of truth to the statement that the art lives on, long after the artist has gone or changed directions. This is certainly the case with Big Star, a Memphis band forged out of a willful vision, whose brief existence profoundly affected scores of artists spearheading the post-punk/alternative power pop schools of music throughout the eighties and nineties. R.E.M., The Replacements, The Posies, Teenage Fan Club, Wilco, and The Bangles, are just a few of the artists who have acknowledged a huge debt to Big Star.
Amazon

[Audioman]

Going back to an earlier comment -


Maybe this one explains some of what's going on in Paul's mind:

[I]The problem with coming in late on an artwork lauded as "influential" is that you've probably encountered the work it influenced first, and so its truly innovative qualities are lost. Thus, if you are hearing Big Star's debut album for the first time decades after its release (as, inevitably, most people must), you may be reminded that Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers or R.E.M., who came after, that is, if you don't think of the Byrds and the Beatles, circa 1965.

I didn't hear Petty and later stuff that's supposed to be influenced by BS. What I hear is earlier snippets from the 60's - Not only Byrds but Kinks, Who, Small Faces, possibly Kalaedoscope (UK), Nirvana etc, even the contemporarious Badfinger. I always thought Petty was directly influenced by the Byrds especialy Mcguinn. It's a skillfull pastiche rather than being groundbreaking.

[The Grand Wazoo]

I agree that, in style, ground-breaking it ain't.
But the whole history of music is littered with pastiche isn't it? You mention Oasis - For example, The Beatles feature just a teeny bit in their influences, I think you'd agree. The Beatles in turn were doing just the same with the songs of their own influences and so it goes on.

[michaelhigh]

I've been into this album since the seventies, and I have friends who regularly trek to Ardent to record (Devon Allman's Honeytribe) so it's no secret here in the States. Wilco also owe a debt of homage to these power pop giants, and Big Star's struggle with the radio and success is well-documented. Good to see that what little good music originated here actually makes it across the pond. Thanks for the play Wazoo.

[keiths]

Not a band I'd listened to before nor a style that I'm particularly fond of, but I enjoyed this. So yet another '3' stars.

[Welder]

Truth is I’ve struggled like buggery to listen to a complete album with most of the album choices so far.
Big Star, well its pop init, and not at all bad pop at that. Big Star are one of those bands I’m sure I’ve heard on a mates system at some point or other but never actually sat down and listened to let alone bought an album.
They do sound like a lot of other bands I agree, but when those bands are the Kinks and ELO for example I can’t see it being a problem. When did you last hear a band that didn’t sound like anyone else?
So yeah, no problem listening without grinding my teeth or reaching for a puke bag; no desire to tell the OP what appalling taste in music they’ve got and recommend a hearing test.
Good well played above average pop and that will do me. If there was a 1 to 10 score with half units I would give this 6.5 maybe 7 after a good day. I’ve had a good day so 4 from me.
Cheers Chris, good call.

[Macca]

I have Radio City and like it a lot but never heard this one until my copy arrived yesterday. Some great guitar licks and vocal harmonies as with Radio City. RC grew on my over the years, I wasn't that keen at first listening. It's funny how many truly great records are growers, isn't it?

Anyhow I've scored it a 3 which for me equals good but not great.

[Thing Fish]

Well I finally got round to listening to this album and I absolutely loved it.

Very tunefully crafted songs. I especially love 'Thirteen' Which I had heard a few years ago but didn't realise was theirs.

Think I'll have to attain a vinyl copy.

A well deserved 4/5

[The Grand Wazoo]

Thanks Dave & Martin for you comments and to everyone else who's contributed.
John (Welder) did you post a score on the poll? Because you're not showing up as having done so.
Alex & Martin T - I wonder if you've had a chance to have a proper listen yet?

Any more for any more?