T.Rex - T.REX****

The Children Of Rarn/Jewel/The Visit/Childe/The Time Of Love Is Now/Diamond Meadows/Root Of Star/Beltane Walk/Is It Love/One Inch Rock/Summer Deep/Seagull Woman/Suneye/The Wizard/The Children Of Rarn (Reprise)

With the new abbreviated title for his group, Mark Bolan would cast aside hippy-dippy idealism and, almost single handed, create the glam rock genre that would dominate the early 1970s British pop scene. (US:188 UK:7)

"The music on this album presents the transformation of the group from its almost anarchistic roots in psychedelia, poetic suites with complex verses and lots of weirdness, into a wide audience oriented sleek hits producing machine and fashion setting glam act, which the group would henceforward become."

"A fascinating fusion of the electric guitar heroics of Bolan's glam period and the preceding folk-prog fairytale guitar-and-bongos duets of the Tyrannosaurus Rex days. It's the blossoming of Marc Bolan's songwriting skills which really stands out here. In terms of subject matter we're still very much in fantasyland, but in terms of Bolan's vocal performance and guitar playing the sound of Electric Warrior is beginning to creep in. The end result is an album which isn't quite like anything else in the T. Rex back catalogue, as well as bringing the experiments of the Tyrannosaurus Rex years to a shockingly good conclusion."

"First release featuring the shortened moniker, T. Rex balances Bolan's brain-fried, hippie-folk mysticism with a pop sensibility that would explode in T-Rexstacy, once he figured out this stuff might sound better with bass and drums. Of course, Bolan could craft a killer hook in his sleep, and T. Rex is full of them, be it on tender numbers like Diamond Meadows, close encounter of The Visit, electric freak out Jewel, or glam boogie previews like One Inch Rock, many numbers benefiting especially well from added string accompaniment."

"This is pretty strange stuff if you have only listened to the glam rock-era of T.Rex. Half of this album is psychedelic folk and half is glam rock. Pretty awesome album which still has a little bit of the original Tyrannosaurus Rex sound left, but it also has a totally new style."

"The transition album between the acoustic mystical folk of Tyrannosaurus Rex and the electric boogie of T. Rex which made Marc Bolan a superstar. This album rocks yet has a beautiful folky quality that is truly unique. The blend of English rock/swagger and mystical folk makes this album unlike any other."