Roxy Music – Country Life – 1974
There’s no way I was going to look back at Brian Eno’s solo work without taking a good hard look again at one of the most important New Wave records from his old band, Roxy Music. I’ve never heard the band WITH Brian Eno just with Bryan Ferry so I have no frame of reference. Country Life is considered one of the seminal works of the second British Invasion, right? (it also has the benefit of the greatest album cover a teenager could hope for in 1974 (there it is, again! 1974. Wow, what an amazing year!)
From the outset with “Thrill of It All” there’s no way anyone would mistake this for a Brian Eno led band. In fact, I would say that David Bowie’s LATER 80s music owes much to this record. As do a number of new romantics. Spandau Ballet, Duran Duran, Psychedelic Furs, Culture Club, so many others, this is their template.
For the most part, Country Life is a pretty, well produced, easy pop rock record. It occasionally gets a little treacly like on “out of the Blue” but I think much of that is due to Ferry’s unctuous, slippery voice. Only Tony Hadley of Spandau Ballet could out lounge him in the era. One gets the feeling that Ferry would be more comfortable in docksiders without socks and Izod shirts. That doesn’t mean the music isn’t great, it means that just as the teeth begin to bite in a song, he’s there to make sure the rip is clean and that when you die, it’s from exsanguination not from the pain of the bite.
The second side of Country life is the more experimental, darker, british side, opening with the almost somnabulant “Bitter-Sweet” and following it the sad harpsichord led “Triptych” and devolving into the libertine “Casanova”. It’s great that you can choose like this, almost two different albums or eps. I prefer side one, but the Resident/Romeo Void part of me loves the second side.
Grade: A
ASide: Thrill of it All, Prairie Rose
BlindSide: All I Want is You, Bitter-Sweet
