Glam Explosion

 

Paul Oldfield on The Great Glam Rock Explosion and a Suzi Quatro compilation, Melody Maker, March 19 1988

Paul here reprising in precis the argument - or some of it - from his great Monitor thinkpiece of 1985

Originally so enthused were we by the early 70s 7 inch singles we'd exhumed from jumble sales and junk shops that we planned to devote a whole issue to glam and glitter....  I believe David Stubbs was going to write about the Year 1975 as the nadir of pop history that 1985 mirrored and that he envisioned extending itself perpetually...  I certainly had some notes on the Sweet, Gary Glitter, Alice Cooper that I stumbled on only a few years ago for the first time since they'd been written in '85 and discovered to my surprise that many of the same phrases and thoughts occurred to me again when working on Shock + Awe

Some of those thoughts and sensations did get aired in this 89? 90? piece for Melody Maker on Last Few Days!, one of those phantom groups that sauntered through the pages of the music press leaving nary a trace on official poprock history