Glam rock was more than just a grab-bag of spandex, glitter and platform shoes – it was first and foremost a bigger-than-life musical attitude whose outrageous fashions only symbolized its boundary-blurring, often aggressively theatrical approach to pop music. While some glam-rooted acts like Bowie became superstars in the ‘70s and beyond, even more have been lost to the shifting tides of fate and fashion. Here’s a brief review of some glam acts time forgot.
The Sensational Alex Harvey Band
was one of Britain’s most beloved cult rock outfits, and this riveting 1973 performance of “Faith Healer” from The Old Grey Whistle Test program shows why. Backed by mime-faced/SG-wielding Zal Cleminson and band, Glasgow-born Harvey (older brother of Stone the Crows ax-slinger Les Harvey, who was tragically electrocuted onstage in 1972) may have been pushing 40 when he taped this performance, but his masterful stage presence was timeless. Alex himself passed away after suffering a massive heart attack on tour in 1982, a day shy of his 47th birthday.
Los Angeles-based Carmen
was fueled by a unique mix of hard rock and flamenco. Fronted by classically-trained guitarist David Allen and lead singer Angela Allen, the band relocated to England in the early ‘70s, a fortuitous move that saw them hook up with David Bowie producer Tony Visconti for their 1973 debut Flamencos in Space and appear on Bowie’s 1980 Floor Show TV special, clips of which can be seen here.
This rare excerpt captures parts 2 and 3 of their debut album’s “Buleria,” as performed on television.
Klaus Nomi
(born Klaus Sperber) spent much of his youth as an usher at a Berlin opera house, a milieu he never forgot when he emigrated to New York City and launched a career as a New Wave-inspired cabaret performer with an intergalactic sense of style. A Gotham avant garde club favorite who counted renowned artists Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat among his fans, Nomi was discovered by David Bowie in 1979 and hired to back the superstar on an SNL appearance. Here’s Nomi’s video for his typically arch cover of American singer Lou Christie’s 1965 chart-topper, “Lightning Strikes.” Sadly, Nomi would become one of the AIDS epidemic’s first celebrity casualties in 1983.
…and no glam retrospective could overlook The Tubes’ hilarious send-up of the whole genre, “White Punks On Dope,” seen here in another mid-‘70s Old Grey Whistle Test clip from British TV. With lead singer Fee Waybill playing mock star/lifestyle casualty Quay Lude in full glam drag and tottering on some of the world’s highest platform boots, the satirical San Francisco-based band – who’d also triumph in the ‘80s essentially spoofing pop-metal and big rock ballads via The Completion Backward Principle – also presaged much of punk’s irreverent and ironic attitudes towards rock music clichés.
