Roxy Music

Roxy Music combined soul and pop elements with their Continental Art Rock craziness, giving birth to the New Romantic sound. The FM hit "Love is the Drug" defined the '70s singles scene, but "She Sells," "Sentimental Fool" and "Both Ends Burning" are still perfect for licking your wounds alone after the disco closes.

There used to be this ad (in the Fifties, I suppose) for a cigarette: You're Never Alone with
a Strand! A guy alone in the street; belted raincoat, turned down hat brim; fog, drizzle,
blurred neon lighting; three in the morning and he'd just left a party or come to the end of
an affair or arrived off a train; down but cool (cigarette cool) and romantic, weary--a
private eye at the end of a case. I always thought it was Frank Sinatra. That was... More >

Good album--a lot of fast ones and a great hook. Of course, Roxy Music albums have always had hooks, but "Street Life" and "Virginia Plain" never told us as much about Roxy's less accessible music as "Love Is the Drug," an equation which represents not liberation from artificial stimulants but the breakdown of both sexual and emotional abandon into "just another high." Very appropriate to situate the song in a singles bar, for that '70s reality is the exemplary environment for Bryan Ferry's romantic pessimism. Much of what his music has to say about such environments is fascinating, even perversely attractive--but ultimately a little off-putting, which I guess is the point. (Grade - A-)