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MARC BOLAN / T.REX -  'MISFORTUNE GATEHOUSE' LP - HOME DEMOS VOLUME 4 (Easy Action Recordings EARS144LP)

MARC BOLAN - MISFORTUNE GATEHOUSE

SIDE 1 

1 : Dance In The Midnight

2 : Saturday Night

3 : Look Around You Baby / Delanie #1

4 : Look Around You Baby / Delanie #2

5 : Galaxy

6 : Keyboard Instrumental

7 : Carsmille Smith

8 : The Leopards #1

9 : Painless Persuasion

SIDE 2 

1 : Squint Eye Mangle

2 : Misfortune Gatehouse

3 : The Leopards #2

4 : Galaxy

5 : Nameless Wildness

6 : All Alone

The material represented on this unique series of albums, come in the main from four reels of home demo tape recorded by Marc at his London homes between the spring of 1971 and the autumn of 1973. What has been uncovered within these reels are the genuine embryonic beginnings of many Bolan classics. Along with well over a dozen songs discarded as the recording process moved from Marc’s four track TEAC A3340 home tape machine all the way to finished studio masters.

It is evident throughout these recordings that even in their early incarnations, a great many of the tracks are already fully realised, complete with lyrics (often completely different from the released versions) and rudimentary guitar overdubs.

It’s no coincidence that the album sleeve designs in this series depict the look and feel of the original Blues artists. Bolan’s Creole style vocal warbling and blues influenced chord structures, sit so well within that guitar, vocal framework that the songs themselves could easily have come from any one of a dozen 'Howling Wolf', ‘Big Bill Broonzy’, 'Skip James' or ‘Robert Johnson’ classics.

Misfortune Gatehouse. The fourth and final album in this series, finds Marc Bolan still riding the crest of a giant musical wave. It's March 1973, both the album Tanx and the single 20th Century Boy, are sitting pretty in the top five of the UK album and singles charts respectively. He's still living at Great Cumberland Place and still recording his home demo's on his trusty Revox A77 four track ¼ inch. The feel of these tracks however is somewhat different from those recorded the previous summer in preparation for the Tanx sessions.

Once again there was no shortage of material for Bolan and his band to work with, the list of tracks that missed the final cut were as long as ever. Even on this album you are now holding, six of the fifteen tracks never saw the light of day. By the time the Tanx album was released on 16th March 1973, Bolan was beginning to exhibit signs of genuine dissatisfaction having to work within the constraints of a four piece band set up. He'd already augmented T.Rex for the Christmas Shows the previous December with saxes and female backing singers, and had big plans for the year ahead, both in the studio and on the road.

An insane touring schedule that included a European tour in March, a massive North American tour that ran from July all the way into September. Followed by a tour of Japan in late October and an Australian tour at the beginning of November, all seriously limited his time in the studio. This coupled with the genuine pressures that fame and overwhelming commercial success brought into his life must have been quite astounding. For those few years at the beginning of the 1970's, Marc Bolan really was the most famous person in Britain. Yet the need to keep producing the goods fell firmly upon his shoulders and can't have been an easy burden (even with his prolific writing style). His latest single 20th Century Boy was the tenth T.Rex single in just over two years to make the top three in the UK singles charts (including four of them hitting the number one spot).He commenced work on the fifth T.Rex album on 17th June at Musicland studios in Germany. Whilst simultaneously working on an album featuring one of his American backing vocalists (Sister) Pat Hall. As if that wasn't ambitious enough he also produced, wrote and played on the Big Carrot single Black Jack/Squint Eye Mangle released by EMI in August .

Close friends were beginning to seriously worry about the pressure he was putting himself under. A workaholic by nature It had become increasingly noticeable that he was pushing himself way beyond the point of no return with his workload. This in turn affected several of his close friendships and his relationship with wife June, producer Tony Visconti and drummer Bill Legend all seriously fractured during this period.

“I try hard not to worry about what's going to happen in years to come” quipped a slightly beleaguered Bolan when cornered by journalists that summer. “In the past things have always managed to get straightened out and I've always been able to adjust to any sort of situation that I have encountered. I've developed enough faith in myself that I can rely on my own abilities to get me through any kind of scrape. If I lost all of my money tomorrow, it wouldn't worry me because I've been about as poor as you can get, and I could do it again if I had to. So I don't think that far ahead. At this moment I'm a rock and roll star. Hopefully I can live through the next ten years, about which there may be some doubt . . . I still think it's an achievement to wake up alive every morning. I don't think I'll live to a ripe old age at all. I just believe that when the almighty hand hits you, he wants you and he takes you. I don't care as it's preordained. My body isn't important, my spirit is fine and that's what matters. I feel grateful for my fans though – in all sincerity. They allow me the artistic freedom to do what I want to do. I love them for buying my records. The thing is, I'm making music for them. I'm spending a lot more time on the recordings now. I've become much more critical about smaller things like the hi hat sound, or getting a good bass drum sound as opposed to just getting a drum sound.”

Recording on both the T.Rex and Pat Hall albums stalled after those initial sessions at Musicland, until the completion of the huge North American tour. He entered London's Air Studios at the beginning of October keen to commence overdub work on Zinc Alloy, bringing with him an ever expanding retinue of musicians. The original T.Rex band were still there, now augmented with Jack Green on second guitar, Danny Thompson on double bass, Howie Casey on Tenor sax, Dick Parry on Baritone sax and Paul Fenton on drums. The cast of characters got even more diverse at Hollywood's MRI Studio, mid November when work continued on Pat Hall's album. This time Marc utilised top American session players including the legendary Motown piano player Sylvester Rivers, along with Ray Parker Jnr. on guitar, Scott Edwards on Bass and Ed Green on drums.'Zinc Alloy And The Hidden Riders Of Tomorrow or A Creamed Cage In August' hit the shops on the 1st March 1974. It had taken a year to bring the original demos to their natural conclusion and the path he traversed getting there had been a pretty insane one. Upon completion of the Pat Hall album in April (which was then shelved), he left Britain for Monte Carlo, split with wife June, began his relationship with Gloria Jones and ended his relationships with both producer Tony Visconti and drummer Bill Legend. As he left Britain to become a tax-exile that April he remained philosophical as ever, chatting to journalists about his life.

“Just be bold, be strong and follow your own convictions. You could say or do whatever you like, but I don't think you should try and hurt people. And you really can't assume that there is a lot of time left to do what you like. You see it may be all over for any one of us in 5 minutes. So I think you have to commit yourself to something and even if you die in the middle of doing it, you know that you've at least accomplished something. I speak this way because I really do feel there are many lives not just this one, but you've got to make all of them count. I know that I live my own life with a sense of urgency that most people can't comprehend. I guess It's all part of the curse.”

Sleeve Note extracts copyright Andrew J. Gardner/Easy Action Recordings 2018