Roxy Music – ‘Stranded’
On July 2nd, 1973, Brian Eno left Roxy Music following the release of the band’s second studio album, For Your Pleasure. A media furore may have exaggerated the dissonance between the future ambient pioneer and his bandmates, but an apparent rift had formed between Eno and frontman Bryan Ferry.
It would appear that Roxy Music could only hold one creative director. Hence, while Eno followed his nose into a solo career beginning with his early avant-pop masterclass, Here Come the Warm Jets, Ferry and his merry men sought a new synth operator. Standing in for Eno on 1973’s Stranded was the brilliant Eddie Jobson.
Released in November 1973, Stranded extended Roxy Music’s early art rock sound with a balanced platter of colourful compositions. Opulent and romantic themes recall For Your Pleasure, and while they represent the concurrent glam-rock aesthetic, it would be unfair to brand Roxy Music’s early incarnation as anything but idiosyncratic.
As a striking stage act garbed to the gnashers with peacock feathers and leopard print, Roxy Music liked to reserve some album real estate for danceable energy. In Stranded, this energy is never more apparent than in the opening track and only single, ‘Street Life’. “I wanted it to be a high-energy, fun song – buzzy and vibrant – and I hope the words convey some of that joie de vivre,” Ferry once said of the hit. “Each verse seems to have its own character, like blocks on a street.”
As a simple slice of “fun”, ‘Street Life’ may have had contemporary teens shaking their hips, but it’s just the skin of a particularly fleshy album. As we progress, Roxy Music maintains this energy but in more dynamic and lyrically evocative settings.
‘Mother of Pearl’, for instance, invites closer inspection as Phil Manzanera’s heavy guitar intro bleeds out into a placid mill pond of rippling keys as Ferry ruminates on romance: “If you’re looking for love/ In a looking glass world/ Its pretty hard to find/ Oh mother of pearl/ I wouldn’t trade you/ For another girl.”
On the whole, Stranded is less experimental in Eno’s absence, but his ghost is conjured in the kaleidoscopic ‘Amazona’. The track throbs with Manzanera’s funky guitar riff, but most intriguingly, it transitions through seamless time signature changes towards a cacophonous mirage of synth-treated exuberance at its close.
The album welcomes a strong piano and saxophone presence that distinguishes it from American rock traditions. This transatlantic tone strikes a pinnacle in the beautifully melancholy climes of ‘A Song for Europe’. A prominent saxophone crescendo earns Andy Mackay his first co-writing credit, framing one of Ferry’s greatest lyrical contributions with due intensity.
Stranded is a true marvel of its time and undoubtedly one of Roxy Music’s finest accomplishments. It spans from the glaring lights of nightlife to the lovelorn cobbles of Paris, from the dense, blurred tones of the Amazon to the clean, maudlin melodies of ‘Just Like You’. As a package, it represents Roxy Music’s thirst for originality, astute musicianship and elegant sensuality.
Listen to Roxy Music’s Stranded below.
