Roxy Music has not gone disco.

Roxy Music has not particularly gone anywhere else either.

Manifesto is the band's first release since it broke up after the obligatory lousy live LP in 1976. Though far more interesting than such sets (Who can forget the Byrds' numbing 1973 reunion album? Who can remember a thing that was on it?), it offers only embellishments on the Roxy sound and story. The new record is a lovely footnote, but it can lead nowhere.

That sound and story deserve a footnote: both were among the most glorious and eccentric of the Seventies. The band -- especially guitarist Phil Manzanera, saxophonist Andy Mackay, drummer Paul Thompson and Eddie Jobson (missing on Manifesto) on synthesizer -- produced railing hard rock or smoky dreamscapes; always the musicians played with precision, individuality and intelligence. Bryan Ferry sang as if he never noticed there was anyone behind him, so lost was he in a strange, abandoned theater of heartbreak, desperate longings and general post-Great War angst. Roxy Music made it all funny and stirring at the same time, storming through Stranded and finishing up with Siren. Siren was perhaps the most perfectly crafted album of the decade, as well as Ferry's heart-on-his-sleeve break with the cynicism of the confused hustler's persona he'd carried so long.

Original album advertising art. Click image for larger view.

So the record has its moments -- moments few bands even know about -- but as with the brazenly (and meaninglessly) titled "Manifesto," they add up to little. Ferry announces he's for the guy "who'd rather die than be tied down"; he's rarely traded on such banality, and he mouths the lyrics as if he hopes no one will hear them. The sound may be alive, but the story is almost silent.

It's not that Ferry has given it up. He began making solo albums long before Roxy called it a day -- starting with his outrageous collection of oldies covers, These Foolish Things, and continuing through last year's astonishing The Bride Stripped Bare -- and on those LPs, the tale of a man struggling to find himself behind his mask, and a lover behind hers, goes on. It's a tale couched in melodrama but driven by terror and compassion: what it has is the intensity Manifesto never reaches for.

Manifesto betrays no pandering to nostalgia, but on it, Bryan Ferry looks back to old loves, remembers fondly, accepts what he cannot have: he feels safe from the hope those loves stood for, from the dangers of the lust they summoned. As in "Still Falls the Rain," this is a shining conception, and the people this state of mind calls up come to life in the music. But like Manifest itself, such a respite can be no more than a respite, a holding action. The struggle is merely out of sight, and on Ferry's own records, I'd imagine, that struggle will soon be back on center stage.

- Greil Marcus, Rolling Stone, 5/3/79.

Bonus Reviews!

For the first Roxy Music album in three years, original members Bryan Ferry, Phil Manzanera, Andy Mackay and Paul Thompson return with new bass player Gary Tibbs and friends Alan Spenner and Paul Carrack to create a new work as fresh and original as any in its career. Though the instrumentation is not as dense nor as electronically augmented as on previous Roxy LPs, the band continues to surprise and delight with its deft changes in melodic and rhythmic lines. The first side, the "east side" rocks a little harder, while the "west side" is a bit quieter. Both sound better with each hearing. Best cuts: "Dance Away," "Manifesto," "Spin Me Round," "Angel Eyes," "Trash."

- Billboard, 1979.

This isn't Roxy at its most innovative, just its most listenable -- the entire "West Side" sustains the relaxed, pleasantly funky groove it intends, and the difficulties of the "East Side" are hardly prohibitive. At last Ferry's vision seems firsthand even in its distancing -- he's paid enough dues to deserve to keep his distance. And the title track is well-named, apparent contradictions and all. A-

- Robert Christgau, Christgau's Record Guide, 1981.

After a four-year layoff, Roxy shed their aggressively dense rock sound and returned with a more streamlined (but still weird) danceable pop. Detractors claimed that the band had lost their edge, but Manifesto introduced Roxy Music to a new audience looking for a sophisticated alternative to generic late-'70s disco. Highlights include "Angel Eyes," "Dance Away," and the title cut. * * *

- Rick Clark, The All-Music Guide to Rock, 1995.

 Reader's Comments

No comments so far, be the first to comment.