Best Roxy Music Album

sw00ds and I discuss Roxy and Ferry.

Thinking Siren might be my new fave, some kick-ass jams on that one...

Siren is indeed a great album, definitely their most underrated. Both Ends Burning, Whirlwind and She Sells would all find a place on my best of Roxy Music.

It's a shame how low Stranded finished, it's my favourite but then the first three albums would all easily make my all time top fifty.

Flesh & Blood is their only weak album, really forgettable apart from Same Old Scene which is a great single.

It would be a toss-up between Country Life and Avalon, but I'd have to go with Avalon.

Siren is indeed a great album, definitely their most underrated.

In England, you mean?

I always think of Siren as their peak album, even if I don't like it the very best (though sometimes I do), so it's weird to see it place so low here!

Britishes aren't as fond of it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SN4aqXCE0Y

I love this performance. Watch him catch that tambourine near the end!

Siren is indeed a great album, definitely their most underrated.

In England, you mean?

― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, August 7, 2010 6:49 PM (Yesterday)

Yeah I think so. Love is the Drug is one of their biggest hits and one of the songs they are best known for but I think most people here rank the first four and Avalon as the real classics. Personally I think it's a much stronger album than Country Life.

I think Siren and Avalon are my faves, but then I grew up with their greatest hits, then downloaded everything they ever did in one big lump a couple of years ago, which I kinda regret now because it's all been presented to me as one conglomerated bunch of records.

Siren > Stranded

Ranked:

1. Avalon
2. Country Life
3. Siren
4. Stranded
5. For Your Pleasure
6. Roxy Music
7. Flesh + Blood
8. Manifesto

lol at 10-year-ago me trying to impress ilm by declaring a bootleg my favorite Roxy record (although it is a GREAT boot.) 2017 answer: Siren.

I could not imagine ever ranking Avalon number one.

it's the only Roxy album i listen to w/ any regularity, but maybe i am not a TRUE FAN.

At one point every album except F&B was my favorite.

lol at 10-year-ago me trying to impress ilm by declaring a bootleg my favorite Roxy record (although it is a GREAT boot.) 2017 answer: Siren.

― I don't really like any of these albums (Dan Peterson)

honestly, i listen to the bbc session versions of the first album stuff way more than i listen to the first album proper. but my favorite album of theirs is still "country life".

xxpost:

I wouldn't lose any sleep over Josh in Chicago's opinion.

The first LP is pretty much an album of two halves for me - I outright adore the first half, but the second is probably their weakest side of vinyl from 1972-1975 for me. For Your Pleasure is a more consistent record, but ultimately I think they got better after Eno left.

Manifesto and Flesh + Blood are a reunited Roxy Music easing themselves back into it and warming up for Avalon.

One of my all-time fave bands. My ranking would be:

1. Stranded
2. For Your Pleasure
3. Flesh + Blood
4. Roxy Music
5. Avalon
6. Country Life
7. Manifesto
8. Siren

...and I do love Siren, it's just that all of the other ones have more of an impact on me.
I am aware that I am in the minority with my high ranking of Flesh+Blood (I named it as well in that recent thread on 'least acclaimed albums you love', someone singled it out as a winning answer). I find the whole mood of that album amazing and could never understand the lack of acclaim for it.

I love Manifesto's hybrid of L.A. studio rock and disco

Avalon is good, don't get me wrong. But I like a couple of Ferry solo albums as much, for the same reasons. Whereas the first five Roxy albums to me are like nothing else, really, and I've loved them all more or less equally at different times for the same mix of novelty, wit and barely controlled chaos. And muscle, tbh.

I personally don't think any of Ferry's solo albums come close to having the level of production that Avalon does.

i don't understand that post given boys and girls

Yes, even compared to Boys and Girls. Avalon also has the superior material.

thought we were talking about production

This is your opinion.

Person in "expressing an opinion on music board" shocker! Of course it's my opinion!

(Of course, I won't have to look far for others that share it, but still...)

Stranded
Country Life
Siren
Roxy Music
Avalon
For Your Pleasure
Manifesto
Flesh + Blood

xxpost:

Yeah, Roxy Music up to Siren is an incredible run of music regardless of the order in which the albums are ranked... and Avalon was the best possible note to end things on. I'm glad they continued long enough to make it!

The proper order imo.

Had no idea For Your Pleasure was so highly regarded

I agree with that grouping. For me FYP is still the best one. I actually have grown to really like both Flesh and Blood and Manifesto; partly because I ignored them for so long that I never really gave them their fair due, and now I'm much less familiar with them.

I'd probably move Mamouna from "solid" to "great" and move Bete Noir down to "solid" myself.

I'm on the akm train. Bete Noir is my least favorite of his smoothie session cat records. Also, Bride Stripped Bare has some incredible stuff ("Sign of the Times," "When She Walks In the Room," "This Island Earth") and some blech stuff (mostly the soul stuff: "Hold On I'm Comin'," "Take Me to the River"). I'd swap it with In Your Mind, which has "Tokyo Joe" and "This Is Tomorrow Calling," among other things. And as noted up-thread, Let's Stick Together probably has more tracks I love on it than any other Ferry album, notwithstanding its grab bag nature.

Agree that Stranded is the best one.

i used to think stranded was my favorite, and tho the highs are probably the highest, song for europe and sunset weigh it down a bit. as amazing as they are, avalon is the only truly filler-free roxy music album imo. maybe siren.

"Song For Europe" is a slight slog, but "Sunset" is one of the most perfect album endings by anyone, ever.

and "filler" isn't even a problem for a band like roxy, which so emphasized mood-creation and experimentation that there are bound to be two or three weird cuts per record. i'm glad that they're there.

xp

There's some missteps but I don't they ever went in for filler, as such.

"Song For Europe" is a slight slog, but "Sunset" is one of the most perfect album endings by anyone, ever.

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Thursday, October 10, 2019 10:20 AM (eighteen seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

sunset is a nice comedown from mother of pearl, and definitely works in the context of the album, but i've never had the urge to listen to it by itself.

There's some missteps but I don't they ever went in for filler, as such.

― Terry Micawber (Tom D.), Thursday, October 10, 2019 10:21 AM (twenty seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah, that's why i qualified--failed experiments aren't the same as filler.

F+B's got the filler.

I love "Song for Europe" with every cell in my body. When Ferry starts singing in French, man, what a warped, emotionally charged, ridiculous and overflowing with europeanness moment.

I, for one, am glad to see some love for Olympia. I can listen to it from beginning to end without a single skip.

he starts singing in Latin before he switches to French!

It's such a marvelous mess, all of it.

Ferry singing in French reminds me of Kenneth Williams singing Crepe Suzette and I still love it.

.. only more camp.

The Pitchfork Sunday review today is 'For Your Pleasure.' Some intriguing points were made concerning connections between British art schools and British art rock. I don't care. The rating score he gave for the album is 9.5. Everybody knows that this is a 10 album, if there is such a thing as a 10 album. It is perfect in every way and one cannot even conceive of how it could be improved upon. So for the love of God, what sort of logic could lead to a 9.5 score? Do I even want to know?

I'd rate FYP an 8 and I love Ferry more than you love your girlfriend.

I’m as gay as a unicorn ranch Soto, which reveals the inherent illogic of this discussion so, checkmate Mary!

yeah i don't know, FYP would be a 10 to me. It's one of my favorite albums of all time.