T.REX - Electric Warrior vs. The Slider

Slider. Slider. Slider. Always felt that Warrior had more recognition because it had the hits--"Jeepster," and "Bang a Gong"--which are both slight and annoying. "Mambo Sun" and "Cosmic Dancer" are all-time greats, sure, but Slider never lets up. It's better than almost anything you'd care to throw at it.

And Slider will break your heart repeatedly. Where does EW ever do that? (With My Les Paul...I may be small, but I enjoy living anyway....) And, if nothing else, Slider is a vastly better title.

I'm not sure that EW is the popular favorite...most people I've run into either don't know who T. Rex is at all (even though they know Bang A Gong Get It On) or know the band and prefer Slider. Writing from the US, where the band's profile is probably very different from the UK.

Slider. Slider. Slider. Always felt that Warrior had more recognition because it had the hits--"Jeepster," and "Bang a Gong"--which are both slight and annoying. "Mambo Sun" and "Cosmic Dancer" are all-time greats, sure, but Slider never lets up. It's better than almost anything you'd care to throw at it.

And Slider will break your heart repeatedly. Where does EW ever do that? (With My Les Paul...I may be small, but I enjoy living anyway....) And, if nothing else, Slider is a vastly better title.

^^^THIS^^^

I always thought people considered "The Slider" the better album

Well, I certainly do.

Me too, and everyone else who's posted here so far!

I met him, you know...

Me too, and everyone else who's posted here so far!

*cough*

Aye, but get off the fence, Ned

Ain't gonna happen!

I remember being surprised when talking with Steve Kilbey once about his favorite T. Rex album -- turned out to be the self-titled one just previous to EW.

^That may be my favorite one, as well, but I'll side with Slider in this fight.

s/t is great

Mystic lady is some special shit to me so yeah...Slider

John Lennon knows your name and I've seen him

ROCK!

[cue multiple interweaving and soaring guitar solos]

also I really love the minimal stuff like

Bolan like to rock now
yes he does
yes he does
Bolan likes to rock now
yes he does
yes he does
yes
he
does

I say the first self titled cos im partial to "Diamond Meadows". But my favorite T-Rex album closer has always been "Frowning Athalupa (My Incan Love)" from My People Were Fair. Tanx is really damn good though.

I was kinda sad a crunk rapper never sampled anything off "The Slider" a la "Crazy Train"...

Happy to see all the support for The Slider here, but I didn't expect no one saying Electric Warrior. I consider Electric Warrior a more consistent album, with better songwriting overall. The Slider's just heavier and faster sorta made me forget what Electric Warrior even sounds like for the moment, so I'm into it right now. But let's keep this a clean fight. Someone's gotta be loyal to Electric Warrior, right?

Pitchfork rated The Slider 0.3 higher on their scale, and yet only included Electric Warrior in their favorite 70's albums. I'm not sure why I noticed this, but I did.

Also the 3 bonus tracks on The Slider are rad.

Anybody out there have, and care to comment on, the alternate versions found on the double cd reissue? Am I missing something significant by not having them in my life?

And so many classic intro riffs on Slider, not that an intro lick makes a whole song.

Pitchfork rated The Slider 0.3

This was all I initially read and I was about to make a call to firebomb Chicago.

wouldn't shock me:
http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/11816-run-dmc-king-of-rock-raising-hell-tougher-than-leather/

i went with slider

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/img/03-08/3012sliders2.jpg

(no cheese, obv)

looks familiar http://static.rateyourmusic.com/album_images/s200780.jpg

I went for Electric Warrior. I love The Slider but - c'mon now - let's be real.

"Rabbit Fighter" and "Baby Strange" is such a sick 2-in-a-row.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I saw a "Born to Boogie" bootleg where Gloria Jones's backing vocals on "Baby Strange" were way up in the mix and it hit me that it was really a girl-group jaunt in disguise!

electric warrior because for mine 'jeepster' is just a perfect song. t rex tracks always seem to have the right measure of swagger and cool, always just that little bit ambivalent.

^^ sorry ambivalent is not the word i'm looking for at all. should read "always just that little bit bouyant and detached"

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

'tis the season

tanx

Why is he singing about Chevy Chase? Also is "Spaceball Ricochet" about Pong?

main man is my top track on slider, rabbit fighter is a close second. perfect record

main man is so good

I considered buying a second Electric Warrior tshirt the other week

do some of the post-slider albums have no bass or am i just listening to shitty early CD era masterings?

The Slider is as good as rock music gets

Kinda, yeah. Telegram Sam, Buick Mackane. Electric Warrior has Monolith and a way better cover tho, and it's not like I actually need or want to choose between them.

imo Slider cover > Electric Warrior cover

but im also partial to the silly "Born to Boogie" movie he made w Ringo

slider cover is great also obv invented slash

I'm surprised by the results and how Slider is far ahead of EW !
I love both but my favourite songs are on EW and I also prefer its sound and production.

yeah i think objectively i would put both on equal footing in a three way tie with the first T. Rex album. Slider was my first T-Rex though so i favor it for sentimental reasons

Monolith is the business. It's got so much atmosphere in the mix with the background singers and strings.

yeah, EW sounds so great.

these two albums mean more to me than anything bowie ever did

you talk about day
i'm talking bout nighttime

My preference or slider is partially cuz I heard Electric Warrior to saturation point first. But yeah as mentioned above and otm this is as good as rock gets!

I own Slider but not EW, hadn't listened to the latter front to back for years before today. After becoming more used to various covers (Bongos, Altered Images, Power Station, Southern Culture on the Skids) it was great to revisit an old friend.

i feel like a true rock n roller when i listen to t rex, i wear my denim jacket and everything and feel untouchably cool

but not in like a dick way, more like a "cool dad" way

totally marcos

i love how loud and orgasmic "Metal Guru" is coming right out of the gate. having Flo & Eddie do the background vocals for these songs makes total sense. they are technically actually good singers and have sung so many different kinds of material by this point they can nail anything. and Marc's girlfriend singing along as well, Gloria Jones (Four Top, The Supremes, Gladys Knight and the Pips), a Motown singer who sang the original Tainted Love in the 60s. she first met him in 1969 while performing in the musical Hair in Los Angeles.

there is retro-futuristic (a la Roxy Music) postmodern takes on 50s/60s rock ("Metal Guru", "Rock On", "Telegram Sam", "Ballrooms of Mars"), Bubblegum NEU! ("Main Man"), proto-80s hair metal balladry ("Spaceball Ricochet" is basically the "Every Rose Has It's Thorn" of it's day), punks doing 60s girl group pop (a la The Ramones) ("Rabbit Fighter", "Baby Strange"), etc. incredible lyrics throughout

they are doing so many things with this simple pop music.

Marc Bolan was a genius <3 all of his albums incl. Tyrannosaurus Rex and "Think Zinc"/"Light of Love" postrock funk fusion-era, ofc his last two albums the beautiful "Futuristic Dragon" and "Dandy in the Underworld" are seriously underrated as is everything he has done.

is this the only album where somebody screams "ROCK!" right before a guitar solo? surely there must be others.

good post adam xp

Electric Warrior has better songs in my humble opinion. Kinda hate that my favorite T Rex song, “Raw ramp” is not in there and got lost as a b-side to “bang a gong” (which is oddly enough one of my least favorites songs in the album).

They’re both amazing but I like Slider’s album cover better. It’s a classic for me... I remember seeing it in the wall of some bar once before knowng who Marc Bolan was and it immediatly made me curious.

I don’t know how well known this bit of trivia is but that photo was taken by Ringo Starr in Lennon’s mansion:

http://www.feelnumb.com/2015/12/17/ringo-starr-famous-marc-bolan-the-slider-album-cover-photo-john-lennon/

heh i had no idea they did that at Lennon's! i wonder if they filmed a lot of "Born to Boogie" there.

btw if you haven't seen it, it's a treat! 1/2 concert footage 1/2 silly skits. there's a bit where they play "Children of the Revolution" in a room with Elton John on piano and Ringo doubling up on drums. there's another nice sequence where they have a mad tea party and Marc does an acoustic garden show wearing the top hat with some cellists accompanying him. it's a lot of fun. (plus the disc has an incredible bonus full performance of Tyrannosaurus Rex playing "Sarah Crazy Child" at the UFO club in 1967 as introduced by John Peel)

Couple fresh uploads from Musikladen on YT:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAI4O5woDiQ

jammy "Buick MacKane"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SG65dlho_o

"20th Century Boy"

Wicked

Wicked

Is there a more perfect riff than that of 20th Century Boy? If there is, it's probably also a T. Rex riff.

I had never paid attention to their bass player before, but he really looks like Jaco Pastorius there. Check 0:57 in 20th Century Boy for a good example.

Celebrate Xmas with this bombass "Bang A Gong"* in this Midnight Special

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyQ1FpW2MyY

*27:50, "Hot Love" @ 6:03

Bombass "Bang A Gong" now officially on its own for your viewing pleasure:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMzVeoJFw44

Awesome. I imagine they had explosives wired up for the end? (I can't see how throwing a guitar would cause those explosions otherwise.)

Mickey Finn wearing a sweet Solid Gold T. Rex shirt in that.

xp yeah he switched out his Les Paul for some SG copy he thrashed with a tambourine, whipped, then threw near a box with no speakers but a flashbomb in it ... !