VARIOUS ARTISTSGlam Rock Anthology / Various

Haven't you ever felt like putting on your mile high platform boots, your spaceage Bowie dress, and coloring your hair green or red? Okay, I haven't either but that still didn't stop me from buying this Glam Rock Anthology. A lot of this stuff I already have from previous CDs, but there are still many joys to be had in this three disc set. The price is certainly right too. With Mick Ronson, The Sweet, Roxy Music, Cockney Rebel, T. Rex and many others you will probably find something to like. I'm not sure I consider The Runaways or Suzi Quatro as glam...but they sure dressed like they belonged. They were more like the hybred between hard rock and punk. As for Lou Reed and Iggy Pop, their flirtation with glam gave us some rather interesting songs. I've always liked Reed's "Vicious" even if it came off as too much posturing. I don't really feel like Iggy's (and Bowie's) "China Girl" and "The Passenger" were glam at all. There are other interesting glam groups on here as well...Mud, Hello, and (gasp)...The Glitter Band. There is only one Slade song but there should have been more since they were one of the bigger glam bands around. I'm not sure that Alice Cooper fits on here but I always enjoy hearing "No More Mr. Nice Guy" anyway. Ian Hunter is always welcome no matter what the catagory and the Mott songs bring back memories. I'm also happy to have Dana Gillespie's version of Bowie's "Andy Warhol" All in all, it's a nice time capsule of a very short lived period of music...you know, the era where men were women...and women were men...or something like that. Get out your pixie dust and glitter and enjoy!!!

From the track listing, this seems like a tremendous glam comp. When you start listening, it's another story. Many of these classics are live versions or recorded in the 2000s, like "Cherry Bomb". Or substandard versions of songs licensed from Cleopatra... I feel like "Live Version" should always be notated on the track listing of the packaging and especially on mailorders vendors like amazon. Thinking you're getting the original, when it's a crappy live or re-recording is false advertising, period.

Not original recordings. Lots of poor quality live tracks.