Flight - Overnight Sensation/ It's Only Money

Satirical sneering at the Glam Rock swindle

Label: Buk

Year of Release: 1975

Some years ago a friend of mine found a pop music history book with a publication date of 1973 in a local charity shop, and sat and sniggered to himself about the perspective from that frozen point in time. The closer the narrative got to the year it was released, the wonkier (or less accepted by modern day standards) the perspective got. In particular, the end chapter looked forward to the future and made bold claims for Glam Rock, stating that it was the pop sound of the future with far-reaching influences, a sound that would reverberate throughout the ages and flex the pop sound into brand new shapes. 

I'm a lover of Glam myself and don't want to casually dismiss its influence, but in retrospect it's apparent that there were rumblings, whinings and bleepings going on in the world of electronic music at that time which would hit much harder on the future of pop music than the thud, chant and thwack of glam. David Bowie has unquestionably been a huge influence on numerous 21st Century artists, but even his most ardent fans would have to admit that it's his Berlin era albums (when he had one ear on influential and forward looking German sounds) and "Scary Monsters" that sounded more futuristic and prophetic than the adventures of Ziggy.

These are the perils of trying to predict the future with confidence. It's far too easy to become a cheap and careless soothsayer and predict that in the year 2076 we'll be listening to the music generated by our houseplants. And anyway, even at the time not everyone agreed with the more forgiving mainstream assessment of glam, with many (particularly prog fans) seeing it as little more than tinsel and tat, a circus filled with aged opportunists and their dodgy managers, a cheap passing craze no more relevant than skateboards or hula hoops. 

In 1974, First Class stuck the boot in with "Bobby Dazzler", a brilliant, sardonic and faintly bitter single about ageing rock stars hitching a ride on the glittery comet trail. "What they trying to do to you?" they sang. "They tell you what to wear and how to comb your hair/ and everything else you do". Alvin Stardust might have winced if he hadn't been too busy to hear it (presumably). 

Then in 1975, just as the glam party was truly on the wane, Flight spat on the dying patient by putting this one out, a 10cc-esque sneer at the pop tat around them. The band adopt a Bay City Rollers chug and sing "We're the latest and the greatest to be born" through their teeth. "We're our manager's creation/ and we love the adoration" they add, just to hammer the point home. 

Is it better than the very thing it's mocking, though? As satire, it's a bit too limp and obvious, a school playground taunt when compared to the genuine viciousness of "Bobby Dazzler". While the latter seems to ask not entirely unreasonable questions of the performers - such as "What are you old men with a decade of flops behind you doing dressed up like bacofoil clowns?" - Flight seem to be ridiculing the shallowness of it all. Like most people who tut at pop music, though, they miss the point. Nobody is trying to claim that all of it is high art; much of it is just a perfectly valid cheap and joyous thrill. They're holding up a mirror to the scene around them rather than hitting the more cynical practitioners where it hurts. 

Still, "It's Only Money" on the flip is much more interesting and complicated, showing that the group were capable of sophisticated, quirky, intelligent pop when they wanted to put it out there. It's light and knowing art rock which shines a light on the real tragedy of the music business - the performers and writers are the only people not making any money out of it. That issue certainly lives on where every single passing trend has faded.

We've covered the group once already in April this year, with their Dad-on-the-toilet referencing single "What Am I To Do" on BASF.  My limited knowledge of their line up and history can be found there. This appears to have been their second and final release. 

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