UNICORN

A nice psychedelic folk album that I believe influenced many other bands to come. "T-Rex" were just a duo in these days with Marc Bolan and Steve "Peregrine" Took (later of Pink Fairies and Shagrat).This early sound is a lot different to the glam rock sound that would come later. Bolan's vocal style is very distinctive and there are lots of lush melodies and surreal lyrics apparently inspired by Greek and Persian mythology as well as other creations.

Lot's of fantasy images can be drawn from this exotic, often peculiar brew of sounds. There's some nice acoustic work from Bolan. Took's subtle contributions play a big part as well, mostly from bongos as well as african drums, the pixiephone, kazoo and Chinese gong.

The best moments are "Chariots Of Silk", "Cat Black (The Wizards's Hat)", "She Was Born to Be My Unicorn" and "Iscariot". "Romany Soup" includes a story read by the late, great John Peel who had a brilliant voice but I always wondered why he reads the story twice on the 15 minute track. Perhaps it was to deliberately make the track longer? I'm not quite sure.

In all, there's a very stoney atmosphere on Unicorn. I can understand why there were many dedicated hippy followers of this music. It's rather sad that both these musicians had untimely deaths. It's an enjoyable album but not essential.