Bolan's Zip Gun is the tenth studio album and a UK-only release by English glam rock act T. Rex, released on 16 February 1975 by record labelEMI. Eight of the eleven songs on the album, along with three tracks from previous album Zinc Alloy and the Hidden Riders of Tomorrow had already been released in the US as the Light of Love album on Casablanca Records. For this retitled UK edition, the three Zinc Alloy tracks were replaced by recent single Zip Gun Boogie and two new tracks.
Background and production
’s new partner Gloria Jones and other recent American friends, such as Gloria’s brother Richard and backing singerPat Hall, had helped influence Bolan's music, and he was experimenting with soul inflections. The album was recorded at MRI Studios in Hollywood, United States. The album was produced by Marc Bolan, having parted ways with his long-time producer Tony Visconti.
Music and lyrics
Although the sound of the album was very stark and the lyrics very simple and direct, Bolan had tried to go beyond the rock format of the previous T. Rex sound and reflect his recent immersion in the US soul scene. Several of the songs had a very futuristic tone, especially "Space Boss", "Think Zinc", and "Golden Belt", Bolan being a great fan of science fiction. The band on this album also featured a twin-drum sound on some tracks, notably "Solid Baby", provided by Davy Lutton and Paul Fenton.
Release
Bolan’s Zip Gun was released on 16 February 1975 on the T. Rex label. It did not chart in the United Kingdom. Two singles were released from the album: "Light of Love", which reached No. 22 in the UK Singles Chart, and "Zip Gun Boogie". Bolan’s Zip Gun was first issued on CD in 1986, on SMS Records for the Japanese market and on the Marc On Wax label in Europe, both coming with T. Rex's 1975 singles, B-sides as well as a remix of Think Zinc as bonus tracks. Later issues on Relativity, Marc On Wax and Teldec left out the bonus material. In 1994, Edsel Records's released Bolan’s Zip Gun with a different set of bonus tracks as part of their extensive T. Rex reissue campaign. A companion release, entitled Precious Star , was released in 1995 which contained alternative versions, studio rough mixes, a live version and demos of the main album and bonus tracks. A combined album digipak was released in 2002. Lots of other CD reissues exist, as T. Rex's catalogue gets remastered over and over again.
Reception
Bolan's Zip Gun was generally poorly received by critics. Stephen M. Deusner of Pitchfork wrote, "A purposeful return to the looser sound of Electric Warrior, Gun fires blanks. For all its directness, the album is mostly perfunctory, working some of the same sounds and ideas, but the results lack movement and liveliness; Bolan's mojo definitely wasn't working. Worse, he really doesn't sound invested in these songs." Whitney Strub of PopMatters wrote "Bolan's Zip Gun contains enough good moments to preclude classification as a disaster, but just barely."
