"Born To Boogie" - Marc Bolan and T Rex

Rummaging for a fun DVD to watch, I ended up spending a lot of time this weekend repeatedly watching Ringo Starr's remastered movie, "Born To Boogie," featuring Marc Bolan, and his trend-setting band, Tyrannosaurus Rex (later, T Rex). Ringo Starr himself, and Elton John, were also featured. In particular, the movie contains footage of two concerts that were filmed at Wembley Arena, in London, on March 18, 1972.

Although Marc Bolan had a talent for writing catchy rock-and-roll tunes, T Rex ended up pioneering a lot of what might properly be called glam rock, or even some varieties of heavy metal. Marc Bolan was an infectiously-fun and charismatic lead singer - many of the teenage girls shown in the movie were clearly in the thrall of latter-day Beatlemania. He was sort of a Goth - an atypical, happy Goth.

I remember when I first heard of T Rex. In January 1971, for a very, very brief period (less than a week), all-purpose rock-and-roll AM-radio station KQEO in Albuquerque played what had become the top single in Britain, Tyrannosaurus Rex's "Ride A White Swan." Although that song wasn't played in the movie, several others were, including T Rex's most famous song, "Bang A Gong."

I still haven't gotten enough of "Ride A White Swan":

Ride it on out like a bird in the sky ways
Ride it on out like if you were a bird
Fly it all out like an eagle in a sunbeam
Ride it on out like if you were a bird

Wear a tall hat like a druid in the old days
Wear a tall hat and a tatooed gown

Ride a white swan like the people of the Beltane
Wear your hair long, babe you can't go wrong

Catch a bright star and a place it on your fore-head
Say a few spells and baby, there you go
Take a black cat and sit it on your shoulder
And in the morning you'll know all you know, oh

Wear a tall hat like a druid in the old days
Wear a tall hat and a tatooed gown
Ride a white swan like the people of the Beltane
Wear your hair long, babe you can't go wrong

Da-da-di-di-da, da-da-di-di-da ....