The tracks here can be split into two parts, before and after signing with manager Simon Napier-Bell in 1966. Marc's earliest efforts were the products of managers and producers doing their "best" to fulfill Marc's dream of being a star. That dream wouldn't come true for a few years yet going through several name changes while developing his writing and vocal style. The first few songs are covers but from track three on are all originals. None of his early single did much on the charts.
During Marc's time with Napier-Bell they recorded one single and many demos. most of these eventually were released on the album The Beginning of Doves. After Marc's passing Napier-Bell took some of those demos and augmented them with studio musician and released the album Love and Death with some songs not found on the Dove album. I deferred to the Doves album for purity reasons and filled the gaps with the unique songs from Love and Death. The result is a nice album of 38 minutes of early Marc Bolan. Enjoy.
Track List
01 All At Once
02 The Road I'm On (Gloria)
03 Blowin' In The Wind
04 The Wizard
05 Beyond The Risin Sun
06 The Third Degree
07 San Francisco Poet
08 Hippy Gumbo
09 Misfit
10 Jasper C. Debussy
11 You Scare Me To Death
12 I'm Weird
13 Charlie
14 Black And White Incident
15 Observations
16 You Got The Power
17 Jasmine Forty-nine
18 Cat Black
Reality Notes
Track one was recorded in 1964 but went unreleased until 2008. Tracks two and three were released under the name Toby Tyler. Tracks four through seven were singles released on Decca records as Marc Bolan via the name Marc Bowland in 1965. Tracks eight and nine were produced by Napier-Bell for track records in 1966. The remaining tracks all come from the Doves album with the exception of tracks eleven and twelve which come from the posthumous Love and Death album. Tracks 14-18 also appear on the Love and Death album and given the post production treatment but I went with the stripped down demos instead.
The Doves album also contained some of the earliest Tyrannosaurus Rex recordings. I included these on the Chinese Christmas Music comp posted a while back. There are a few early songs that were recently released that I do not have and are hard to find. If I do come across them I'll add them to this and post and update. This should be the last of the Marc Bolan collection but if I have enough of them I may put together a short comp of his spoken word poetry, maybe.
