JUKEBOX: Happy Birthday, Bryan Ferry
The most suave man in rock turned 69 last week, which is as good a reason as any to look back at some of the best Bryan Ferry songs, both solo and with his old comrades Roxy Music. As you can imagine, there’s a wealth of top tunes to choose from and the videos are the height of rock glamour.
Ferry’s cover of the Wilbert Harrison song “Let’s Stick Together” is pretty faithful to the original, only replacing the harmonica with saxophone, and, of course, Mr. Ferry’s unique vocals. Dare I say — it’s better? The video is also great, not just because of Ferry’s sleazy looking pencil ‘stache, but also because his then-supermodel girlfriend Jerry Hall pops up midway through, miming badly but looking so glam you barely notice.
“Is Your Love Strong Enough?” has to be one of the greatest forgotten songs of the ’80s. Featured in the Tom Cruise fantasy film Legend, the video features Ferry fully leathered-out singing in front of a screen playing the movie, shoulder dancing like a cool teacher. Watch out for David Gilmour bizarrely soloing through a surprise door near the end.
From Roxy Music’s 1974 album Stranded, “Mother Of Pearl” is arguably the greatest track on a truly great album. Also, the change of pace from full-on rock song to a laid-back groove midway through, overlaid with Ferry’s stream-of-consciousness lyrics, is nothing short of genius.
Only Bryan Ferry could write a love song to an inflatable doll and make it sound both sinister and sophisticated.
“Love Is The Drug” has easily one of the best grooves of any rock song of the 1970s. Plus, in this video, Bryan Ferry turns eye-patches into a stylish accessory as only he can. Grace Jones also did an absolutely fantastic version of this song for her 1980 album Warm Leatherette.
“Baby Jane’s in Acapulco, we are flying down to Rio…” That’s a reference to Warhol superstar Baby Jane Holzer in case you didn’t know. The name “Virginia Plain” came from a painting Ferry did in his art school days of Holzer on a packet on Virginia Slims cigarettes standing — you guessed it — in the middle of a plain.
Ferry later recorded an entire album of Bob Dylan songs, 2007’s Dylanesque, but this, from his 1973 debut album These Foolish Things, is his greatest Dylan cover.
Kids today seem to think the 80s was all neon colours, big hair and Brat Pack movies, but there was another slicked-back, sharp-shouldered side full of a more upmarket glamour: think Dynasty, power dressing, yacht rock. Bryan Ferry naturally fit into this side of ’80s culture perfectly with his Boys And Girls album. But no song sums up the super-rich glamour of the ’80s like the Roxy Music song “Avalon,” which sounds like the early hours of the morning after a supermodel-filled party at a Los Angeles mansion.
There’s more Ferry fun, including Roxy Music’s odd cover of The Byrds’ “Eight Miles High,” on our Spotify playlist below.
