Does Marc Bolan – king of glitter, pioneer of crushed velvet pantaloons and early 70s hitmaker supreme – need any more praise? If you are the Who manager Bill Curbishley, who produced AngelHeaded Hipster: The Songs of Marc Bolan & T Rex along with director Ethan Silverman, the answer is most definitely yes. “I felt he deserved universal acclaim,” says Curbishley. “His life was cut short, as [were] a lot of people’s, but he didn’t achieve the acclaim and the fame that Jimi Hendrix did.” Well, the exact level of Bolan’s position on the fame meter may well be a source of dispute – particularly as far as the US goes, which admittedly Bolan never conquered to anything like the same extent as his chum in glitter, David Bowie – but he’s never been short of devoted admirers.
Least of all the lineup of musicians – from grizzled rockers such as U2 and Nick Cave to slightly less grizzled singer-songwriters including Maria McKee and Beth Orton – who have assembled to record a cover-versions album (of the same title), and of which this film is basically a record. (The record’s producer, Hal Willner, sadly died in 2020.) It’s a pleasant enough watch, listening in as these various acts grapple with whichever Bolan masterwork they’ve opted to try – though there’s not much in the way of on-screen fireworks on show, and in any case the film doesn’t get to linger on any single performance; you’ve barely got to grips with one song before it’s off to another.
Fortunately the film-makers have been busy in the archive, and pull out lots of nicely restored clips of Bolan in his heyday as the film whistles through the historical context. (One particularly jawdropping segment shows Bolan theatrically sniffing a flower, like a groovy Oscar Wilde, as he introduces Generation X on his late-70s music show on ITV.) All the archive work is much to the film’s good, as things really take flight whenever Bolan himself appears on screen. Did we really need a new album to remind us of this? Maybe, maybe not; but even if Bolan never achieved Bowie’s longevity, there’s surely room for a Moonage Daydream type film about one of Britain’s most glorious pop acts. We can but hope, anyhow.
• AngelHeaded Hipster: The Songs of Marc Bolan & T Rex is released on 14 September for a one-night-only preview event in UK cinemas, and goes on general release on 22 September.
