Roxy Music Tour 2001

SECC, GLASGOW
Monday, 11th June 2001

The Scotsman
The Guardian
The Daily Telegraph
Glasgow Herald
The Mirror
Daily Express
NME

So, however cash-motivated this reunion might be - and it does tie in rather neatly with a new best-of compilation, available in all good record stores from the beginning of next month - it was always going to be an exciting prospect.

Erstwhile synthesiser wizard and girlie dresser Brian Eno was the only original member to decline the invitation to the party but as the group slammed into a frenetic Remake/Remodel - the greatest-ever love song to a car - it was clear that, save for his glittery eyeshadow, he was not really missed.

Roxy, as we pathetically-loyal fans like to call them, has the nostalgia show sussed from the start, grabbing the audience with a stimulating volley of early favourites, then splitting the two-hour set democratically between singles and album tracks, with an evenly-paced selection from throughout their career. They veered from a crazed Editions of You and an explosive Virginia Plain to a sultry Avalon and a silky-smooth More Than This.

Bryan Ferry was resplendent in silver lame jacket, Phil Manzanera was laid back and cuddly, but it was Andy Mackay's musical input, which added that special frisson, be it his frenzied saxophone on Street Life or the eerie oboe on Ladytron. Dancing girls bopped to Both Ends Burning, teasedduring Mother of Pearls and shook more than a tail feather to Love is the Drug and Do the Strand.

However, the band didn't want the audience to have too much fun and there were dips into ponderous guitar soloing, least anyone forgets their art school roots.

Still, the welcome mix of mainstream hits with unexpected connoisseurs' choices made this the best reunion of old geezers since The Who reformed.

FIONA SHEPHERD, The Scotsman

Style rules over substance in the opening numbers (Remake-Remodel, Streetlife) too, as the muffled sound - a bit like hearing Roxy through floorboards - struggles in this vast, charmless arena. Ferry, in black leather trousers and a silver lame jacket (then white tuxedo, then black leather to finish), cuts a fine figure, dancing as if he is holding Ken Dodd's tickling sticks then freezing in a still avant-garde pose, a crab flaunting its pincers. Manzanera and Mackay sport brightly coloured frock coats, somewhere between high Edwardian chic and Teddy Boy streetwear. The stage set echoes the cover of Siren, all deep blues and jade greens; behind billowing folds of organza there's a big wodge of something that is probably supposed to look like coral but actually looks like a giant piece of petrified broccoli.

At its best, the two-hour set re-creates Roxy Music's special magic, their theatricality and musical agenda-setting; you can still hear this on Ladytron, how it must have been sudden, bewildering and unlike anything else. There are songs the band still love to perform - Song For Europe, Mother of Pearl, Editions of You, Virginia Plain - and during these, the reunion not only makes sense, you forget they ever went away.

But reality kicks in on weaker numbers that perhaps they feel obliged to play. On some songs they simply sound as if they've run out of steam: Avalon is so half-heartedly done, we could be in the company of a lacklustre tribute band. And all the sophistication drains away as Roxy bring on the dancing girls. Sure, they always surrounded themselves with glossy lovelies but now, with bus passes on the horizon for the band, the girls look tacky. It's almost heartbreaking to behold them writhing like table dancers for Mother of Pearl.

The trio claw back considerable credibility with a second encore of For Your Pleasure, a sly twist of a song to end with. Its title partly answers the "Why do it?" question hanging over the reunion, but reminds us too of the days when they sounded and looked like no one else, did things no other band would. During the song, with minimal fuss, the trio leave the stage one by one, and don't return for a final bow. It's a dignified way to end a nostalgia-fest that could have been the first really undignified thing Roxy Music ever did.

ELISABETH MAHONEY, The Guardian

Roxy roll back the years in style

FTER 18 years of silence, Roxy Music have returned to the limelight, reforming for a money-spinning, greatest-hits tour that will take them across the world, and back into the hearts of thousands of now not-so-young fans.

Original members - guitarist Phil Manzanera, 50, saxophonist Andy Mackay, 54, and singer Bryan Ferry, 56 - cut quite a dash as they relived their younger days: old hits such as Oh Yeah and More Than This received an ecstatic response from the crowd.

Roxy Music, pioneers of the art-rock style that has bequeathed the miserabilist experimentation of Radiohead to modern music fans, were a glamorous, futuristic band in the Seventies, early adopters of the synthesizer thanks to Brian Eno (who turned down the chance to join this comeback). Over the decade, Ferry in particular evolved into an elegant, sharp-suited style guru, and the look has stayed with him into maturity.

The comeback tour can be beset with pitfalls, and Roxy Music certainly ran the risk of destroying their myth, but in Glasgow they got away with it. A small fortune will no doubt be made by the musicians, but this is no hollow, money-grabbing reunion like that of the Sex Pistols. Ferry claims that when he played some old Roxy songs on a solo tour last year, the response was so great that he decided to take the music back to bigger venues.

The advantage of an arena tour is that the crowd is too far away to see your wrinkles. But the band coped with rockier numbers such as Do the Strand and Both Ends Burning without looking like old duffers, surrounding themselves with scantily-clad dancing girls to remind people of the old glamour.

They did show themselves to be somewhat out of touch by grafting tedious, meandering solos on to most songs. There were widdly guitar bits everywhere, as well as solos by piano, violin and oboe. Most seemed to be an opportunity for Ferry to change his jacket, but even his whistling segment in Jealous Guy went on too long.

With no new material to promote, it's difficult to see Roxy Music's reunion as any more than an exercise in nostalgia, but there are few bands with so many great, timeless songs, and they should not be forgotten. It's right that Ferry and his bandmates, rather than some wearisome tribute band (Xeroxy Music?), should be basking in adulation decades later.

David Smyth, Daily Telegraph

Remade and remodelled, Roxy can still turn on the old streetlife style

HE last time Roxy Music played in Glasgow in 1982 it turned out to be their second last show on British soil. A subsequent concert in Edinburgh and a lengthy American tour that took them into 1983 culminated in the winding up of the band.

At the time, the Apollo, where they played, was still Glasgow's premier music venue and the SECC, where they performed last night, was a piece of derelict shipyard.

But for a band who have been away for longer than they were together, there was a remarkably slick entrance, which immediately took the audience back to the first track on their first, self-titled album, Re-make, Re-model.

Though the advance publicity for the tour centred on the trio of Bryan Ferry, guitarist Phil Manzanera and sax player Andy Mackay, the later addition of drummer Paul Thompson perhaps gave more credence to this expanded line-up.

Appropriately, the audience response was strongest when confronted with exhibits from the peak period (1972/3) incarnation of the band, many of which were augmented by a troop of eight dancers.

The prime examples - Editions of You, Virginia Plain, Do The Strand, and For Your Pleasure were preserved for the climax of the set and encores.

Beforehand, Avalon and the still sickly version of John Lennon's Jealous Guy served as a reminder of where it all started to go wrong, while My Heart Is Still Beating, and Mother Of Pearl trawled the more interesting parts of the group's history.

The verdict? Well, when Ferry declared "don't mind these people, come forward" there was a gentle surge to the front and while this was tonnes more fun than a Ferry solo show, the ghost of the absent Brian Eno loitered with intent.

With him on board and the energy of youth, Roxy Music must have been one ofthe greatest bands ever. Fortunately, their return did little to damage that reputation, if not quite living up to their best.

JOHN WILLIAMSON, Glasgow Herald

Ferry good to be back

IKE a clarion call from my youth, Bryan Ferry sends shivers down the spine with a simple statement I thought I'd never hear again. "It's great to be back," he says. "This is Roxy Music."

I can hardly believe it. The band I grew up with have risen from the dead. It's 2001 and I'm with 8,000 ecstatic fans gathered for Roxy Music's comeback gig at Glasgow's SECC. But a big part of me has been transported back to 1972 when, as a teenager, I stood open-mouthed in the Croydon Greyhound and saw for the first time the group that defined my generation.

They last played together 18 years ago, bowing out after eight hit albums and umpteen top 10 singles. But it's not about statistics. I wanted to see if Roxy Music could recreate the magic of those halcyon days.

Well, hey Bryan, at 56 years old you bloody did it!

Sure, this four-month world tour could be classed as a money-making exercise cashing in on people like me. But there were moments which transcended all such considerations. The mesmerising show was packed with Roxy's early material. They fairly ripped through stunning revivals of Street Life, Ladytron, Both Ends Burning and Mother Of Pearl.

And who else in rock but Bryan Ferry could garner applause by donning a white tuxedo? Yup, we always appreciated his style. But his voice was the main thing. And all the time the man's distinctive vocals were complimented by the saxophone of Andy Mackay.

The final song was For Your Pleasure. The band then quietly walked from the stage as the song's chorus beat out a repetitive farewell: "'Tara, Tara, Tara, Tara..."

KEVIN O'SULLIVAN, The Mirror

When the lights dimmed and we heard that familiar chinking of glasses and party chatter - the opening to Re-Make/Re-Model, a noise that wasn't so much a song opening as a statement of intent - you'd have had to be a soulless soul not to have felt the hairs on your neck shiver ever so slightly

Of course, they all looked depressingly good. Sharp and stylish, Ferry slipped effortlessly into lounge lizard mode, changing jackets to go over the leather strides - predictably the white tuxedo got a cheer - while Mackay was a revelation on oboe and sax. The requisite dancing girls filled in the spaces in between.

Any Roxy crowd is going to be split between two camps: those tastemeisters who know that their first two albums are the finest records ever made. and the misguided souls who go for the smooth mainstream soul/pop of the later years. In Glasgow, there was no doubt that was where the crowd's sympathies were - distressingly, the dreaded On The Radio (? ed.) got the biggest cheer of the night - but, by the time we got to an exhilarating Editions Of You, the 8,000 crowd were ready to "Woooo" on cue with the Slinky sirens.

The set slipped between the two sections - Virginia Plain, Song For Europe, Love Is The Drug, Avalon, Jealous Guy - and, allowing for a halfhour or so warming-up period, they blew hot. Things ended on a very Roxy note - eschewing the big show-stopping exit, they left us with the spooky, discordant For Your Pleasure filling the cavernous arena.

JEREMY NOVICK, Daily Express

And the EpiIogue: the sumptuous romanticism of swansong 'AvaIon'- each number an ornate lesson in heartbroken Euro-pop. As a result, avant-anthems 'Virginia PIain' and 'If There Is Something' are allowed to gambol alongside such silver-flecked sophisti-pop standards as 'Oh Yeah' and 'More Than This', leaving Ferry to dance, as ever, like grandma's over-egged soufflé. The effect is both disconcerting and breathIessIy entertaining - the perfect reminder that Roxy always spiked their awkward, art-pop cocktail with a pomp-defiating dose of humour.

Whatever the reasons behind their reunion, it's clear neither cynicism nor the soulless sheen of professionalism has blighted their canvas. Ferry, Phil Manzanera and saxophonist Andy Mackay still rock like demons, still sound Iike the bravest, smartest, strangest band that ever was. Almost two decades after they kissed their past goodnight, Roxy Music are still, effortIessIy, the sound of the future.

Sarah Dempster, NME