When I sing, ‘Do You Wanna Touch Me,’ a sea of hands goes up. “When I play, the crowd sings along in a loud voice.
“They are my people, and I love them,” Gary says with a satisfied smile. Fans still come dressed to his shows in versions of re-vamped glittered remnants and six-inch heels. If his new show is any indication that Gary is determined to conquer America, then perhaps it could very well happen. The audience has always played an important part in a Glitter performance. As he opens the show to “Rock and Roll (Parts One and Two),” the audience cheers wildly to the first sight of Glitter, who ascends down a flight of stairs to the center of the stage. But now I think the time is right for me in the USA.” It does seem pretty favorable for Gary, who has always attained a faithful following in the States. Then there are other years when you are big in Europe and no so in the States.’ For me, I guess it’s like a time warp everywhere. Some years you are really big in America and not so in Europe. “David Bowie said to me,” Glitter states rather casually, “’It’s strange. You just can not say I have one kind of audience.” Although Gary says he feels like “a man out of time,” his music sure doesn’t qualify as a blast from the past. Mostly, I get a lot of skinheads and punks at my shows. Although many rock critics at the time, and the late Marc Bolan himself, had proclaimed that “Glitter Rock is dead,” Gary viewed these opinions in a different way: “Either you are into Glitter Rock or you are not,” he said, relaxing in his New York hotel suite. Some of Glitter’s contenders, David Bowie, Marc Bolan of T-Rex, and in America, Alice Cooper, to name a few, helped preserve the musical movement that remained till its demise in mid-1975. In a recent New York appearance at the Limelight, Gary thoroughly delighted an enthusiastic crowd with old favorites, like “I Didn’t Know I Loved You (Till I Saw You Rock and Roll),” “Do You Wanna Touch Me (Oh Yeah?),” and “I’m the Leader of the Gang (I Am).” Not all of Gary’s song titles have parentheses. In support of the concert tour, Epic Records in America has released a “greatest hits” package album, appropriately entitled, The Leader. With more than a decade behind him, the founding father of Glam Rock has returned in triumph, and is performing for American audiences for the first time. With the release of his first Stateside hit single, “Rock and Roll (Parts One and Two),” Gary instantly became recognized as a rock legend. Gary sold over 18 million records and had a total of 11 top-10 British chart singles between 19. In the early ‘70s, he was acknowledged for inventing the flamboyant Glitter Rock era in America, and Glam Rock in England. Who ever said old rock heroes just fade away? This may be true for some but not so for British phenomenon Gary Glitter.
GARY GLITTER T SHIRTS FREE
Odds are he will never tour again (again, rightfully so), therefore I am happy to have had the chance to have had the experience when I did, free and clear of any guilt-by-association. The show at the Limelight (which started as a church, which became the Studio 54 wannabe Limelight, then became known as the Avalon, and is currently a shopping mall called the Limelight Market ) was a blast, and it was obvious that Glitter was having fun as well, both of which fed each other into a love-fest of chants, sing-alongs, and joyous mayhem. It’s nearly impossible not to chant along with his boom-pa-TOOM, boom-pa-TOOM (etc.) rhythm that is as identifiable to him as that chukka-chukka is to Bo Diddley, or the I-IV-V to Chuck Berry (the true king of rock’n’roll). Joan Jett had covered a number of his songs, as well.
Glitter’s music is especially catchy, which is why his “Rock and Roll (Parts One and Two)” is still used at nearly every sport event, even after all that has come to light. That being said, it is hard to read this interview today in hindsight without seeing irony in nearly every paragraph and many song or album titles. Yes, I know all about his disturbing sexual - ah - reputation, both in the UK and abroad, but this article was from way before any of that was known, and besides, this is a discussion about his musical legacy, not his jail-worthiness (rightful in my opinion). Thanks to Mary Anne Cassata, I had the chance to catch not only Gary and his enormous toup play at NYC’s Limelight, which she mentions below, but I also had the opportunity to attend the press conference earlier, where FFanzeen photographer extraordinaire Cathy Miller took a photo of him holding up one of our logo t-shirts (and another of me standing with Gary). The following article, written by Mary Anne Cassata, originally appeared in FFanzeen #13, from 1985. Record images and videos from the Internet Introduction by Robert Barry Francos, 2010
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