A NEW WAVE OF GLAM ROCK
February 25th, 1971 marks what could possibly be the first official “glam” performance. The lead frontman Marc Bolan of English rock band T-Rex displayed a striking silver jacket with a corkscrew hairstyle performed “Hot Love'' on BBC's music television program, Top of Pops. With the hippie psychedelic era of art rock coming to an end, an incarnation arose soon after that added a splash of color popularized as “glam rock.” This sparked a cultural rebellion against the mainstream scene of rock music in the late 1960s. “Rebelling against the rebellion," as American rock critic Robert Palmer was noted in the book Disco, Punk, Wave, Heavy, and More: Music in the 1970s and 1980s.
The glamorous business side of showmanship hasn’t always been glitter and glitz. On the 16th of September 1977, Bolan, the man who once saw himself as a living work of art, died in a fatal car accident in Southwest London at the appalling young age of 29. A brief stint of flamboyance, which feels like a scene out of a Rocky Horror Picture Show with its provocative and outrageous clothing, appeared to come to a screeching halt. The genre that brought fashion trends such as platform boots and makeup, gave unapologetic confidence to fans worldwide to live out their gender fluid fantasies—male, female, extraterrestrial or anything in between.
Fast forward to the Millennium, we still have bands and solo acts actively immersed in the glam rock genre. Rock At Night spoke with New York City’s self-proclaimed band of social rock ‘n’ roll misfits known as Beechwood. A trio of young men with old souls, stylish and illegally good-looking, the musicians consist of Gordon Lawrence, the statuesque lead singer, Sid Simons, the blonde male-beaux guitar player, Russell Yusuf, a would be lawyer who sold his soul to the devil’s music who plays the drums and the returning renaissance man of rock ‘n’ roll, Jensen Gore on bass. All were in favor of flirting outside the law while struggling to break from the basement of Gordon Lawrence’s childhood home where they named themselves after a street called Beechwood on the New Jersey side of the George Washington Bridge.
As the rock and roll narrative of defying other people’s expectations; “...there are no rules,” says Yusuf. “You can do anything.” When asked about the glam rock genre and its current state of popularity, Beechwood’s fashioned frontman Gordon Lawrence answered, in a rather brief and polite manner, “We don’t consider ourselves a Glam Rock band. What was daring and exciting 40-50 years ago is just pedestrian these days. It’s not relevant anymore.” But why is it “irrelevant and pedestrian” nowadays when the self-conscious embrace of fame, fortune and narcissism continues to reanimate on many/several occasions through pop music? Well, decades after the generally supposed death rattle of glam rock, pop stars like Lady Gaga, Nicki Minaj, Haim, and Harry Styles have adopted the style of outlandish outfits, however each of them are missing one crucial element for a revival — the earsplitting. The best time for rock music was the explicit Renaissance of the late ‘60s, early ‘70s; a time when “Record labels,” says Lawrence, “were actually taking chances on tons of new bands that had interesting ideas that were different from the norm. Nowadays, it seems like artists are punished or even “cancelled” at times for having certain ideas or belief systems that go against what is generally accepted as in the indie world, which I think is just plain boring.”
Beechwood lives and breathes as a standalone unit, they’re not solely sold on popular music, but the pleasure and attitude music embraces. For them, the shock and awe of glam has already passed its expiration date and is therefore “irrelevant,” and “if it isn’t dead by now it should be.” “Any so-called ‘glam rock’ band” says Lawrence “is instantly categorized as “retro” which is another word for irrelevant.” Beechwood loves T. Rex’s Marc Bolan as much as any Red Coat. But the band believes it’s time to move on and create something new instead of looking to legacy artists and re-releases; instead take risks on new and exciting bands in blunt support of the fight for the future of the music industry - and not just those with a ton of Instagram followers, but artists with exciting ideas, visions, and important things to say.
Even though the initial hump of depression and inactivity caused by a global outbreak and its impact on the current state of live concerts; Beechwood took a year full of uppers and downers, yet managed to continue working on a new record entitled Sleep Without Dreaming. In support of the record, the band will be touring the United States and Europe. “Our rehearsal space is basically our second home,” says Sid Simons. “If I’m going down, I’m going down with these boys.” Musically, Beechwood is in better shape on what they could do, as opposed to what they couldn’t. There’s about to be a wave of Beechwood material that will inundate the world. “Our plan is to top the charts,” says Jensen Gore “And nothing less. We want to remind the world of the necessity of a good rock and roll band. Our sound and vision is our path to success.” Beechwood ends the conversation in punk mayhem by saying “Most music is trash. We represent the treasure among the trash.”
