3. T. RexElectric Warrior
… the first time I owned an album of my very own. I didn’t pay for it with my pocket money, my sister Clare got given it by a boyfriend and she passed it on to me immediately. The Hipgnosis cover with the black and gold solarisation and the amp – it’s a classic record sleeve. It’s just a really brilliant album, a bridging album between the Tyrannosaurus Rex years and the full-on commerciality of Fly, and ‘Telegram Sam’ and ‘Hot Love’. There’s a great poster of Marc looking supercool in his Maida Vale flat with a mirror in the shape of a guitar, and illustrations of him by George Underwood, who famously went to school with David Bowie and punched him in the eye, causing ‘the Bowie eye’.
Selected in other Baker’s Dozens: David Yow, Sarah Cracknell, Paul Weller, Simple Minds, Pixies, Irvine Welsh, Vince Clarke, Cornershop
