#405 - Big Star - Radio City (1974)

MUSIC HISTORY WRITTEN BY HEAD WRITER DJ MORTY COYLE:

Released in February of 1974 on Ardent Records and produced by John Fry and the band this is the second album by the highly influential American Rock and proto-Power-Pop band.

Now, because this is the third and final Big Star album on The 500 we’ve run down their biography a couple of times. I’m just going to catch you up with how this album came to be.

The band formed in 1971 in Memphis, Tennessee after guitarist/singer/songwriter Chris Bell asked his old friend, fellow guitarist/singer/songwriter Alex Chilton to start an acoustic duo.

Chilton had already been a teenage rockstar a few years earlier as the Blue-Eyed Soul singer in The Box Tops but he turned Bell down… until he went to see Bell’s three-piece band Icewater which had Andy Hummel on bass and Jody Stephens on drums.

Chilton showed them some of his songs and then shortly joined the band.

After signing with local label and studio Ardent and distributed by Soul label Stax Records the band recorded their debut in 1972 and changed their name to Big Star after the Big Star Market across the street from Ardent Studios where they’d get their snacks.

Among the various influences included the British Invasion music of the ’60, especially The Beatles and their own unique Southern twists including their hometown proximity to classic Soul and R&B.

The record was critically acclaimed as something of a Pop masterpiece but their traditionally Black record label didn’t know how to properly market a group of young white guys and with added distribution issues Big Star’s debut was almost impossible to find in record stores.

The band’s frustration at hindered success led to tension and even physical confrontations. After working on a few new songs Chris Bell quit and the band took a hiatus.

Alex moved forward with recording a few more songs with drummer Richard Rosebrough and bassist Danny Jones.

As some of the only people who could hear their albums were the fawning Rock critics who got advanced copies to review John King of Ardent organized the Rock Writers Convention in Memphis in 1973. It was essentially a party engineered to get Alex, Andy, and Jody back together to play for them and it worked.

They were a huge success and it inspired them to pull back together to finish the record.

However before it came out bassist Andy Hummel, who was in his last year of college and didn’t see a future for the band quit to pursue a more normal life.

They got a replacement bassist John Lightman to tour but sadly when the album was released their label got into a disagreement with their new distributor which once again blocked most of the world from getting it.

They still sold a modest 20,000 copies but it wasn’t enough to keep the band together.

Now even though Alex and Jody did go back in the studio with assorted musicians in 1974 to make a record they were never formally called Big Star until it was released without their further involvement in 1978.

Founder Chris Bell tragically died in a car accident around that same time.

But you can hear more about that and more on those past episodes.

Just know that all three Big Star albums went on to become cult classics and almost as influential to the Alternative and Power-Pop music scene as anything that came before.