FESS UP. YOU HAD IT.

Holy blowdryer Batman! How in the world did these hairdo girlymen end up on the turntables of rock fiends in the seventies? Just about everyone I knew had a copy of "Desolation Blvd." For a band that seemed a little too into grooming, without the requisite scuzziness, The Sweet (sometimes without the "the") somehow snuck in the back door, and caught the attention of the same people listening to the Dolls and Bowie. They had that glam beat, and songs so catchy that you gave them a pass for the falsetto vocals. A good number of their songs were written by songwriting team Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman, the same guys who wrote Suzi Quatro's catchiest stuff ("Can the Can," "48 Crash," and "Devil Gate Drive").


The Sweet ("four men in make up") concise eight minute profile.

The Sweet were practically made for radio, at least in the UK, where they racked up thirteen hits in the seventies. On "Desolation Boulevard," the had it down to a science, locked in as a stripped down formulaic glam machine (Occam's Razor, ala Ramones). They even had the marketing wherewithal to have the Sunset Strip, the Hollywood epicenter of Rodney's English Disco-era glam, on the cover. What self respecting L.A. glam scenester wouldn't buy an album with Filthy McNasties, Turner's Liquor and Powerburger on the cover? They didn't have to put a photo of the Whiskey-A-Go-Go. You knew it was right across the street. Every glam kid in Hollywood would own that LP, and that's exactly who they wanted it in the hands of.

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Listen:
Sweet - Ballroom Blitz mp3 at Medicine Films
Sweet - Fox On The Run mp3 at The Cargo Culte
Sweet - The Sixteens mp3 at Medicine Films
Sweet - AC/DC mp3 at The Vague
Sweet - Teenage Rampage (Live) mp3 at Medicine Films
Sweet - Hell Raiser mp3 at Medicine Films
Oddball:
Dondero High School A Capella Choir - Fox On the Run mp3 at Archive.org
Video:
Sweet - Fox On the Run, Top of the Pops, 1975 at YouTube
Visit:
Sweet at Wikipedia