I caught the back half of Dazed & Confused on TV the other day, and although I have watched this movie countless times in the past, I realized a couple things again: (1) the 1970s were truly the coolest fucking decade since the 1920s, (2) someone ought to do a film that attempts to capture the same general vibe, but for the early ‘90s instead of the mid ‘70s, if that’s even possible, and (3) after deciding that I wanted to watch the film from start to finish I found that I have, once again, misplaced our DVD copy of the movie, so I will thus be buying yet another for the third time---there is some beautiful irony in that. It’s not often that musicians who initially make their reputation appealing to the tween set are able to parlay that career into something that would attract the interest of adults, let alone adults who like to party, but Sweet pulled off just this feat in the mid ‘70s: having been cast as bubblegum dildos initially, this LP was the band’s real shift towards a heavier sound. You know me, so you know that I love the synths, the proto-punk edge, the driving drumbeat… but I also love the way they crafted this song about a groupie that changes shape with the times, and in so doing actually take the piss out of themselves in highlighting critics of their own image alteration, “…I don't wanna know your name, ‘cause you don't look the same, the way you did before; OK, you think you got a pretty face, but the rest of you is out of place, you looked all right before…”
