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For Your Pleasure
Studio album by Roxy Music
Released 23 March 1973
Recorded February 1973 at AIR Studios, London
Genre Glam rock, art rock
Length 42:16
Label Island, Polydor (UK), Warner Bros., Atco, Reprise (U.S.)
Producer Chris Thomas, John Anthony, Roxy Music
Professional ratings
Allmusic 5/5 stars
Rolling Stone 5/5 stars
Robert Christgau (B)
Piero Scaruffi 7/10 stars
For Your Pleasure is a 1973 album by the British glam and art rock group Roxy Music, released by Island Records. The band's second album, it was also their last to feature synthesizer and sound specialist Brian Eno, who would later gain acclaim as a solo artist and producer.
Production
The group was able to spend more studio time on this album than on their debut, combining strong song material by Bryan Ferry with more elaborate production treatments. For example, the song "In Every Dream Home a Heartache" (Ferry's sinister ode to a blow-up doll) fades out in its closing section, only to fade back in again with all the instruments subjected to a pronounced phasing treatment. The title track fades out in an elaborate blend of tape loop effects. Eno remarked that the eerie "Bogus Man" displayed similarities with contemporary material by the krautrock group Can.
Of the more upbeat numbers on the album, "Do the Strand" and "Editions of You" were both based around insistent rhythms in the tradition of the band's first single "Virginia Plain". "Do the Strand" has been called the archetypal Roxy Music anthem, whilst "Editions of You" was notable for a series of ear-catching solos by Andy Mackay (sax), Eno (VCS3), and Phil Manzanera (guitar).
Brian Eno is very present in the final song from the album, "For Your Pleasure" making it unlike any other song. The song ends with the voice of Judi Dench saying "You don't ask. You don't ask why" amid tapes of the opening vocals ('Well, how are you?') from "Chance Meeting" from the first Roxy Music album. A live recording of the song has been used in 1975 as a B-side to "Both Ends Burning".
Promotion
As with the debut Roxy Music album, no UK singles were lifted from For Your Pleasure upon its initial release. A single-only release, "Pyjamarama" b/w "The Pride and the Pain", was issued in Britain, making #10. "Do the Strand" b/w "Editions of You" was released as a single in the US and Europe; it was finally issued as a UK single in 1978 to promote Roxy's Greatest Hits album, released in December the previous year.
The cover photo, taken by Karl Stoecker, featured Bryan Ferry's girlfriend at the time, singer and model Amanda Lear. Original pressings of the album (by Island Records in the UK, and Warner Bros. Records in the U.S.), featured a gatefold sleeve picturing all five band members wearing their Antony Price-designed stage costumes and posing with guitars.
Reception
For Your Pleasure made #4 in UK charts in 1973. In 2000 Q magazine placed it at number 33 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever. In 2003, the album was ranked number 394 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. It was one of four by the group that made the list (Country Life, Siren and Avalon being the others). It placed at 87 on Pitchfork Media's Top 100 Albums of the 1970s. The citation notes that Morrissey told the British press that "he could 'only think of one truly great British album': For Your Pleasure."
Track listing
All songs written by Bryan Ferry.
Side One
1. "Do the Strand" – 4:04
2. "Beauty Queen" – 4:41
3. "Strictly Confidential" – 3:48
4. "Editions of You" – 3:51
5. "In Every Dream Home a Heartache" – 5:29 (LP editions of the album incorrectly listed the song's timing as 4:25, due to its "false fade" referenced above)
Side Two
1. "The Bogus Man" – 9:20
2. "Grey Lagoons" – 4:13
3. "For Your Pleasure" – 6:51
Personnel
* Bryan Ferry – vocals, piano, Hohner Pianet, Mellotron, harmonica
* Brian Eno – VCS3 synthesiser, backing vocals
* Andrew Mackay – oboe, saxophone, Farfisa electronic organ
* Phil Manzanera – electric guitar
* John Porter – bass guitar
* Paul Thompson – drums
Production
* Chris Thomas, John Anthony, Roxy Music – record producers
* Roxy Music – musical arrangers
* John Middleton – sound engineer
* John Punter – sound engineer
* Jennings – crew
* Bryan Ferry – art direction, cover art concept
* Karl Stoecker – photography
* Nicholas Deville – art direction, photography
* CCS – artwork
* Antony Price – clothing/wardrobe, make-up, hair stylist
* Smile – hair stylist
* Amanda Lear – cover star
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