The New Big Star Album

Deidre pointed out that I was a little blase regarding the very interesting news from the Divine Miss Angela (please see below) regarding a new album by Big Star. For those who don't know anything about them, here's a good article from the Austin Chronicle prior to the group's appearance at the South by Southwest Festival (another entry in the Rock Snob's Dictionary, btw) last year.

The new album is supposed to come out in August, and will feature original members Alex Chilton (vocals, guitar) and Jody Stephens (drums). Chilton first made a name for himself in the 1960s as singer for the Box Tops ("The Letter"), but much more significant is his work with one of the most influential (if unknown) American bands of the 1970s. After Big Star folded in 1974, he went on to a rather strange solo career, shades of which were--IMHO--prefigured in Big Star's third and last album (Third/Sisters Lovers), which is filled with haunting sounds and images and unusual instrumentation.

The version of Big Star that recorded #1 Record in 1971 also included singer/guitarist Chris Bell, whose songwriting talents rivaled Chilton's, and bassist Andy Hummel. Due to differences with Chilton, Bell quit the group after the first album, and later died in a car crash, and Hummel left after the second album, Radio City, when it was clear that the band members' dreams of fame and fortune would never come to fruition.

The upcoming album was recorded at Ardent Studios in Memphis, where the group cut their seminal (a big Rock Snob term!) albums in the early 1970s. Chilton and Stephens are joined by Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow of the Posies, who have performed with them off and on since the first Big Star "reunion" at the University of Missouri in 1992. As for what the album's going to sound like, we'll see: I've tended to be a little skeptical of comebacks, though I always love to believe in the idea. Who knows? Maybe this time around, the world is ready for Big Star.