You Scare Me To Death

Few, if anyone, ever disputed Marc Bolan's continual associations with the adjectives "eccentric," "odd," "provocative," or "original," and You Scare Me to Death! is yet another reason to celebrate these terms. The acoustic guitar and vocal tracks for this set were recorded in 1966 by Bolan, shortly before he joined John's Children and a year or so before he started T. Rex, but the rest of the instruments were overdubbed 15 years later in 1981, four years after Bolan's death, which makes this a curious set. Because Bolan had become such an icon for glam rock, the additional music is performed in the style even though the songs were recorded five years before Bolan was experimenting with the genre. This immediately distorts the authority of what Bolan's original vision might have been, but it is an interesting approach and not at all bad since it presents the music in the light that Bolan didn't necessarily change the way he wrote music, but the way he presented it. The songs are all of fine quality, making this a fun listen for fans of Bolan and T. Rex, but one can't help but wonder if the posthumous overdubs were necessary or if You Scare Me to Death! might have been more revealing had the tracks been left alone. ~ Gregory McIntosh