Sheet Music (1974)

1974 turned out to be one of the most eclectic years in pop music. The sparks were led by an effeminate bohemian and a keyboardist with a Hitler mustache. Roxy Music had an album graced by two nude German beauties. Queen released her best work, an amalgamation of black and white theatre. ‘On The Beach’ showed Neil Young baring his soul, following in the footsteps of Bob Dylan a year earlier. In between all that, rockers from the north of England, 10cc, released their second album, a canny combination of pop invention and recommendation.

Hailed as the Beatles of the ’70s, 10cc had something even The Beatles didn’t (apologies to Mr. Starr): four accomplished songwriters and singers, each brimming with ideas, each capable of turning a bizarre idea into a smash hit. . George Martin was not needed, each was a competent producer, Stewart’s technical knowledge served him well as resident engineer at Strawberry Recording Studios.

Continuing the Beatles analogy, 10cc had a songwriting partnership of McCartney brimming with pop tunes and groovy tunes, guitarist Eric Stewart and bassist Graham Gouldman, giving the album its most obvious hit, ‘The Wall Street Shuffle’. (Before joining 10cc, Gouldman had written beloved sixties hits for The Yardbirds and The Hollies as a songwriter-for-hire.) Their John Lennon counterparts, second guitarist Lol Creme and drummer Kevin Godley, introduced esoteric lyrics and avant-garde sensibilities to their songs, though perhaps going further to the left of that direction than Lennon: ‘Clockwork Creep’ offered a bombshell perspective. , from the mindset of the bomb itself – even Gainsbourg didn’t do that! Neither where they’re afraid to swap writing partners, ‘SiIlly Love’, an excellent piece that combines Stewart’s ear for guitar melodies and Creme’s accomplished use of puns: “you take beauty from beautiful / It touches the strings of my heart.” / Oh baby, you take the wonder out of the wonderful / Oh my, oh my, and my, if you were mine”, becoming one of the most idiosyncratic pieces of the seventies.

Understandably, these differing factions led to a breakup two years later, Godley and Creme turning their cinematic art sensibilities into filming music videos for Sting, Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Duran Duran, while the other two bravely ventured out as ’10cc , earning a valuable No. 1 in 1978 with the reggae-inspired track ‘Dreadlock Holiday’.

But never better than as a quartet, ‘The Sacro Lilliac’, one of the best examples of a skabeat from English musicians, Gouldman and Godley bouncing and harmonizing well with each other, ‘Oh Effendi’ as perfect for Caribbean brilliance as any. they are likely to listen; sung by Godley, it had the strongest voice of the four, something Creme and Gouldman have reiterated over the years. ‘The Worst Band in The World’ is one of the best pieces of art in the language of sass, ersatz to the extreme, incorporating a mixture of styles, pop, rock, even baroque: a song by the worst band in the world performed by one of the best bands in the world.

‘Sheet Music’ proved to be a valuable addition to the ever-increasing palette of musical styles released at the time. The album’s greatest service was in its songwriting prowess. A band without a distinctive leader (Creme had the closest personality to the wild men of the seventies with his long and lucid hair and Stewart was without a doubt the most handsome, although neither of them was nominated more than as artists and musicians) , the band The Legacy depended on their ability to write songs. And ‘Sheet Music’ struck the fine line between wit and modesty that their later albums failed to manage. “Our best album,” wrote Gouldman (the only original member still playing live with 10cc to this day), “representing what 10cc was all about. Unique songwriting and production.”