Amanda Spielman

OH! YOU PRETTY THINGS

The Birth of Glam Rock, March 10, 1971

When Marc Bolan of T. Rex performed on television in 1971 with glitter on his cheeks, glam rock was born and the door was opened for David Bowie and his iconic glam alter-ego, Ziggy Stardust. Personified by artists such as Bolan, Bowie, and Roxy Music’s Bryan Ferry and Brian Eno, glam was outrageous, decadent, and subversive. Glam professed the fluidity of identity and sexuality, and gave traditionally masculine rock an alluring and unnatural femininity. Glam was simultaneously nostalgic and futuristic, reacting against the obligation to be socially conscious by returning to themes such as girls, cars, sex, and stardom. The antithesis of the hippie movement, glam was all about artifice and affluence, androgeny and performance, and it was over by 1975.