Unless working to an older model, all music is a product of its time. In 1967 Marc Bolan formed Tyrannosaurus Rex which produced a series of folk inspired acoustic albums, before adding in rock to become the successful T Rex.

Prophets, Seers & Sages: The Angels of the Ages was released in 1968, the second of the transitional albums coming very much out of the quickly fading hippy era. The album has been rereleased with a plethora of extras, in the form of differing recordings and unreleased material.

This was the age of experimentation, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band had been released the previous year and Pet Sounds the year before that. Both became seminal albums, known for their experimentation with songs and soundscapes. It is little wonder that Bolan would think to apply some of this experimentation to his own work and in the opening track “Deboraarobed" Bolan uses tape to reverse his vocals on the second half of the song.

In many ways this song alone points to the weakness in Tony Visconti’s production. Firstly the experimentation appears to be for its own sake and rather than improving the song does the reverse. When I listened to it for the first time I seriously though that there was something wrong with the MP3 as the song degenerates into a mess of sound, which is neither pleasurable nor easy to listen to.

The other issue, and one which surprised and disappointed Bolan; there is a short interview with him, is that his distinctive way of singing means that the words which are discernible are often few and far between.

The original album contained fourteen tracks and you get them all included in this release,. On top of that there are a further forty-two tracks of extra material, although that said, many of the songs have five or six takes, some of them more interesting than others.

The sound is very sparse, mainly Bolan and an acoustic guitar, mostly rhythm is provided by the bongos, kazoos and a variety of easily transportable musical instruments. This sound is a pretty good representation of where Bolan was in his musical career as he would often just sit down with people and play them music, so a simple set up was ideal.

The album is so far removed from the massive hits like 20th Century Boy and Children of the Revolution that it’s obvious that at some point he took a musical about-face to make his sound more commercial. But this was a time when talent was allowed to work its way out and if for no other reason than listening to Bolan grow as a song writer its worth dusting off this relic of a bygone age of British underground music.

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Charles Packer