Music Blog, Seventies

Hoople Head

Nancy's Notes 🖊️🎶

Written for Glyn’s Mixed Music Bag week #27 where we are asked
to write about a song by a group or solo singer beginning with
the letter M or N. Here is my group for this week.

Formed in 1967, Mott the Hoople wanted to make music like Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones. They never quite achieved the level of success of their idols but they were still important to British music at the start of the 1970s. They initially had limited commercial success, although they were popular in mid-sized venues in London and were always considered to be a good live band. Fans caused so much damage at their 1971 concert at the Royal Albert Hall that rock concerts were banned from the iconic venue. By the beginning of 1972, following poor album sales, an aborted tour and an onstage fight in Switzerland, Mott the Hoople were on the brink of breaking up.

Sometimes in life, quality is more important than quantity, and even if you don’t have a huge number of fans, if your hardcore group of fans includes David Bowie, you must still have some hope. Such was the case for Mott the Hoople. After hearing of the band’s troubles, Bowie offered to give them his song “Suffragette City”. They declined the offer thinking that it would not get them the kind of radio airplay that they needed to sell more records but took him up on his offer of “All The Young Dudes”. The single release became their greatest hit and a classic of the glam rock genre; the album of the same name that followed, produced by Bowie and Mick Ronson, got to #21 in the album chart. This was their fifth album and it was where they moved away from standard 1960s rock music and jumped firmly onto the glam rock band wagon.

David Bowie’s production gave Mott the Hoople a hit album at their fifth attempt but unfortunately without him they were not able to maintain this level of success. Their sixth album actually charted higher than All The Young Dudes but they split up in 1975. Mott the Hoople was one of those groups who were absolutely brilliant live on stage but could not quite recapture that magic in a studio.

In 2009 they played a 5 night sell out reunion residency at the Hammersmith Apollo in London. The crowd were on their feet through the entirety of each show and apparently lead singer Ian Hunter commented that it was the first time he had ever had a standing ovation for an entire concert. The surviving members of the band have continued to play sporadically since. Not bad for a band that never had a #1 hit single or album.

Despite being commercially unsuccessful, Mott the Hoople influenced some serious musical players such as Queen, REM and, of course, David Bowie. The Clash, The Sex Pistols, The Smiths and the New York Dolls all cite Mott as influencing them.

Mott the Hoople was one of our favorite groups; we loved their sound, their delivery, their attitude and the fun they brought to live shows. We saw them perform live twice .… August 3, 1973 at the Felt Forum with the New York Dolls and again on May 7, 1974 at the Uris Theatre with Queen. The Uris (now known as the Gershwin Theatre) was newly opened when Mott and Queen performed there; it’s Broadway’s largest theater, with almost 2,000 seats across two levels. Over the years, it has hosted musicals, dance companies and concerts. It’s a beautiful place. Unfortunately, the theatre sustained significant damage by the fans during one of Mott’s shows …. fortunately not the one we attended. Here’s a clip from the New York Times:

“Mott the Hoople arrived on Broadway Tuesday night for the first of six shows, the first hard rock group ever to appear there, and the Uris Theater will probably never be the same again. Cigarette burns in the rugs and seats, spilled drink stains on the floor and torn upholstery were just part of the mess after their final show leaving people wondering how something like this could happen.”

Really …. who could blame them? That type of wonton destruction and disregard for property is disgraceful. You’d think the owners of the Uris Theatre would have been prepared after hearing about the damage at Royal Albert Hall three years earlier. Still, there’s no excuse and we were shocked to hear the reports just days after we were there.

This is Mott the Hoople’s greatest hit song … “All The Young Dudes”  written by David Bowie.

This next song tells us about the protagonist who is in a rock band and his friends, Jack and Jane, who work as a banker and clerk. They all come home from work, sit by the fire, and listen to classical music together. The song talks about different aspects of life, such as working hard and dealing with difficult people, but also acknowledges that life is short. The song is “Sweet Jane”; written and originally recorded in 1970 by Lou Reed, it was covered by Mott the Hoople in 1973.

This is Mott the Hoople with Lou Reed’s “Sweet Jane”. 

“All The Way From Memphis” is a single written by Mott the Hoople’s front man, Ian Hunter. It was released as the lead track from the album Mott in 1973. The song is based on true events and describes the unglamorous side of rock stardom …. the tale of a guitar lost in transit (shipped to Oriole, Kentucky instead of Memphis, Tennessee) and what seemed like a paltry and unenthusiastic concert audience. Despite the album’s popularity, the song never charted in the US although it did receive considerable airplay on album-oriented rock stations. The Mott album reached the Top 40 of the Billboard 200, peaking at #35.

This is “All The Way From Memphis” by Mott the Hoople, featuring the great Andy Mackay from Roxy Music on sax.

Big thanks to Glyn for hosting Mixed Music Bag every week.

Thanks for joining me today and spinning some tunes.

See you on the flip side. 😎

NAR©2024

All text, graphics and videos are copyright for The Sicilian Storyteller, The Elephant’s Trunk and The Rhythm Section and are not to be used without permission. NAR©2017-present.

35 thoughts on “Hoople Head”

  1. Wanton disregard of other people’s property seems to be the hallmark of too many rock bands out there. I always wondered what prompted band members and, as a result, their fans to behave in such a manner.

    Mott the Hoople is one of those bands where I could not mention a tune but react like I did with the first one with a “oh, that’s them”!

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    1. Before Bill retired he worked for a company that leased private jets to people with mega bucks, including a couple of rock bands. That association with rock groups didn’t last long and his company stopped leasing to them after one of their jets was trashed. I’d say three things contribute to this type of behavior: 1) drugs; 2) alcohol; 3) a sense of entitlement with no regard for other people and their property.

      Re your “oh, that’s them” comment, I can certainly understand that. 😎

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  2. Hi, Hello & Howdy, NANCY ~

    I never owned any LPs by Mott The Hoople, although I was aware of ‘All The Young Dudes’ and probably a few others.

    However, when Ian Hunter’s 1979 solo album was released and I heard ‘JUST ANOTHER NIGHT’ I fell in love with it immediately and wasted no time getting to a record store to buy ‘You’re Never Alone With A Schizophrenic’. And was I ever surprised to learn that some of Springsteen’s E Street Band played on the collection!

    To say that, in my youth, I spent more than “just another night on the other side of life” is putting it hysterically lightly (as yakked about in my most recent BOTB installment, which also features Bruce & his E Streeters).

    This blog bit or yours inspired me to go listen to Ian Hunter’s great hit, and I love it just as much today as I did in ’79! [*I just now looked up that song in my copy of ‘The Billboard Book Of Top 40 Hits’ and was shocked – SHOCKED! – to discover that ‘Just Another Night’ was never a Top 40 hit! Hokey-Smoke! L.A. radio stations played the helck outta that song! That’s how I learned of it. NOT a national hit?! SMH!]

    ~ D-FensDogG
    http://stmccpresentsbattleofthebands.blogspot.com/

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    1. Hiya Stephen –

      “Just Another Night” is a fabulous song by Ian Hunter with that definitive Mott sound.

      We also spent a lot of time on the other side of life but by 1979 we were into yet another phase of our lives called parenthood! I can remember singing along to “Just Another Night” and dancing around with my baby. How he laughed when we did that! Now HIS kids are listening to Ozzy!

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  5. Mott the Hoople, a band I always heard about, but never actually heard (a bit before my time?). I’ll bet they WERE amazing in concert. Especially loving Clive’s clip!

    Thanks for all the back story!

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  7. I loved Mott The Hoople in their hit band version, and All The Young Dudes is a classic track. I first came across them a few years earlier, when I bought an Island Records double sampler album called Bumpers. This was their track on it, written by lead guitarist Mick Ralphs, who went on to form Bad Company. I wore this track out!

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          1. That was the nature of the sampler albums: highlight the bands on the label at a ridiculously cheap price, and hope we bought the full albums by anyone we liked. I had six of them, three each on Island and CBS (Columbia for you), a double and two single albums for each. It was a great way to build a record collection!

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  8. This was a fascinating read. I had never heard of the group Mott the Hoople or the song before despite there being a significant influence on lots of game changers groups & artists. You can hear the David Bowie sound / production and Dylan vocals in ‘Young Dudes’. The orchestration is very expansive and impressive. Thanks for broadening my music landscape Nancy.

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    1. As I mentioned to Debbie (below), I was waiting for the Ms so I could write about Mott the Hoople, hoping someone would be reading/listening for the first time. I’m very glad that someone was you, Matt, and that you fully appreciate the story behind Mott and their sound. As much as I enjoy talking about a group with a fellow fan, I really dig introducing a new sound to my readers.

      Thanks for leaving such a great comment!

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  9. Great choice! Great piece!

    One of my favourite bands too, though I never saw them ‘live.’ (I did though receive a ‘thank you’ message from Ian Hunter some years ago after I reviewed a solo release on the old version of my Loud Horizon blog. )

    🙂

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  10. I remember Mott The Hoople and their connection to Bowie, plus ‘All The Young Dudes’. The rest was new information for me and interesting to read. Their cover of ‘Sweet Jane’ was pretty good too. Thanks for the education, Nancy! 🙂

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    1. I’ve been waiting for the Ms to roll around just so I could talk about Mott the Hoople; I was curious as to how many people would know them. I’ve loved them since the beginning and ATYD is a favorite song of mine. I prefer Lou Reed’s Sweet Jane, TBH. ATWFM is a really fun song.

      Thanks so much, Debbie!

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