Slade in Flame

When 70's Glam Rock champions Slade where asked to appear in a movie, several script options came their way. It was not until Manager Chas Chandler and John Steel came across Flame that the ball started rolling (and Rocking). Original songs where written by usual Slade Songsters Noddy Holder and Jim Lea. Slade spent the latter end of 1974 filming around Leeds and London. The Movie premiered in 1975 accompanied by the hit record "Far, Far Away". The Movie shows the rifts building within the group and the behind the scenes wrangles of Management. Snatched from obscurity, Pub and Club band 'Iron Rod' are discovered just as their relationship with seedy Manager Ron Harding is ending. They are given a make over "Im not a bloody fish-finger" moans Paul (Jim Lea). But Flamboyant Barry(Dave Hill) and reluctant singer Stoker (Noddy Holder) are keen for glory. Drummer Charlie (Don Powell) provides the on screen laughs. New Manager Robert Seymour (Tom Conti) employs ex-Singer Jack Daniels (Alan Lake) to steal the group's contract from Harding, but Daniels gets discovered by Hardings heavies and is beaten up. Harding threatens Seymour with more violence unless his contract turns up. Seymour returns the group to Harding on the same night that Paul walks out on the group. harding goes to the groups hotel room where Stoker informs him "We've all had enough Ron", and the film finishes to the strains of "How does it feel?". Great concert scenes filmed at the Marquee club in 1974 featuring members from the Slade Fan Club. An Album 'Slade in Flame' was released to tie in with the film, and an accompanying book by Andrew Birkin are available. See it just to relive the Glam days of flares and glitz of the early 1970's. Keep On Rockin'

The British Glam Rock kings of the 1970's never quite made the impact they should have in the states. Probably David Bowie is the only one of the bunch that most Americans have even heard of. The Sweet had only a few hits. Marc Bolan only managed one Top 40 record. Now that's a shame. Roxy Music was a cult group. Status Quo is virtually unheard of; a one-hit wonder whose only hit was their first single from 1967, "Listen to the Flower People," er, I mean, "Pictures of Matchstick Men." Slade shifted some LPs, but had no hit singles. But they did make this film, which can finally now be seen here in the USA on DVD. Interesting to watch from the American perspective, but anyone who's at all a fan of such British cultural touchstones as The Beatles or Monty Python should find plenty to enjoy here.

The group acquits themselves as actors quite well in this somewhat true-to-life tale of a rock band's rise and fall in England. The story starts in the mid/late 1960's, which helps to separate the real life Slade from the fictional Flame.

Although somewhat of a gritty drama, there are a large number of hilarious anecdotes (which all supposedly really happened, though not to Slade but to different bands) about the singer getting stuck on stage in a coffin (Spinal Tap pod incident, anyone?), the attack on the pirate radio station, and dealings with posh types on a train and shopping for a Rolls-Royce at a snooty dealership.

Overall, one of the better rock and roll films, if one of the lesser heralded ones. Worth watching for rock music fans or fans of 60's/70's pop culture. Just listen carefully, fellow Americans! You'll have a hard time sussing out some of the dialog with those Midlands accents. In fact, Noddy Holder said that when the film showed in St. Louis in the 70's, it was actually subtitled! Too bad that option is not provided on this DVD, but other than that, I don't have much to complain about here.

Forming in Wolverhampton, England, in the late sixties and coming from working class background's they originally called themselves The Vendors, after a while changing to Ambrose Slade, and finally to Slade.

The four-piece line up was to be Noddy Holder - Singer, Jim Lea - Bass, Dave Hill - Lead Guitarist and Don Powell - Drums.

Being managed and produced at the height of their career during the early 1970's by Chas Chandler, bass player to the Animals, and founder of Jimi Hendrix. After having several number one hits in England, their next phase in their career were to be the Movies.

For greater realism and to better their research, the band took the writer Andrew Birkin and the films director Richard Loncraine on tour with them to America. During Messer's Loncraine and Birkins tour of duty, they had gathered enough material to help them with their story. In fact, the vast majority of this movie is based on actual incidents that have happened to other Rock 'n Roll band's in their careers.

Released in the English Cinema's in January 1975, this is a dark and truthful translation of the Rock 'n Roll lifestyle. Deliberately shown this way to dispel the myth of the hype and glamour that the Business would want us to believe. Reselling the image as dishonest, disloyal, dirty and dangerous. Flame does a very good job here of testing your own loyalties, to be confronted with home truths that we would rather ignore, show business propaganda confronts a rude awakening.

We have it all here, a band heading from rags to riches, the double-dealing, well-heeled, and well-connected Manager, in the form of Tom Conti, his first movie. The greedy and highly psychotic back street agent, the hard tour that eats away at the bands heart and soul, which has them turning inside out and finally imploding into bitterness and resentment. Saving the best till last, we have the music, this movie has a great soundtrack that do Slade justice, having to write a completely new album to go along with Flame. It contains one of their finest songs to date: Far Far Away, reaching number two in the British charts in 1974.

There is a wonderful bit part by the late British D.J. Tommy Vance (1940 - 2005) as Ricky Storm.

Slade in Flame is not so much a parody but more of a Rock 'n Roll History lesson; it brings home the hardcore realities of the ivory-tower elite and the exploitations of what is Big Business. Showing the naivety of a Rock 'n Roll Band that want fortune and fame, but in the end pay the highest price, themselves.

Glam rock band, Slade caught the zeitgeist in the early-'70s although by 1975 their flaming fire of success had declined in the UK. ''Slade in Flame''- aired in cinemas in 1975 shows Dave, Noddy, Jim and Don involved in the British film world with this gritty tale about the rock industry, using the last burning embers from their success. Slade showed adventure when during that exciting flower-power year of 1968 they performed gigs in the Bahamas and ''Slade Alive'' recorded in London in October 1971 is a classic. 1975 was the year of Leeds vs Bayern Munich and West Ham vs Fulham, The Ramones debut album, ''Brut'' aftershave and the early stirrings of the punk movement. The film shows the seedy side of the music industry featuring pubs, clubs and bingo halls plus the corporate world of London in the pre-Thatcher era. Stout, bald, bespectacled London actor, Johnny Shannon is excellent as the thuggish agent, Mr Harding: he was in ''Performance'' (1968-1970) with James Fox and Mick Jagger. NME's Barney Hoskyns saw value in Slade in a 1983 article featuring nihilistic LA punk band The Angry Samoans, noting Slade's influence on the LA hard-core punk scene alongside The Stooges and Black Sabbath, while US hard-rock band Quiet Riot took ''Mama Weer All Crazee Now'' to Number 2 (?) in the American Billboard charts in 1983 (?) and Slade actually had American chart success in the early-'80s via newer songs. There are some sharp telling scenes: Don Powell up to no good in a bingo hall and first-class train carriage; the ''I'm not a fish-finger'' phrase from Jim Lea and a vicious scene involving the Jack Daniels figure (Alan Lake). The album, though only features one exciting song ''Those Kinda Monkeys Can't Swing''. The well-known ballads, ''How Does It Feel'' and ''Far Far Away'' are too slow.

The backdrop to this film was so bleak and gritty that one would not have been surprised to have spotted Jack Carter (in his black raincoat) passing by in the background.

With Alan Lake, Tom Conti and Johnny Shannon there to do the real acting, despite the serious nature of the film, Slade's thespian talents were little more important than the Beatles's were in Hard Days Night or the Monkees in Head. Despite that, Noddy Holder and Jimmy Lea (who were the brains behind Slade anyway i.e. they wrote all the songs) both aquit themselves extremely well; successfully creating credible, interesting and well rounded characters. Dave Hill simply played himself (not that that was a problem, as he was, to all intents and purposes, cast as himself anyway). I defy anyone to decipher a complete sentence mumbled by drummer Don Powell, but that oddly adds to his character's charm.

This successful hybrid between Get Carter and Stardust is truly a lost gem, that, despite it's rediscovery and favourable reassessment in the 90's, has still not received the popular recognition it deserves.

Who knows, if this had been a major success (as opposed to a major flop) on it's initial release, would it have been that long before we saw The Sweet doing a bullion job in The Sweeny?