T. Rex - Ride a White Swan (2023 Remaster)
"Ride a White Swan" is a song by English band T. Rex. It was released as a stand-alone single on 9 October 1970 by record label Fly, and was the first single credited under the band's new, shorter name. Like all of the band's songs, it was written by the group's singer, guitarist and founder Marc Bolan. The song was included on the US version of the 1970 album, T. Rex.
The song was the band's first hit, and, according to Ned Raggett of AllMusic, the song "inadvertently founded glam rock mania"nalthough Bolan did not wear characteristic glam stage clothing until the promotion of follow up single "Hot Love".
In spring 1969, after three acoustic Tyrannosaurus Rex albums and an equal number of singles released to limited appeal, Bolan began to make the transition from basing his band's sound around an acoustic guitar to an electric. The new sound was premiered on single "King of the Rumbling Spires" and tracks were recorded for a planned fourth album, before Bolan replaced percussionist Steve Peregrin Took with Mickey Finn following a US tour. Shortly thereafter, the new duo completed the fourth album A Beard of Stars (including some material salvaged from the final Took sessions). This was released in early 1970. Later that year a fifth album, T. Rex, was recorded under the band's new shortened name of T. Rex.
"Ride a White Swan", a simple four-stanza lyric with the second repeated as the fourth, was written in Bolan's West London home that he shared with his wife June. In 1976, Bolan suggested that he wrote the song after he was spiked with LSD at the launch of the British version of Rolling Stone magazine in Hanover Square, Westminster. The song, which was brimming with mythological references, was recorded on 1 July 1970. It was less than two minutes long and contained four layered guitar tracks, with Bolan also playing Tony Visconti's Fender Precision bass, with a capo placed on the fourth fret. It included a small string section but no drums, with time being kept with a synchronised tambourine and clap recorded in the bathroom of Trident Studios, London. This location was chosen for the ambient room echo. To extend the song to two and a quarter minutes, Tony Visconti looped Marc Bolan's "da da dee dee dah" vocal line at the end of the song, six times.
New stereo remaster of the original stereo mix.