The Rock Spot- The Greatest Squawk in Rock and Roll History!
By WTJU Rock
Christopher Pickles remembers the joy, excitement and naughtiness of Slade’s second chart topping single, Take Me Bak ‘Ome.
The opening riff is catchy but then the big guitar rolls in, cranking and revving like a smooth, fat V6 engine, driving the song into greatness! It is 1972 and Slade are becoming Masters of their Craft.
It’s been such a big ten years, wow, what happened?! I can’t imagine how I would begin to explain it to a stranger from another planet, so just strap on your guitar and we’ll play some rock n roll!
‘Take me Bak ‘Ome’ picks up where ‘I Saw Her Standing There’ left off. We’ve seen a girl at a party and we fancy her, but everybody knows she’s already got a boyfriend. However she is intrigued by you, she loves your humour and free spirit, she feels trapped by the boyfriend thing and quite happy for the young pretender to come over …
The rumbling, rolling pumping guitar is interrupted by one of the best squawks in rock and roll; and then we are into the song. As ever with Slade, Noddy has such a way with words, evocative of scenes and experiences. That time when you enter the game, teasing and weaving intrigue. “You said your name was Sydney…” Great name for a playfully defiant girl. She’s drinking a bottle of brandy, held loosely in her hand, she’s still standing. She is wild, too wild for you. She looks at you confidently from behind her blue eyes.
Noddy’s voice cracks at the high notes, he is joyfully fascinated – he knows she is interested but she has this thing with this older boy. I don’t think she really likes him that much and yes she would possibly be available if they broke up. So Noddy walks her home and doesn’t stay long to say ‘goodnight’, but it’s alright, he can wait until another crazy exciting day and he did well tonight, she is definitely interested!
Those lyrics, those guitars, the voice and those times. When we were just 17 (give or take) and dancing with the possibilities of life and love …. with joy and total abandon!
What do you think? For surely you have played Take Me Bak ‘Ome several times now. ‘Opefully dancing around a bit and rather badly because we all danced rather badly back then, but it didn’t matter at all. We were having fun. What do you hear when we talk about the 70s? Write it down and send along because the Rock Spot is squawking to know. Send to [email protected]
