Avalon

33⅓ Main Series #155

by Simon A. Morrison

Having designed Roxy Music as an haute couture suit hand-stitched of punk and progressive music, Bryan Ferry redesigned it. He made Roxy Music ever dreamier and mellower-reaching back to sadly beautiful chivalric romances. Dadaist (punk) noise exited; a kind of ambient soft soul entered. Ferry parted ways with Eno, electric violinist Eddie Jobson, and drummer Paul Thompson, foreswearing the broken-sounding synthesizers played by kitchen utensils, the chance-based elements, and the maquillage of previous albums.

The production and engineering imposed on Avalon confiscates emotion and replaces it with an acoustic simulacrum of courtliness, polished manners, and codes of etiquette. The seducer sings seductive music about seduction, but decorum is retained, as amour courtois insists.

The backbeat cannot beat back nostalgia; it remains part of the architecture of Avalon , an album that creates an allusive sheen. Be nostalgic, by all means, but embrace that feeling's falseness, because nostalgia-whether inspired by medieval Arthuriana or 1940s film noir repartee or a 1980s drug-induced high-deceives. Nostalgia defines our fantasies and our (not Ferry's) essential artifice.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, 21st Century, 20th Century

160 pages, Paperback

First published May 6, 2021

About the author

Dr Simon A. Morrison is a writer, academic and Programme Leader for the Music Journalism degree at the University of Chester. Author of the book Discombobulated - a collection of Gonzo ‘Dispatches From The Wrong Side’ columns penned for DJmagazine and published in the UK and US by Headpress – Simon has reported on the music scene everywhere from Beijing to Brazil; Moscow to Marrakech. He edited Ministry of Sound’s Ibiza magazine for two years and has also produced and presented TV and radio. A screenplay Simon penned, based on a story he wrote for The Guardian, is currently with a TV production company.

Within academe, Simon has contributed to Bloomsbury books including How To Write About Music, DJ Culture in the Mix and Kerouac on Record, as well as various academic publications including the journal Popular Music. His research interest, like his own practice, lies in the intersection of words and music, and his current writing stretches from a co-authored book about the global club scene for Reaktion to a co-edited title about Pink Floyd for Routledge to the publication of his PhD – Dancefloor-Driven Literature: The Rave Scene in Fiction – by Bloomsbury New York, in May 2020. Simon has presented this research at conferences across the world, including Portugal, Holland and Australia.

Reviews

[Alan (the Lone Librarian) Teder · Rating 3 out of 5]

Swan Song
Review of the Bloomsbury Academic paperback edition (May 4, 2021).

Now the party's over, I'm so tired
Then I see you coming, Out of nowhere
Much communication in a motion
Without conversation or a notion
Avalon
When the samba takes you, Out of nowhere
And the background's fading, Out of focus
Yes the picture's changing, Every moment
And your destination, You don't know it
Avalon - Opening verses of the title track "Avalon".

Avalon was the final studio album of British art-rock band Roxy Music (1970-1983), which had also been the launching pad for the career of Brian Eno. By the time of the 1982 album, only 3 of the 6 original members remained and studio musicians filled in on the other parts. Singer and main songwriter Bryan Ferry was already concentrating on his solo career and much of Avalon is dominated with his world-weary ennui although the instrumental tracks and brief solos are all quite striking and set the mood very effectively.

Simon Morrison's book for the 33 and 1/3 series is yet another example of much attention paid to non-album elements and not enough to the album itself. At the time of release it had the feel of a goodbye to the decade of the band's existence merging with the Arthurian mythology evoked by the album title and the cover art. In a way it signified the end of Empire as well. That impression is reinforced even more these days in the days of Brexit. It still remains a captivating listening experience, but Morrison doesn't quite capture it. A 3-star "Like" is the best I can say.


The cover of the "Avalon" LP album (E.G. Records 1982). Image sourced from Discogs.

Soundtrack
Listen to the full 10-track Avalon album via a single stream YouTube posting here or track by track via a YouTube playlist which starts here or on Spotify here.

Bonus Track
Roxy Music reunited for a concert tour in 2001 and backup singer Yanick Etienne (who sang the ethereal high-pitched ooh-ooh's in the original studio recording) joined them on stage for performances of the title track "Avalon", one of which you can see on YouTube here.

Trivia and Links
Roxy Music's Avalon was published as part of the Bloomsbury Academic 33 1/3 series of books surveying significant record albums, primarily in the rock and pop genres. The GR Listopia for the 33 1/3 series is incomplete with only 38 books listed as of June 2024. For an up-to-date list see Bloomsbury Publishing with 197 books listed as of June 2024.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just love Roxy Music's Avalon, It's the ultimate soft cool sophisticated summer night album. As a swansong, it's an excellent one.
This volume, though is very tech heavy. Simon A. Morrison goes into every single detail for the tracks from tempo shifts, how the band feel about the song and it's impact on popular culture, obviously this aspect is on the singles, with particular emphasis on More than this.

There's detour in the end, which is about what the members of the Roxy music mk 2 lineup are doing, with reference to Brian ferry and his Todd Terje collab.

Usually techy analysis' can be boring but here it's balanced nicely.

[Keen Reader · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 Stars!

“Chris Blackwell of Island Records, who moved as a producer between Dantean realms, from Bob Marley’s reggae paradiso to AC/DC’s inferno to Grace Jones’s purgatorio”

I’m sorry, but that’s just terrible writing. I think I’m a little done with the pointless pretentious BS of this kind of writing about mainstream music. I don’t buy it, and I think it’s almost always used to try and cover otherwise mediocre writing, and this book has plenty of it. Elsewhere the author talks about “Ovidian machinations of love” or what about, “the phrase has a slightly Phrygian quality.” And let’s not forget about the one song as an example of “poesie melique”.

Using the hifalutin academic language doesn’t lend it a sense of solemnity or professionalism but just makes you look like a desperate try hard who ultimately has very little of interest to say about a decent album made by a commercially successful rock band.

This instalment, like so many in this series I’ve read is just too clunky, bitty and frustrating to be anything other than someone’s half-formed thoughts on an album. I remain a big Roxy fan and this album was released during what I think is their strongest period, although the predecessor, 1981’s “Flesh and Blood” is still my favourite album of theirs.

I mind reading a review of one of the reissues of this album by a guy at Q magazine, who described the album as being filled with “post-party ennui”, which I thought pretty funny and on the money. Yes often it can feel like those lush production values can outweigh and outshine the quality of the actual songs, with at least two instrumentals amounting to little more than short filler “India” and “Tara”. But there are some great moments on here, which still hold up really well in 2025, not least the opening track.

As for this little essay, well I’ll let you into a secret, I’ve read a fair number of the books in the 33 series and to be honest many of them aren’t very good, and rarely seem to rise above readable, and this is the same, nothing exceptional to rave about.

On a random aside, Van Morrison’s “Avalon Sunset” came on straight after listening to this album, and I have to say there are some beautiful songs on there, so there you go.

[Tosh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kimley and I will discuss this book on Book Musik. The link is here: Book Musik podcast

[Beth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I usually enjoy the 33 1/3 books about favorite albums. They've always been informative and enjoyable, little tidbits about the writing and making of the albums, a look inside the minds of the musicians. (The one about Duran Duran's album "Rio" by Annie Zaleski is by far my favorite.)

However, this one not only disappointed me, it actually made me a little angry. Why on earth would a book make me angry? Well, I'll tell you!

This was an opportunity squandered. "Avalon" is one of the most iconic albums of the '80s, beloved by many for numerous reasons, and the best-selling Roxy Music album of their eight studio albums. It is lush, romantic, atmospheric, and the song "More Than This" is itself one of the most beautiful songs to come from that era. It means so much to so many.

Unfortunately, instead of speaking to the intensity of the songs and lyrics, the author dived headfirst and deep into the weeds of minutiae. Was it really necessary to discuss the chord changes, detailing music theory knowledge that the majority of people don't have? It goes off on various tangents about Irish poems and Arthurian legend, as well as musicians involved. Nile Rodgers alone gets two or three pages of discussion. I love Nile as much as anyone, but this was a Roxy creation, not a Nile Rodgers creation.

Most people remember songs like "More Than This" or the title track for a moment in time: a sweet moment with someone you've had a crush on; a first kiss; or maybe a blissful night with someone that you think you just might be falling in love with.

What a shame that this author reduced it to a sterile musical project. It deserved much more than...well, more than this.

[juicyD · Rating 2 out of 5]

if I was going to fill a book about Avalon with needless tangents and straw grasping then I’d at least spend more than two lines talking about Lost in Translation

[Alex Sarll]

Not so long ago, a 33 1/3 on the best band ever would have been guaranteed to address their spiky art-rock debut, but it makes sense that now, with so much music smoothed into playlistable inoffensiveness, the times are instead more propitious for their final album, 'music for bored hairdressers' which managed that same slickness yet also achieved the elusive feat of not sucking while it was about it. Yes, obviously in an ideal world, the subject of the analysis and adoration would be Stranded, the one even Eno knows is the best, despite being the first one after his sacking. But given this was published in the 2020s, I guess we should just be grateful it wasn't a bumper-length exegesis of the second, bad side of For Your Pleasure, or a monograph on Jealous Guy. Still, it's an odd beast, which is true of many of the series' more interesting entries, but this one feels like it's trying to be a few of them at once. In places it gets into the gritty technical detail of what instruments were used and the "Bsus2 chord (F#, B, C#, and F#)", which makes about as much sense to me as Linear A; the first example I was going to quote, I couldn't because I don't even know where to find one of the characters (it looks a bit like a Dark Elf hashtag). But then out of that the close reading will suddenly home in, using words I do understand, on which bit of the song does what to the emotions and how, and so I keep slogging through the code. Elsewhere it will go off on tangents, with very variable results; a perfectly sensible and enlightening passage on the use of a couple of Avalon songs in Grand Theft Auto then wobbles into a more general thought on music in video games which is trying to cover so much within one paragraph that it only serves to make Morrison look absurdly overambitious, and not in a good way. Which is a shame, because I really enjoyed the more controlled digressions, like the one about how Dante Gabriel Rossetti was forever depicting music in his paintings despite clearly not having a clue how it was written or played, as in some visual equivalent of a John Boyne recipe. But the book is at its most powerful when it approaches closest to the ineffable, never quite able to spell out a conclusion but at least providing some fresh light on the album's ungraspable heart, whether that be the paradox of the months of painstaking, precise efforts expended to create the most perfect impression of lovelorn languor, or its overarching mood of an impossible nostalgia for times and places that, even if they could ever have existed, surely could not overlap in the seductive neverland in which Avalon nonetheless leaves the listener believing for 37 minutes.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author demonstrates a good knowledge of musical theory and describes some of the patterns that really work in this album. The background and context of the work is investigated satisfactorily, however I felt at points it got a bit distracted, particularly towards the end. Well worth the read for a long-time fan and those looking for something new. I first heard the album last year so I'm in the latter camp and definitely learnt a lot about the group here. 7/10

[Nathan · Rating 1 out of 5]

Honestly, this is the sort of book from the series that I abhor. It has no real purpose, and that's clear. Morrison doesn't really propose anything in the opening introduction, and as the book unfolds, he seems to be over-indulgent in his ability to describe chord changes. There's maybe four pages of this book that I found redeemable, and that ultimately had little to do with Avalon.

[Christopher Renberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of inside baseball in terms of how it was recorded. That is how this series can go. I did enjoy the background of Roxy Music leading up this particular album. Good thorough look into an album that was a part of my high school years and still sits in my vinyl collection. Check it out!

[Emily Sontag · Rating 5 out of 5]

Too many aren’t really interested in the music so can’t appreciate the beauty of this book. Here’s an expert appraisal of the sound and aesthetic of a truly interesting and ambitious album. No gossip, only sophisticated analysis worthy of Ferry himself.

[Harry · Rating 4 out of 5]

For fans of Roxy Music only but I am one so it’s right up my street. It’s a rather academic reading of the Avalon album and not as easy to read as some of the others in the series but each album in the series is covered by a different writer with their own agenda.

[Gloomy · Rating 3 out of 5]

"He mused that "there is indeed nothing called 'real life', nothing to which we can attach ourselves when the fuses blow and the parents die and all the standards props like 'love' and 'success' prove hollow".

[Paul R · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome detail!

[Kimley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tosh and I discuss this with author Simon Morrison on our Book Musik podcast.

Mention Avalon to diehard Roxy Music fans and you’ll get a wide spectrum of responses, but few would put it at the top of their list even if they like it. However, Avalon (their last studio album), is the band’s most successful album in terms of sales and Morrison is more than happy to defend its brilliance with its lush production and sensuous vibe.