T. Rex T. Rex on Limited Edition 200g Japanese Import LP! 

The fifth Tyrannosaurus Rex album was also the first T. Rex set, as Marc Bolan abbreviated the band name at the same time as enlarging everything else — most notably the group's sound. Transitional through and through, T. Rex is the obvious successor to Beard of Stars, but it's clearly looking toward Electric Warrior, a point proven when the band hit the tour and TV circuits early in 1971. But Jewel, Sun Eye, Beltane Walk, and One Inch Rock are all bona fide Bolan classics and, if T. Rex itself was to be overshadowed by the simultaneous success of the Ride a White Swan single (pointedly not included on the album), then that only allowed Bolan more time in which to plan his next move. In many ways, this is the quintessential Bolan album, the last to be made before his entire life was swallowed up by superstardom, but the first to begin imagining what that could be like. Certainly he has an awful lot of fun revisiting one of his earliest ever compositions, The Wizard, while his ambition is writ large throughout the opening and closing snippets of The Children of Rarn, excerpts from a full-fledged concept album that he was then contemplating. You also get Is It Love?, one of his most contagiously underrated compositions ever, but really, there's not a sour moment to be found all album long. And it might just be the last Bolan album that you could say that about.

1. The Children of Rarn 
2. Jewel 
3. The Visit 
4. Childe 
5. The Time of Love Is Now 
6. Diamond Meadows 
7. Root of Star 
8. Beltane Walk 
9. Is It Love? 
10. One Inch Rock 
11. Summer Deep 
12. Seagull Woman 
13. Sun Eye 
14. The Wizard 
15. The Children of Rarn