MARC BOLAN - The Outsider: a stranger in a strange land… *

       In the mid 50's, The Outsider, a book written by 24 years old Colin Wilson became a best-seller in England and his generation became known as the 'Angry Young Men'. In this book, Colin Wilson studies through literature and various characters of Sartre, Camus, Hesse, Lawrence, Dostoevsky, Blake and others, the problem of the Outsider: a man living in a world, a society, whose values and goals are totally irrelevant to him. The Outsider is hankering for a higher purpose, a higher life, to taste the extremes and live his life to the fullest. This was the intellectual desperate cry among the new generation when young Mark Feld declares: "At 9 years old, I became Elvis Presley!" There had to be more in life than the 1956 social grey landscape of England. Colin Wilson writes:

       "If you are living a very ordinary dull life at low pressure, you can safely regard the Outsider as a crank who does not deserve serious consideration. But if you are interested in man in extreme states, or in man abnormally preoccupied by questions about the nature of life, then whatever answer the Outsider may propound should be worth your respectful attention. The Outsider is interested in high speeds and great pressures; he prefers to consider the man who sets out to be very good or very wicked rather than the good citizen who advocates moderation in all things."

       Marc Bolan was a true Outsider, a Bopping Elf from a strange universe. Those who have known him will agree. Captain Sensible of The Damned once said: "Marc Bolan was out on a limb, destined to make weird records with weird lyrics, doing something that nobody else could understand." Biographer Mark Paytress adds in his book, 20th CENTURY BOY-The Marc Bolan Story: "...few have managed to bring that sense of not quite belonging, of estranged Outsiderness, to the pop mainstream."

        Leaving the mists of Beltane and the elfin music of Tyrannosaurus Rex, Marc Bolan becomes the Electric Warrior and conquers part of the world with his dragon-like rocking machine, T.Rex. Wars and battles, victories and defeats... His very life doesn't allow any in-betweens and Marc Bolan pays the price with his own sanity, his own self.

       Marc Bolan has left this mortal world but his legacy will live on forever - because it was born from the soul of a man who lived his life in the fast lane, explored the secret valleys of dream and fantasy, the dark regions of hell, drank the cup of fame and fortune and sank in the moving sands of disgrace. But like Orpheus, he finally came back from the underworld only to write the last chapter of his life and to leave this material world early on the 16th September 1977...

"As in life, so in death. Whereas most of the world aims for their life to end in their sleep during their eighties, the stylish Rock 'n' Roll ending has you extinguished just as you burn brightest, while the flame is still hot. One expects Marc would have approved, in principle, the idea of a car crash at the age of twenty-nine being a suitable means of dying. Rock is a religion based on the worship of adolescence; the faithful give their lives rather than become apostate."                                                Steve Turner, Introduction of the Tribute book

Of course Marc Bolan was no Mother Teresa and I'm sure God never planned him to be as such... God wants poets, rockers, philosophers, dreamers, builders, people who want to change the world, people with ideas, people who disagree, people who shout, people who live for an ideal... most saints were anarchists as well.

This is the man and the music this website is all about.
                                                                                              Michel Laverdière

       * Major parts of his text was first written as the introduction for the release of the Tiller-Rex CD. Visit the Till Dawn website for more info: www.TillDawn.net

        P.S.: I would like to thank Ivan Kocmarek for his inspiration. He was the first real fan I have met after joining the Till Dawn Chat List and his friendship is nothing less than beltanian…
I must also mention Rick Dalvano, list owner and manager of Till Dawn, and the whole family of Tillers busy keeping Marc Bolan's legacy alive all over the world. Come visit us on Till Dawn!