![]() The four classic albums Sparks would record for Island Records took a Trojan-horse approach to glam rock: The clean production, catchy riffs, and androgynous vocals drew in fans of David Bowie, Queen, and T Rex, but the band’s love of pre-rock and roll styles like swing, chamber music, and light opera would shine through on songs like " Looks Looks Looks," " Under the Table with Her," and " Hospitality on Parade" from their fifth album Indiscreet. ![]() Sparks change their sound as often as other artists change their clothes. The clip was so well-known that Paul McCartney would later parody Ron in the video for his song “ Coming Up.” 4. He stared down the camera with a menacing facial expression that frightened schoolchildren throughout England and led John Lennon to compare him to Hitler because of his slicked-back hair and toothbrush mustache. With his black velvet suit and head of tendrils, Russell looks like the dictionary definition of a glam rock frontman, but Ron’s deadpan screen presence elevated the clip into a legendary TV moment. They promoted their breakthrough album Kimono My House with a truly bizarre performance of the single "This Town Ain’t Big Enough for the Both of Us" on the BBC’s Top of the Pops. Sparks' appearance on Top of the Pops was a pre-internet viral video.Īfter landing a contract with Island Records, the Maels relocated to London in the summer of 1973 and assembled a backing band of British session musicians. “We shortened it to Sparks,” Russell recalls in The Sparks Brothers. While recording Halfnelson’s album, Bearsville Records owner (and Bob Dylan's manager at one point) Albert Grossman suggested that the Maels change the band name to the Sparks Brothers, because they reminded him of The Marx Brothers. Their elaborately packaged demo-which Russell designed to look like a restaurant check-landed on Todd Rundgren’s desk, and the iconic musician and songwriter produced the band’s debut album for Bearsville Records. The brothers would eventually gain some success with Halfnelson, a proto-Sparks quintet that merged witty first-person narratives, ambitious arrangements, and studio trickery with melodies that got stuck in your head for days. ![]() (In The Sparks Brothers, Ron recalls running Fritz Lang’s film M upside down “ so then it would be called W”-an early example of the band’s trademark absurdist sense of humor.) After school, the brothers fronted the bands Farmers’ Market and the Urban Renewal Project, both of which played gigs on the Los Angeles club scene. Ron and Russell enrolled at UCLA in the mid-1960s, with Russell in the theater department and Ron in film. Ron and Russell Mael found pre-Sparks success as part of a quintet. While the rumor that their mother was Doris Day turned out to be false, their mother used the pseudonym Mary Martin when she served as the secretary of the Sparks Fan Club. As children, they modeled for the Sears catalog, and they’re visible in the audience of the 1960s concert movie The Big TNT Show. Growing up in Los Angeles played a huge role in the Mael brothers’s early years, both in fact and in band mythology. In an early scene in The Sparks Brothers, Ron spoke of how his father’s artistic talent played a formative role in how he viewed his hometown: “When I think of Venice Beach, my father’s painting is what comes to mind." Casual fans might think they’re from Europe, but Ron and Russell are proud Los Angeles natives. ![]() Sparks first became popular in England they would later record a string of dance and new wave albums in Germany, and singer Russell Mael would sometimes sing in a French accent. Sparks found some early fame in the UK, but were formed in California. If you’re interested in learning more about Sparks but don’t know where to begin, these 10 fast facts will bring you up to speed. Two movies-Edgar Wright’s documentary The Sparks Brothers and Leos Carax’s musical Annette, which the Mael brothers wrote with Carax-that debut this summer could bring Sparks to a wide array of new listeners. Their peers respect their constant musical innovation, while teenagers of all ages see themselves in Ron’s poignant, self-deprecating lyrics, but their records have never caught on with a wider audience. Over the past 50 years, brothers Ron and Russell Mael have been at the forefront of a variety of popular music trends, from glam rock to power pop to electronic music to new wave and beyond. "Throughout all the years I’ve been making music, if you get on a tour bus with a bunch of musicians, eventually the conversation will go to Sparks,” Beck says in the trailer for Edgar Wright's new documentary, The Sparks Brothers. ![]()
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