In 1973, alone and with an acoustic guitar, Marc Bolan recorded the revealing “This Is My Life”. Over its five minutes, a strummed elegy akin to the T Rex
B-side “Baby Strange” evolves from a finger-picked blues. The lyrics
name-check B.B. King, Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B Goode” and mention a visit
to New York State, playfully rhymed with steak.
“Everything I did when I was going to school was just an imitation of
Carl Perkins singing ‘Don’t be Cruel’,” he sings, no doubt well aware
the Elvis Presley hit did not figure in Perkins’ usual repertoire. Once
Presley hit big, Perkins was firmly relegated to playing second fiddle.
Bolan was subverting history’s hierarchy. “This Is My Life” found Bolan
reflecting on who he was and who he had become.
A home-recording, it was caught on tape for the sake of it. Bolan had a
new song, so he set his equipment up to capture it: what he had just
written could have charted or become a future classic, so he hit the
record button. But, its fascinating lyrical self-analysis aside, “This
Is My Life” was no classic. Instead, it was a rambling musical sketch
for filing away alongside the other demo tapes and was not meant to be
heard, and certainly not intended for release.
