Slade: "Love Me Or I'll Kick You" Article (1973)

Slade’s "Love Me Or I'll Kick You", a one-page article in Circus Magazine, January 1, 1973.Slade: Love Me Or I'll Kick You In The Head With My Silver Boots

Slade: Skinheads in silver boots show England that ugly is beautiful. But would you let your sister marry one?

All right Il right everybody, let your hair let your hair down I want to see everybody get off their seats, clap your hands and stamp your feet GET WITH IT!" GET DOWN AND

One/Two/Three/Four. stomp stomp stomp goes the music. Hands start clapping and bodies start swaying, feet start stamping and girls start fainting. It's somewhere between a revival meeting, a Nazi rally, a rock and roll concert and a down-and-out- drunken-free-for-all. It's a riot by any standards, and the group that's causing it all is Slade. Why? Because that's the way Slade like it to be.

Slade (whose latest album is called Slade Alive! (Polydor)) are from the north of England. They all live in an industrial city just south of Birmingham called Wolverhampton. They speak with broad accents that bring back a faint glimmer of those past days we all remember. They're not pretty; in fact, they're downright homely. Several years ago they all cut their hair to skinhead length, wore suspenders and combat boots and

tried to make it that way. It didn't work. Now, they wear silver plat- form boots, plaid knickers and long hair. But no matter how much silver and glitter they throw around, they're still not cosmic. In the old days the headlines read, "Would you let your daughter marry a Rolling Stone?" Now (especially since Marc Bolan married) mothers quiver at the very vision of their daughters coming home lovingly clutching the hand of Dave Hull (lead guitar), Noddy Holder (lead vocals), Jimmy Lea (bass guitar) or Don Powell (drummer) of Slade.

Were they ugly enough? T.Rex thought so. Though it appears on the surface that Slade is enjoying an over- night success, they've been working together for about five years. In the beginning they were called Ambrose Slade. Then, when the name was shortened to Slade, they brought out an album on Atlantic Records called Play It Loud. Around this time in England, Britain's youth, then searching for musical decadence to sink

their teeth into, discovered them. Though nothing had really changed, "Get Down And Get With It," "Cos I Luv You" and "Take Me Back 'Ome" sailed up the English charts. Soon they had T.Rex clattering off from the high number one spot and Rod Stewart stopping cold in his tracks. It looked as though Chas Chandler, original bass guitarist from the Animals and ex-manager of Jimi Hendrix knew what he was doing by managing and producing this band of roughnecks.

The band is coarse. Maybe that's why the English working class youths love them so. Instead of having to settle for warmed-over, upper-class refined funk by the likes of Masters Jagger and Bolan, these new idols are just like the kids themselves. They don't speak perfectly, they don't look beautiful and they don't make any attempt to hide it. Their clothes are take-offs on construction workers' gear. It doesn't matter that the boots are silver; they're still bovver boots that are good enough to kick ass with. The words are plain and simple: "If you feel like shoutin', say whatever you like, it all adds to the atmo- sphere." Noddy Holder, the bulging- eyed, slightly paunchy lead singer calls out. "So, all you drunken louts, say what you will" And, as the beer flows and the tension reaches yet another orgasmic peak, the girls start screaming and the boys start dancing madly.

Belches are a girl's best friend. That's another of the unique things about Slade. While the little girls are getting turned on by the slightly sweeter looks of Jimmy Lea and Dave Hill, the guys in the audience are ad- miring the toughness of Noddy Hold- er and the stamina and drive that keep Don Powell drumming at such a feverish pitch.

The beat lets up only long enough to allow for "Darling Be Home Soon." Sandwiched between the gen- tle vocals (Noddy usually comes across in much the same way as Steve Marriott did in early Small Faces days) and the tight harmony work of Dave Hill, Noddy Holder belches. Right in the middle of a chorus, just as the girls begin to soften with senti- mentality, the music gets just that little bit uglier than all the other sounds around. Slade are ugly, but they're human, much more so than any group the English have identified with in years.