Before reinventinghimself as an influential electro-disco divo, Sylvester (née Sylvester James)plied his otherworldly falsetto and drag queen fashion sense to funky, bluesyrock. But despite pop music’s glammy sexual ambiguity during the first half ofthe ’70s, the two albums this large, flamboyant dude recorded with his Hot Bandwere commercial non-starters.
Long out of print, thematerial here holds up well in this time of freer gender bending. Arguably, hisrockin' persona may have worked best when he was being most subversive.Sylvester’s takes on Neil Young, James Taylor and patriotic tunes from hisperspective might have seemed downright radical at the time. His band'soriginal numbers reflected more of his own conflict, self-deprecating humor andsexual innuendo. Strobe-lit dance anthems may have made him a star, but it'sgood to hear the late pioneer in this rollicking guise as well.
