The Artist: Big Star
Big Star were supposed to be huge.
Formed in Memphis in 1971 by Chris Bell and Alex Chilton, they made sharp, heartfelt power pop that critics adored and almost no one bought. Their first two records - #1 Record and Radio City - flopped commercially but later became sacred for everyone from R.E.M. to The Replacements.
By the time Third (Sister Lovers) was recorded in 1974, the band was falling apart. Chris Bell was gone. Alex Chilton was spiralling. The studio was in chaos. The label didn’t even release the album.
But the result is astonishing - raw, broken, strangely beautiful. A record made in the wreckage, somehow glowing from within.
The Record: Third (Recorded 1974, Released 1978)
Third isn’t really a Big Star album - not in the clean, crafted sense of their earlier work. It sounds more like private recordings of a breakdown.
Depending on the edition, Third (Sister Lovers) opens with Kizza Me or Stroke It Noel. Each version offers a different entry point into the album’s fragmented beauty.
You Can’t Have Me snarls with bitterness. Kanga Roo drifts into experimental haze. Holocaust is just Chilton and a piano, barely holding it together. It sounds like John Lennon on the edge.
Nighttime is almost tender. Thank You Friends sounds sarcastic. The whole album veers between collapse and clarity.
It wasn’t properly released until 1978, long after Big Star had imploded. But Third has since been recognised as a masterpiece - a cult record that captures something pop music usually avoids: the sound of coming undone.
Play Now:
🔊 Spotify | Apple Music | YouTube
Start With:
- Stroke It Noel - Baroque, bittersweet
- Holocaust - Devastated, devastating
- Kanga Roo - Ghostly and unmoored
