T. Rex

(b. Mark Feld, 30 July 1947, London, England, d. 16 September 1977)

Initially dubbed Toby Tyler, he completed several unsuccessful demo discs before reportedly adopting his new surname from ( Bo) b Dy( lan).  A former model in the halcyon Mod era, Bolan began his singing career during the mid-60s folk boom.  Frustrated at his commercial impasse, the artist then opted to join Napier-Bell proteges John’s Children in 1967. He composed their best-known single, Desdemona, but left the line-up after a matter of months to form Tyrannosaurus Rex (later T. Rex). Between 1970-73 this highly popular attraction enjoyed a run of 10 consecutive Top 5 singles, but Marc’s refusal to alter the formula of his compositions resulted in an equally spectacular decline. Bolan was, nonetheless, one of the few established musicians to embrace punk and a contemporary television series, MARC, revived a flagging public profile. This ascendancy ended abruptly in September 1977 when the artist, as a passenger in a car driven by his common law wife, American soul singer Gloria Jones, was killed when they crashed into a tree on Barnes Common, London. (T. Rex members: Steve Peregrine Took died in 1980 choking on a cherry pit on mushrooms, and Steve Currie, who had played bass on Electric Warrior and The Slider, met his end in 1981. Also, Marc’s first and only wife -they never divoced, June Bolan passed away of a heart attack while vacationing in Turkey in 1995 at age aprox. 46). T. Rex Connections