Peter Buck of R.E.M once called them “a Rosetta Stone for a whole generation of musicians.” Gaining a strong cult following after their commercially unsuccessful three year run in the early 1970s, Big Star is now regarded by musicians as one of the most influential bands of all time, and also one of the unluckiest.
Big Star, almost called the Sweden Kream, was founded by Chris Bell, Alex Chilton, Andy Hummell, and Jody Stephens in Memphis, Tennessee in 1971. Alex Chilton had already made a name for himself as the 16-year-old lead singer of the Box Tops whose 1967 song, ‘The Letter’, hit the top of the charts in the US and UK. When Chilton came back to Memphis after living his teenage rock star lifestyle, Bell asked Chilton to join his band along with Stephens and Hummell. Chilton agreed, and Big Star was formed.
The group recorded their debut album, #1 Record, at Ardent Records in Memphis, a recording studio with humble beginnings and a unique story all of its own. At the time, Ardent recorded music for Stax Records, a larger record company who was overbooked at the time. This partnership was big for Ardent and Big star as Stax was being distributed by Columbia. However, marketing issues between Columbia and Stax resulted in sparse distribution of the album. Despite critical acclaim from major publications including Rolling Stone, the commercial success of the album was severely impacted.
Because of his success with the Box Tops, Chilton was the assumed brains behind the album. This was crushing for Bell who founded the band and contributed to the writing and vocals as equally as Chilton. The rise in turmoil lead Bell to be emitted into a psychiatric hospital, and he decided to leave Big Star.
In 1974, the remaining three members put out a second record entitled Radio City, which many believe topped their first. However, they were met with the same fate – cover versions of their songs gained more popularity – so they disbanded.
Despite their commercial misfortune, Big Star’s impact and legacy lives on and continues to grow. A second wave of Big Star surfaced in the 1990s, over twenty years after the group’s conception. People began discovering Big Stars music throughout the 1980s, many of whom also happened to be in bands. Big Star has been noted as a major influence to some of the greatest musicians of the era including The Replacements, Wilco, R.E.M, This Mortal Coil, and Jeff Buckley. According to Rolling Stone, Big Star “created a seminal body of work that never stopped inspiring succeeding generations of rockers, from the power-pop revivalists of the late 1990s to alternative rockers at the end of the century to the indie rock nation in the new millennium”.
So there you have it – Big Star: The Greatest Band That Never Was. If you’re looking for a place to start with their discography, I would highly recommend giving #1 Record a listen… and then Radio City… and then pretty much anything they ever put out.