1975 Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel: Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me)

Never one of nature's wallflowers, with Cockney Rebel, Steve Harley purveyed a musical hybrid that sought to fuse the outré experimental Glam electronica of a Roxy Music with the serious wordplay and surreal imagery of a Bob Dylan. Sometimes it worked '(Mr Raffles', 'The Psychomodo'), most times it didn't ('Sebastian', 'Mr Soft'...oh take your pick), though at all times it carried a whiff pretentiousness that allowed none of the former's playfulness or the latter's mystery. Ironic then that Harley's biggest hit should come via one of his most straightforward recordings.

As a matter of fact, 'Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)' was recorded by Cockney Rebel Mark Two as a kiss-off raspberry to the original line-up after all bar one quit through disillusionment at the figure Harley was cutting in the media; no small co-incidence then that this is credited to 'Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel'. Not that it's that all that obvious from the lyrics where the bile is directed; lines like "Blue eyes, blue eyes, how come you tell so many lies"? can easily be taken to refer to the end of any love affair and so allow the song a broader appeal.

And actually too, 'Make Me Smile' isn't that straightforward either. Though it's based on a chunkily acoustic, almost flamenco strum, the chief selling point are those full stops of silence at the end of every chorus, broken each time by Harley's sardonic drawl. Take them out and the song becomes a very ordinary and meandering chorus in search of a hook, but slotted in place they become the chorus and the hook that pulls you in. By stamping on the brakes, it forces you to listen by coolly focussing attention as surely as the slap in the face that Harley was dishing out to his ex bandmates. So effective are they that it comes as a disappointment that 'Make Me Smile' bottles the ending by fading to a close rather than coming to a grinding halt. The latter may have resulted in an unsatisfactory "is it time to clap now????"confusion that would have spoiled the effect, but the former suggests a man running out of ideas and pandering to convention. Judging by the rest of his output from here on in, maybe there was a lot of truth in that so enjoy it while it lasts.