Return to Base is the eighth studio album by the British rock group Slade. It was released on 1 October 1979 by Barn Records, and did not enter any national album charts. At the time of the album's release, the band's success had waned and were receiving little fortune. Forced to play at small halls and clubs around the UK, the only income they were reliant on was Noddy Holder and Jim Lea's songwriting royalties. Their recent singles had sold poorly and they were no longer drawing in large audiences. Prior to their last-minute call up for the 1980 Reading Festival, they were on the verge of disbanding.
The band's previous album, Whatever Happened to Slade (1977), featured a "straight" hard rock sound, dropping the band's glam rock image, and despite critical acclaim, had brought the band little commercial fortune. Return to Base was conceived as a continuation of the band's sound, and an attempt to raise the band's fortune. The band aimed to record twenty songs, with the best eleven being put onto the album. In the 1979 July–August fan club magazine, drummer Don Powell confirmed that seventeen tracks had been recorded at the time. However, while the critical reaction to the album was generally positive, the album sold poorly, something partially blamed on Barn Records, who only pressed a total 3,500 copies of the album's lead single "Ginny, Ginny", virtually guaranteeing its failure to enter the charts. Even the single that followed, "Sign of the Times", failed to chart and most copies which were left were melted down.
Some of the tracks from Return to Base re-appeared on Slade's 1981 album We'll Bring the House Down, released following their successful appearance at the Reading Festival in 1980. The remainder tracks from Return to Base were included as bonus tracks on the 2007 "Feel the Noize" remaster of We'll Bring The House Down. As such, the album was the band's only album not to be included in the series of remastered releases.
Background
Having returned to the UK from the United States in August 1976, Slade found themselves out-of-favour at the time of the UK's Punk rock explosion. The band's 1977 album Whatever Happened to Slade proved a commercial failure while their tour that spring had shown that they could no longer fill large venues. Slade's waning success soon led to the band taking any gig they could. They found themselves playing small venues, mainly universities and clubs. The band's tours often ran at a loss, with the band having to bring their own PA and lightshow. Bassist Jim Lea, however, was unfazed. "I still thought the band was great," he told Chris Charlesworth in 1983, "We were playing as well if not better than we ever had... now we had something to prove again."We'll Bring the House Down - 2007 Salvo remaster booklet liner notes
Despite being successful at filling small venues for their live performances, the band's new records were barely selling. With the band's new output no longer being released on Polydor Records but instead on manager Chas Chandlers' label Barn records, singles such as "Burning in the Heat of Love", "Give Us a Goal", "Rock 'n' Roll Bolero" and "Ginny, Ginny" were all chart failures. Even the band's second live album Slade Alive, Vol. 2 (1978), the sequel to their critically acclaimed and commercially successful Slade Alive! (1972), was a commercial failure.
Recording The album was recorded over a period of six weeks in 1979.November–December 1979 Slade News magazine. The album saw the band produce together for the first time. In a 1979 fan club interview, Hill said: "We each took it in turn to produce certain parts ourselves – which makes it the first album we have solely produced ourselves."
Disagreements between the group – especially Lea and their producer/manager Chas Chandler – had been brewing since the recording of Whatever Happened to Slade, and, having continued throughout 1978, came to a head during the recording sessions for Return to Base. "Jim was becoming more and more involved in that side of things," lead vocalist Noddy Holder told Chris Charlesworth. "He wanted to produce the group and he didn't think that Chas was coming up with the goods." Chandler, for his part, was unimpressed with the group's current material: "They felt that a great sound was the all important thing," he told Charlesworth. "I've always felt that the song comes first and you craft your sound to suit the song... not the other way round." Although Chandler offered to end his association with Slade altogether, the band asked him to remain as manager while they produced themselves. Chandler said: "I agreed to this because if I refused I felt I would have been kicking them when they were down."
Asked in 1979 for his thoughts on the album, Hill said: "I'm very satisfied with it. It's got a mixture of different types of songs on it, all of which adds up to it being a good album! My favourites are the rock 'n' roll one "I'm a Rocker" and the instrumental one "Lemme Love into Ya" – probably because of the way that they come over on stage more than anything else."
In a 1980 fan club interview, Holder spoke of the album. "Over the last couple of years me and Jim have been writing a lot of songs, but we haven't known which way to approach them really. With Return to Base we were really pleased with the album, we thought that it turned out really well, but it didn't sell. Everyone around the band was saying to us that we weren't coming up with as good songs as we used to, but me and Jim knew that we were, we knew that we were coming up with strong songs. Some of the songs on Return to Base we thought were some of the best songs that we'd ever written. There only seemed to be me and Jim that had confidence in the songs; people like Chas, Dave and Don said that they didn't think our songs were as strong, some of them they did but some of them they didn't. But we ourselves thought that they were. Thus it was a case of getting the album down; and in our minds it turned out to be a great album."Slade Fan Club Newsletter November–December 1980
During the recording of Return to Base, Slade were persuaded by engineer Andy Miller to record a song he had co-wrote with Bernie Frost. The song, "Another Win", recorded by Slade but was not released.Slade Supporters Club Newsletter May – June 1981 In 2011, the song emerged on the internet through the Slade in England website.
Music
As the album title suggested, the album continues the "back to basics" sound of their previous album Whatever Happened to Slade (1977). AllMusic stated that "the sound of this record harkens back to the hit single sound, a bit less overdriven and heavy, and a bit more hook-filled and light. Acoustic guitars even appear at times."
Side one "Wheels Ain't Coming Down" tells the tale of a near-death flying experience suffered by Holder and Lea when travelling to Los Angeles. The track was later released as a single in 1981 and peaked at No. 60. "Hold on to Your Hats" is a mid-tempo track influenced by a more rock 'n' roll sound. The track uses backward reverb effects and features a question and answer technique between Holder and the other band members Hill and Lea during the chorus. "Chakeeta" is a more commercial sounding track on the album. "Don't Waste Your Time (Back Seat Star)" is an acoustic-based ballad, described by Holder in 1988 as a "surrealistic social comment".Slade International Fan Club newsletter October – November – December 1988 "Sign of the Times" is a ballad based on technological revolution. Released as a single in its own right, which did not chart, it was later featured as the B-Side to Slade's 1981 hit single "Lock Up Your Daughters".
Side two "I'm a Rocker" is a cover of the Chuck Berry track. To promote the album in Belgium, a Belgian film crew recorded the band performing the song at Portland Studios in London. The song was released as a single in Belgium in 1980, peaking at number one there. The song originally came to Holder's attention when it was played on Radio One by DJ Annie Nightingale. In a 1980 interview, Holder said: "I really liked it [and] mentioned to the others in the band that I'd heard a really great Chuck Berry number". After spending time trying to get hold of a copy of the song, Holder obtained the album of the same name from an import shop. Holder revealed: "After listening to it, we started to play it live on stage, first of all just as a jam at the end of the set. Then one night we went into the studio, we'd been all over the pub, and we had half an hour left at the end of a session, and we decided to record it, and we got it down in one take. The feel is there in that song, it's us, Slade – it's what we are all about."
"Nuts Bolts and Screws" is another rock-based track which AllMusic states ranks among the band's best work. "My Baby's Got It", is a track influenced by rock 'n' roll and boogie rock. "I'm Mad" is an acoustic-based track which portrays a man who is in thrall with his fantasies and dreams. Record Mirror stated that the song "is the nearest thing to a hit single with its jump along beat and pure sixties chord changes." "Lemme Love into Ya" is a minor-key ballad which became a regular inclusion in the band's live set-list. Record Mirror noted the song's "backwards tremeloed guitar intro" and "very ambient sound". The song was later re-worked into the song "Poland", which Lea recorded as a solo venture under the name Greenfields of Tong. His version was released as a single in 1982. "Lemme Love into Ya" was voted number two of the top three Slade album tracks in the Slade Fan Club Poll of 1979.Slade Fan Club Magazine, January–February 1980
"Ginny, Ginny" was released in May of that year, vaguely feted as the lead single from the album (despite coming out five months in advance of the album itself). The single failed to chart; however, according to the official Slade fan club newsletter of the time, the track had entered the UK best sellers Top 200 chart. The song was originally named "Jeanie Jeanie" and was issued on a yellow vinyl as a single in hope of interesting buyers. Lea also recorded his own version of the song with his brother Frank as part of his side-project The Dummies. Recorded during 1979–80, it was later released in 1991 on A Day in the Life of the Dummies, an album that gathered The Dummies' recordings.
Title and packaging The album title is a line from the album's song "Sign of the Times". In response to how the album's title was decided, Hill said the band "had a whole list of suggestions for the title, and Return To Base is from one of the lines in the song "Sign of the Times". In the November–December 1979 fan club magazine, it was stated that the album's title also described the band's actions of the time. Both Lea and Hill lived in Wolverhampton while Holder and Powell lived in London. By the album's release, all members were living in Wolverhampton.
Dressed in a plain red sleeve with the stark black title in a battered typeface, the album cover was intended to reflect a no-nonsense, back-to-basics, "never-say-die" attitude, although it was noted that "it ended up looking as threadbare as much of the public assumed Slade to be." Upon asking if the album's artwork had been designed, Hill replied "It's still being done, but I understand that it is going to have a photo of a ticker-tape message on the front saying "Return To Base", in computer-like lettering. But it should be a very basic cover – so that it ties in with the "basic" reference in the title."Slade Fan Club Newsletter Nov–Dec 1979
Release The album was released on their manager Chas Chandlers' label Barn Records on 1 October 1979 in the United Kingdom, over two and a half years since their previous studio release, Whatever Happened to Slade, which was their first album on the label.
Commercial performance