Six of the Best (EP)

"Six of the Best"
Single by Slade
from the album Return to Base..../We'll Bring the House Down
Released 24 May 1980
Format 12" Single
Recorded 1979, 1980
Genre Rock
Label Super
Writer(s) Noddy Holder; Jim Lea; Chuck Berry
Producer(s) Slade
Slade singles chronology
"Okey Cokey"
(1979)		 "Six of the Best (EP)"
(1980)		 "Live at Reading (EP)"
(1980)

"Six of the Best" is rock band Slade's first extended play (EP) from 1980. The EP features six tracks, three originally from the album Return to Base which was released in 1979, two tracks that featured from the 1981 album We'll Bring the House Down and the track "9 to 5" which was exclusive to this release. The track eventually featured on the remastered edition of We'll Bring the House Down.

The EP was released whilst Slade were still unpopular and before their triumph at the 1980 Reading festival in August. As a result, the EP failed to chart despite being for sale at a low £1.49 as printed on the EP's cover. Shortly following the single's release, the fan club newsletter explained that there was not enough airplay to get the single to chart.[1][2]

The featured track of the E.P. is Night Starvation.

The EP chart into the top 5 in Belgium telemoustique chart, the band's previous album "Return to Base" peaking at #1 around the same time.

The first three tracks were named the rock side whilst the other three were named back side. The featured track was the opener Night Starvation.

The three tracks were used from the "Return to Base" album, "I'm A Rocka", "Don't Waste Your Time" and "The Wheels Ain't Coming Down" were slightly remixed for this extended play.[3][4]

Jim Lea personally created the extended play's artwork.[3]

When I'm Dancin' I Ain't Fightin' was later covered by The Wall and The Dummies which was a project of Slade's bassist Jim Lea.

A promotional 7" single was released to support the E.P., featuring Night Starvation as the a-side and When I'm Dancin' I Ain't Fightin' as the b-side. It was released on 10 May 1980.

For the Dutch and Belgian market, an E.P. titled Three of the Best - Alive at Reading was released in 1980, featuring the entire Six of the Best E.P., minus I'm A Rocka and Don't Waste Your Time as the a-side. This was although the title stated 'Three of the Best'. The b-side features the entire Alive at Reading '80 E.P.

Background

In 1980, Noddy Holder was interviewed for the Slade fan club. He spoke about some of the songs that appeared on the E.P. "After "Return to Base", then there was a period of us writing songs and seeing how they turned out. Like "When I'm Dancin' I Ain't Fightin'" and "9 to 5" - to us they were all good songs - but they didn't sell huge quantities of records. Therefore, we got to a point where we thought that we'd cool it for a little while, and not go in the studio. Jim was working on his band The Dummies - so me and Jim decided to write a song specifically for them. It wasn't written as a Slade song, because Jim had the idea in his mind how he wanted to do The Dummies record. He played the tune to me, I wrote the lyrics to it - he worked out how he wanted to do it, and the final record got lots of radio play. So we knew that we could still write songs that would get played on the radio. Then it was a case of thinking "where do Slade go from here?" We now knew that our songs were strong. Then the Reading Festival came along. You've seen the reaction on "When I'm Dancin' I Ain't Fightin'" now - when we first brought the track out on the "Six of the Best EP", it didn't see the light of day as far as charts were concerned - but now it's on the Reading EP and all the crowds are singing it!"[5][6]

Track listing

  1. "Night Starvation'" (Holder/Lea)
  2. "When I'm Dancin' I Ain't Fightin'" (Holder/Lea)
  3. "I'm A Rocka" (Chuck Berry)
  4. "Don't Waste Your Time" (Holder/Lea)
  5. "The Wheels Ain't Coming Down" (Holder/Lea)
  6. "9 to 5" (Holder/Lea)

Critical reception

Charlie Gillett of Music Week positively reviewed the EP on 28 June 1980, "Rasping guitar, spot-on Holder vocals, earthy and commercial, catchy riff. Six cuts, no duffs. Slade are no has-beens."[2][7]

Chart performance

Chart (1980) Peak
position		 Total
weeks
Belgian Telemoustique Singles Chart[8] 3 4

Personnel

References

  1. ↑ http://sladefanclub.weebly.com/uploads/7/6/6/0/7660950/2181517_orig.jpg
  2. 1 2 Slade Fan Club Newsletter July–August 1980
  3. 1 2 http://sladefanclub.weebly.com/uploads/7/6/6/0/7660950/7871082_orig.jpg
  4. ↑ Slade Fan Club Newsletter May–June 1980
  5. ↑ http://sladefanclub.weebly.com/uploads/7/6/6/0/7660950/7694077_orig.jpg[]
  6. ↑ Slade Fan Club Newsletter November–December 1980
  7. ↑ http://sladefanclub.weebly.com/uploads/7/6/6/0/7660950/9374638_orig.jpg
  8. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 16 July 2011. Retrieved 29 January 2011.
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