Do The Strand

The opening song on Roxy Music's sophomore album For Your Pleasure is a theatrical homage to a fictional dance craze called "The Strand." As is typical for Roxy Music, the lyrics contain numerous art and cultural references. Frontman Bryan Ferry explained to The Mail on Sunday in 2009: "There was a particular genre of songs based on dance crazes, like 'The Twist,' 'The Jerk,' and 'The Madison Time' etc. which I found amusing, and 'Do the Strand' was a nod in their direction, although it attempted to be more highbrow, or a bit further uptown, in as much as I wanted to turn 'The Sphinx and Mona Lisa/Lolita and Guernica' into a rhyming couplet."

Ferry revealed in the same interview with The Mail on Sunday that this song was inspired by Broadway standards songwriter Cole Porter. "I had long been a fan of Cole Porter and other songwriters from that era, and in particular I admired the sophistication of their lyrics," he said. "'Do the Strand' was an attempt to emulate that style of writing, with a lot of cultural references that I found interesting."

Brian Eno, who went on to become a very successful and influential producer, played synthesizer in Roxy Music, leaving after the For Your Pleasure album. One of the many groups he inspired was OMD, whose lead singer Andy McCluskey told Songfacts, "Apart from loving the first two Roxy Music albums, Eno was our hero because he taught how to make interesting music on ordinary instruments. We couldn't afford synths in the early days. He also championed music on cheap instruments. That's all we had."