I think this request might be a stretch...but here goes.

Grey Lagoons was originally named The Bogus Man Part Two. I believe it was announced as such on live gigs (pre FYP tour) and on a session or tv appearance (?).

Any ideas why it's linked to The Bogus Man? It follows it on FYP, and there is certainly a lyrical conceptual link IMO. Something to do with a common protagonist in both songs?

I love these songs, but still don't have much of an idea what kind of things they're on about.

The Jonathan Rigby book "Both Ends Burning" mentions the detail around this, and the original title, too. I also recall "bogus" being a buzzword Ferry used a lot in interviews around early '73 - and I think he used it in completely contradictory terms. He once talked about a guy coming up to them (I think after an American gig) enthusing "Hey man, you're bogus!" Now, to my mind bogus means false/a sham, but this guy used the word as a compliment. I think BF just liked the sound of the word. I love both songs too, but I can't see a thematic link between them. TBM is scary - I think it's about "the Bogie Man" that parents (at least in the north-east of England where BF and I come from) used to tell us would come and get us in our beds if we didn't go to sleep and this mythical creature terrified us kids. GL is just rip-roaring fun.

Plus, if BF called it "The Bogie Man," then elsewhere it would have drawn unwanted comparison to nasal appendages!! Hardly cool.

It's apparent that BF (and Eno) don't rate Grey Lagoons at all, calling it a 50s throwaway thing - I think that's 'cos the lads were getting sick at that time of being compared (Stateside at least) to the lame-and-lurex-bedecked 50s pastiche band Sha Na Na, who were fun, but one-dimensional. It was like comparing Chicory Tip to Kraftwerk.

Grey Lagoons was one of the first songs Ferry wrote. This was one of the 5 songs he did a demo with Eno, Graham Simpson, Andy Mackay, Roger bunn and Dexter Lloyd in June 1971, a year before the first roxy album was released.

Simon Puxley wrote some essays on the Roxy Lyrics and only the one for Do The Strand has been published, the rest may end up in the 40th Anniversary box set??
http://www.vivaroxymusic.com/songs_118.php

From these essays:

The Bogus Man

the sham, the ultimate faker. There is a play of course, on ‘bogey man’, the ugly monster who children fear is out to ‘get’ them.

Grey Lagoons.

The lyric consists of chains of images which don’t require ‘explanation’ – they mean whatever they conjure up in the mind. They’re carefully patterned, though: each item takes the form adjective + noun, while there’s a kind of time-sequence through the three stanzas - the offer of romance in the first, it’s realisation (marriage?) in the second, leaving any more information to one’s own imagination.

I've always loved Grey lagoons, the line "Morning sickness on Friday nights" is quite witty and makes me chuckle every time I hear it.
Bogus Man is pure Art School Prog Rock wierdness and was easily my fave Roxy song as I first got into them.

i missheard that lyric as..Motorcycles on Friday night..i love Grey Lagoons..pure ear candy

....any idea why it was called TBM part 2? I just cant yet see the lyrical r thematic link

To me, Grey Lagoons captures all of the key aspects of Roxy Music Mark I perfectly in miniature. It is an ideal sampler of the early output and is deffo on my list for taking onto a Desert Island.

Nobody has been able to answer RoxySiren's original question though. I am curious about this as well. It can't be that they couldn't come up with a suitable title because the one that was eventually adopted is pretty obvious from the lyrics.

In the absence of any suggestions, and as a piece of pure conjecture, I wonder if this was part of a wider idea that Bryan had at the time e.g. a "concept" type thing. The late 60s /early 70s was the boom period for concept albums. The idea was fairly new and pretty cool at that time - funny how things change ! So, was Bogus Man an unfulfilled concept project that got no further than Part 2?

The Great Man's been interviewed so many times by so many people, and nobody asks him anything like this. It's always the same old stuff, like, early influences, Coal Miner Dad, Charlie Parker, Co Durham, 1960s America,,Marilyn, fashion, etc. Can't they ask him something else ?

Interesting thought. You might be onto something there