"While Head seems unfussed by his relative obscurity, it is still hard to accept that a masterpiece like The Magical World Of The Strands remains so marginal. If anything, The Magical World has improved with age. In the mid-'90s, there was an imperative to position Head as bruised guru to a generation of British rock classicists, exemplified by the Gallaghers and Richard Ashcroft. Head shared a certain romanticism that was rooted in but transcended the working-class Northwest of the country, and his study of old records was just as thorough and unabashed. He was not, though, a writer of anthems, his songwriting mostly too feathery, too evanescent for blokey singalongs.
The closest he came on The Magical World was a rueful and brilliant song about his heroin addiction called 'X Hits The Spot,' which articulated a difficult choice that he had made—essentially, drugs instead of a relationship—and its consequences: coming round to discover he had sold all his furniture to stay high. The chorus is punchy, emphatic, memorable. The verses, though, are more typical of The Magical World: words come in breathless, jazzy flurries, Head appropriating [Arthur] Lee's trick of squeezing two or three extra words into a line to create a sense of babbling discombobulation." - Uncut