CrowleyHead

Well-known member
the nature boy song from moulin rouge a while back was very scott walker. that album also had one of the best covers ive heard of bowie or otherwise by beck of diamond dogs, produced by timbaland. if you ever wondered what timbo and bowie might have done, thats probably as close as youre going to get.

id personally like bowie to do a more modern scott walker type of record.

I disagree, because I feel like he's not... This is convoluted, but bear with me. I feel like as opposed to Scott being a psychological gross expansionist of Pop (A song like say, Jesse being "Jailhouse Rock" expanded beyond it's borders into something gross and disproportionate.) Bowie is so much more conventional. Which is obviously not a bad thing, because if everything was like Scott, it'd be the most tedious thing in the world to listen to.

For me, the best future for Bowie would be something that's like... A warped version of Scott 4/Side A of 'Til The Band Comes In, where you have a very unique sounding adult contemporary record. Because he is a pop star and in many ways, all his experimental interests doesn't change that. He should feel more like a bridge and neither close and relate-able or completely adrift.
 

rubberdingyrapids

Well-known member
true, bowie is a pop artist. i didnt really like nature boy (its not a great song, but it has a good, consistent, somewhat monotone mood), but i found it interesting as something he might do - i wouldnt mind that kind of direction for him a bit more, i.e. just not straight genre rock. maybe something a bit like rufus wainwrights more baroque material.
 

CrowleyHead

Well-known member
Bowie wrote All The Young Dudes for Mott the Hoople and I think Prince might have given away a few good ones too.

Actually, both Bowie and Prince would spend a great deal of time writing songs and trying to incorporate their heroes (along with their girlfriends) under their protege system, with both Main Man/Paisley Park respectively turning into a bit of a graveyard where those artists would later resent the star, and accuse him of stealing ideas... Wayne/Jayne County claiming s/he and the NY Dolls were savagely ripped off by Bowie, or the legend of Mazerati rewriting "Kiss" from a bluesy/folk number into a version closer to the one we know.

I know Prince claims he was inspired by the movie The Idolmaker to become more of a behind-the-scenes character, but maybe it was in fact Bowie who inspired him in that direction.
 

jenks

thread death
Some superb stuff on Space Oddity/ David Bowie/Man of Words Man of Music (not sure quite title the sails under now. Letter to Hermione, Freecloud, I love Memory of a Free Festival and of course Space Oddity itself.

Think the rockiness of Man Who Sold was a wrong move - one of teh few times he sounded like he was following - Bolan-esque on Black Country Rock but All the Madmen and the title track are great moments in his career.

No-one much mentioning the greatness of Hunky Dory - obvious singles - Pretty Things, Changes, Life on Mars but also Bewley Brothers, Kooks and Andy Warhol.

Ziggy not get the props here but Soul Love, Five Years, Rock n Roll Suicide are... well to be honest I could do this for every album from SpOd to Scary - including Pin Ups! And the Catpeople single and Under Pressure...

Bowie was the first genuine full blown music fanaticism that I ever had where I had to have everything and read everything about him, then go buy all these other artists, read the books, see the art - he is an autodidact's dream - a gateway drug for popular and high culture whilst looking like an alien.

The new album is a slow burn - I think Heathen was a real return to form and this seems in the same vein - Where Are We Now not really representative of the whole - I tend to prefer it when Dave doesn't get too obsessed with guitars but lyrically it seems to be much more considered. I think Visconti and Eno are good for him in the production booth - glad to see him ween himself off Reeves Gabriel's influence.
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
Never did get round to Lets Dance, i will promptly correct this. This is how I'd rank Bowie's albums in order

Low
Ziggy Stardust
Hunky Dory
Heroes
Aladdin Sane
Man who sold the world
Diamond Dogs
Station to station
Space Oddity
Scary Monsters
Lodger

also gotta mention his work on Iggy's 'The Idiot'. Love that whole Cracked Actor/Berlin period stuff. Fave song has to be 'Time' from Aladdin Sane, still remember my jaw dropping when I first heard that song. These lyrics need quoted in full!

Time - He's waiting in the wings
He speaks of senseless things
His script is you and me boys

Time - He flexes like a whore
Falls wanking to the floor
His trick is you and me, boy

Time - In Quaaludes and red wine
Demanding Billy Dolls
And other friends of mine
Take your time

The sniper in the brain, regurgitating drain
Incestuous and vain,
And many other last names
I look at my watch it say 9:25 and I think
"Oh God I'm still alive"

We should be on by now

You - are not a victim
You - just scream with boredom
You - are not evicting time

Chimes - Goddamn, you're looking old
You'll freeze and catch a cold
'Cause you've left your coat behind
Take your time

Breaking up is hard, but keeping dark is hateful
I had so many dreams,
I had so many breakthroughs
But you, my love, were kind, but love has left you
Dreamless
The door to dreams was closed.
Your park was real and dreamless
Perhaps you're smiling now,
Smiling through this darkness
But all I had to give was guilt for dreaming

We should be on by now
We should be on by now
We should be on by now

 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
shit i knew i was forgetting something! I'd rate it better than Space Oddity but not as good as Station to Station in that list then.

rock albums sounded so good back then didn't they? - between Visconti, Ken Scott, Mick Ronson and Bowie himself they made the best produced rock records ever (not to mention Eno's contributions). This thread is making me want to wallow in Electric Warrior or Perfect Day or Ziggy like a warm bath all over again.
 
D

droid

Guest
From that article:

"For all the sonic experimentation on display, very few effects were employed during the recording, not even the Eventide Harmonizer which Visconti had applied to live drums on Low after memorably informing Bowie and Eno that "it fucks with the fabric of time". Visconti only used it when mixing some of the Heroes album, and not the title track itself."

From Goldie's Autobiography:

...Mark (Mac - 4 Hero) was really open minded and he suggested we try using an HF 3000, which is an analogue harmoniser. You could say, play one note on a guitar and it would be harmonised by five notes above and five notes below. So I said: I wonder what happens if you put breakbeats into it?...

...The break was from James Brown's 'Funky Drummer', which everyone used right? But not this way. I started to really play with it and take it to the limit, without it falling out. It was contained within the two extremes. And it sounded brilliant - the pitch was going up but the speed stayed the same...

Conclusion: Bowie invented Jungle.
 

CrowleyHead

Well-known member
That said *takes a deep breath, ruins all of his credibility in one fell swoop* I KIND OF LIKE "Little Wonder" by Bowie. The fake jungle part though, when it goes into that dramatic "RAWK OUT" bit, he loses me.
 

CrowleyHead

Well-known member
Outside and Earthling are both better than you think, or than they appeared.

I mean, they were pretty good for their time, and not terrible things in his discography, but I tend to agree that Reeves kind of brought out some really 'blah' things from David. The Sales Brothers too, in my book. I wish more of Bowie's older musicians had lived longer and stuck with him into the more weird era... How's Carlos, btw? Anyone know what he's up to? He deserves a fucking medal for everything he did on Station To Station.
 

Leo

Well-known member

IdleRich

IdleRich
"also gotta mention his work on Iggy's 'The Idiot'. Love that whole Cracked Actor/Berlin period stuff. Fave song has to be 'Time' from Aladdin Sane, still remember my jaw dropping when I first heard that song. These lyrics need quoted in full!"
I picked up the BBC series of Buddha of Suburbia from a charity shop the other day and it's got a load of Bowie music in it. As well as the incidental music and the title music which he wrote, Time pops up several times and it sounds great.
 
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droid

Guest
Yeah, the two ambient pieces he did for that are both really good.

I still think 'jump they say' was one of the best post-shit Bowie singles, though the album is very patchy. Probably as much of a dance pedigree as 'Earthling' though, wot with all the remixes.
 
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droid

Guest
IIRC Lester Bangs referenced 'Time' as an example of why Bowie was such a shit lyricist...
 

luka

Well-known member
bowie's a bit schmaltzy and overblown. not into it. i'll check out the wanking song now if its on youtube though
 
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