r/DavidBowie

I don't have much to say about this album. I understand that the genre is like that, but those drums and electronic noises all the time make it exasperating. One could even consider it electronic music with lyrics, and I don't like electronic music.

But songs like Seven Years in Tibet, Dead Man Walking or I'm Afraid of Americans are great songs for me. But the album has that repetitive and deafening sound at a certain point that makes it heavy and very noisy.

I understand that some people consider it a great album, and that it certainly does very well in the genre it operates in, but god, that drum will haunt my nightmares. Is it better than the Labyrinth soundtrack? I don't know, but it's close. It's better than the debut, though. I'll read you and I appreciate you all!!

Bowie is one of my artists, and Low is genuinely one of the best albums I've ever heard — but it's overrated relative to how the critical consensus frames it, specifically on the "groundbreaking/visionary/pioneering" axis. That reputation conflates two different things — originality and influence — and the album is much stronger on the second than the first.

Side one is where the real invention happens, but it's invention-as-synthesis, not invention-from-nothing. None of the ingredients are new — krautrock pulse, art-rock fragmentation, synth texture, vocal-as-texture — but Bowie combines them into his own pop/lyrical form and his own voice, and that specific combination hadn't existed before. He has better individual pop songs on other records, but nothing else of his has this particular fractured, textural approach, which is what sets it apart. "Sound and Vision" is the clearest distillation of this — gorgeous, and it basically synthesizes the whole album in one track: the sonic statement plus the personal-recovery undercurrent.

Side two is gorgeous and contains some of the album's best songs (the closer especially), but compositionally it's nothing new. It's Bowie and Eno executing pre-existing vocabulary at a high level rather than inventing: Weeping Wall is Reich's phasing process applied almost directly, Art Decade was largely assembled by Eno on his own (echoing his own Another Green World/Discreet Music), and even Warszawa's central theme came from Eno building on a piano riff Visconti's kid was noodling, with Bowie adding a ten-minute vocal on top afterward — a vocal whose melody itself leans on a Polish folk choir recording. So the side that gets called most "visionary" is the one most thoroughly built from other people's already-existing material.

The vocal-over-texture idea on side two (Warszawa) isn't a separate innovation either — it's side one's actual move (voice treated as another instrumental texture) just carried over onto ambient material. So there's really only one site of invention on the record, and it's side one.

The influence is real and separate from all this. Joy Division literally named themselves after the Warszawa-adjacent material before becoming Joy Division; Robert Smith has named Low directly as the reference point for Seventeen Seconds; Siouxsie and the Banshees' early cold/minimal sound draws on the same Berlin-period well. But that influence runs on the compression/packaging achievement — Bowie and co. took avant-garde, krautrock, and minimalist vocabulary that already existed at full scale elsewhere and made it legible inside a mainstream rock record for the first time, which is why the next generation of guitar bands could actually use it. No doubt that it's a great album and achievement. But just quite different from saying this is revolutioanry or Bowie invented this. But that's just my take. You're welcome to share your thoughts below!

https://preview.redd.it/lsknc55wydbh1.jpg?width=450&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=14ec38b2b59128120135b1c5dafd5eda4a4c6d7c

Okay, this is where things get serious. An album that I love, that fascinates me, that thrills me, that dazzles me, a fantastic album. I'll say it like this, better than all the 60s, 80s, 90s, 2000s and what I heard from the 2010s (I'm missing Blackstar) and a couple from the 70s. That's how I like this album.

A VERY dark album; the darkest album we've had up to this point was TMWSTW, which I highlighted in its review, but this one is much, much darker. The songs, the interludes, The aesthetics, Bowie's singing style... Everything very, very dark, very gloomy, even melancholic in some aspects. And I love it.

The songs, the songs... What amazing tracks this album has! Outside, The Hearts Filthy Lesson, Hallo Spaceboy, The Motel, I'm Deranged, Thru' These Architects Eyes and Strangers When We Meet are my favorite songs on the album. Although, I admit that I prefer SWWM's version of Buddha of Suburbia.

A super complete album, it takes you to an impeccable atmosphere and it's heavy, but in a good way. There's not much more to say, I love it. I'd put it ahead of Lodger but below Young Americans. I'll read you!

As someone who has been a fan since around November last year and listened to most of his discography, this is my top 10 albums list:

#1: The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars

Hey man! Call me basic but this is the best album of all time. Period. I don't care if it's a fake fan album, it changed my brain chemistry and is my comfort album. Rock 'n' Roll Suicide is my top song ever, which comes from this magnum opus. That build to "oh no, love, you're not alone" is pure cinema. Hits me hard every time. And Lady Stardust? Thank you Mick Ronson for the incredible piano and the vocals fit perfectly. Five Years is THE ultimate opener and the outro.... Just wow. My love for this album is beyond words.

#2: Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)

A real life adventure worth more than pieces of gold. Even though this was released in 1980, I count it as a 70s album because it's stylistically closer to Lodger. I will defend Teenage Wildlife forever. All over the album, Robert Fripp doesn't just play the guitar, he attacks it, and I am here for it. As a 33 year old heavy smoker who'd done lots of touring, Bowie shouldn't have been able to reach 1.5 to 2 octaves on Teenage Wildlife. And when he did it on the Outside tour 15 years later? HOLY SHIT. Also Scream Like a Baby is infinitely slept on. The Japanese vocals on It's No Game (Part 1) are ELITE and Bowie's yelling? Felt that. The vocals on that album overall are satisfying on a cellular level. No other notes.

#3: Lodger

First off: Lodger is way too slept on. It deserves way more recognition than it gets. Second off: I get that it's stuck between Heroes and Scary Monsters, but that doesn't mean it's "lesser". This whole paragraph is about why. Fantastic Voyage is the perfect opener. African Night Flight is like induced anxiety on steroids. Move On is meh, but still great. Yassassin speaks to me personally as a half Turkish person. The chaos of Red Sails is wow. The paranoid drawl on DJ is immaculate. The single edit should be avoided at all costs. The urgency in the choruses of Look Back in Anger is a masterpiece. Boys Keep Swinging is genuinely so fun. The way the musicians switched instruments? Genius. Carlos Alomar isn't actually a horrible drummer. Repetition gives me chills. The emotionless almost speaking? Disturbing. And Red Money? The bass and drums are spot on. Recycling the groove from Iggy Pop's Sister Midnight had no right to work this well. Perfect closer, yet again. This album is my weird little gremlin baby and I will defend it forever.

#4: Diamond Dogs

This ain't rock 'n' roll, this is GENOCIDE! Future Legend is creepy in the best way possible. Great way to open a fantabulous album. The transition between that and Diamond Dogs and the transitions in the Sweet Thing sequence are almost imperceptible. Almost too smooth. And Rebel Rebel? Absolute classic. Speaking to trans people from 1974. He really was ahead of his time. As per usual. All the songs intended for an aborted soundtrack for a stage version of Nineteen Eighty Four are perfectly theatrical. Halloween Jack IS a real cool cat. Always has been, always will be.

#5: 1. Outside (The Nathan Adler Diaries: A Hyper Cycle)

Oh, Ramona. I need to start off by saying thank you Brian Eno. His production on this art crime case file is spot on. He knew what to do and where. Thank the heavens he had been at DB's wedding or this would not have come to be. And DB's vocals on The Hearts Filthy Lesson and Hallo Spaceboy? Absolute cinema. I love how each song is supposed to be sung from a different perspective. Makes it feel like a real alt universe. The names of the characters are perfect in their own ways. Nathan Adler actually sounds like he could be a detective. The segues are essential and should not be skipped. However, the retread of Strangers When We Meet seems unnecessary and I always skip it.

#6: Station to Station

What a troubled time. Surviving on cocaine, milk, peppers and cigarettes. So, David, it was in fact the side effects of the cocaine. Not love. Continue being delusional if you want. Golden Years is impossible to not dance to. That groove. Word on a Wing is so beautiful it's almost painful. You can hear his desperation for some kind of help. TVC15 is a masterpiece, but what the actual hell is he on about? Same goes for the title track. But props to the Alomar/Murray/Davis trio for immaculate funkiness, and the lead guitar line on Stay is slick as hell (no pun intended as Earl Slick is lead guitarist). Wild is the Wind is also stunning. A stunning song from a stunning album. Shame he didn't remember making it.

#7: Black Tie White Noise

This is me putting on the black tie and cranking out the white noise. This is the album he wrote as a wedding gift for Iman. How sweet is that? Jump They Say is an immediate energy boost, but with a sad undertone when you learn what it's about. The title track is a brilliant way of addressing the LA race riots and a desire for interracial harmony overall. You can hear how much he loves Iman in Miracle Goodnight. Classic love song, but not too cheesy. Nite Flights really is a dramatic highlight with his vocals really out there. Perfect comeback after Tin Machine.

#8: Reality

Ready, set, GO! Reality is something else. In a great way. New Killer Star is perfect as the opener. Bring Me the Disco King is impeccable. The half spoken lyric is amazing. And Mike Garson on piano? Underrated. That piano line weaves in and out of the lyric without taking over. Perfect balance. Fall Dog Bombs The Moon may be DB's most devastating song. He called it "an ugly song sung by an ugly man" and there could not be a better description. One of the best late era Bowie songs. Full stop.

#9: Never Let Me Down

Now, this ain't the right thing to do, so let's.... so let's go! Yes, really. I have the "worst" Bowie album in my top 10. This isn't for shock factor. It is totally unironic. I actually really enjoy it. If you listen past the aggressively 1987 production choices, there's some great songwriting in there. Day-In Day-Out paints the perfect picture of poverty and inequality and the music video matches it impeccably. His voice on Time Will Crawl has a real, detectable sense of urgency in the aftermath of Chernobyl. Zeroes is so nostalgic. The almost narrating of the start of Glass Spider is part brilliant, part chilling. Hate on my putting this here, I could not care less. This is my enjoyment. Also, feel free to check the 2018 revamp on the Loving The Alien (1983-1988) box set before you really come at me.

#10: The Next Day

He really meant it when he said "here I am, not quite dying". What. A. Comeback. Only Bowie could get away with something like this. Everyone thought he'd retired, but then he dropped Where Are We Now? on his 66th and proved everyone wrong. Not even the record company knew there was an album in process. They made every musician/collaborator sign something saying they wouldn't tell anyone. It was this whole operation. The Next Day the song is pure defiance, and I am here for it. The sleaziness of Dirty Boys is like if Cracked Actor and The Jean Genie had a child. The video for The Stars (Are Out Tonight) is one of the best late Bowie promos. Thank you Bowie, Tilda Swinton and Floria Sigismondi for this mini nightmare. Valentine's Day is so so so devastating. It gets sadder every listen. The way it starts almost upbeat is so brilliantly deceptive. The almost childlike chants in How Does The Grass Grow? are creepy as hell. And the first verse and chorus of (You Will) Set The World On Fire are immaculate. Best comeback he could have done.

Just out of top 10 are:

#11: Aladdin Sane

Who will love Aladdin Sane? Loads of people would have it permanent top 10. But not me. Don't get me wrong, there is some immaculate songwriting there. The softness of The Prettiest Star is a jarring contrast to the sneering on Cracked Actor. But it just isn't up there for me anymore. It was for a while, but no longer. It has been dethroned by the comeback album. I do not regret that at all

#12: Young Americans

All night I want the young American. I used to kind of dismiss this album but I severely regret that. It's really grown on me this past month. Especially since I bought it on vinyl earlier this week. I did not think it could sound smoother than it already did on digital but boy was I wrong. It feels bigger, smoother and more absorbing. The groove has been advanced. The backing vocals on Win sound heavenly on vinyl, and the "ain't there one damn song" line on Young Americans? I ascended to a higher plane of existence. Fame sounds even dirtier and full of attitude. The sneer seems to be front and centre. And, lest we forget, 2/3 of the DAM trio were present during the recording of this. Carlos Alomar lending his slinky, creeping guitar lines and Dennis Davis blessing us with his immaculate drumming. You could really feel the sound coming together. SO glad I decided to give this album another chance because I have become emotionally attached to it.

Yes, I know most of the "classic canon" albums like Low and "Heroes" aren't there, but, yet again, this is my opinion. Feel free to disagree, but don't be obnoxious about it.

Can anybody give me a complete list of A: all the David Bowie singles that didn't appear on his albums & B: all the David Bowie B sides that didn't appear on any of his albums from 1969 David Bowie/Space Oddity album to 1987 Never Let Me Down album. I've looked online but there are no definitive results. Thanks.

Hi There

These are 2 similar sounding albums right?

Lodger has Eno which connects with the Berlin Trilogy but again Lodger has that Scary Monsters type sound even if it’s more world music with New Wave and Post Punk than Scary Monsters.

Fripp definitely makes Scary Monsters be the album that it is with his guitar playing on top of Visconti and Bowie making this album their”Sgt Pepper” yet I can still connect some similarities sonically with Lodger!

Released in the EP The Dream Anthology 1966-68 I think it is one of the best “what if” Bowie songs crated, it’s still the young David Jones in his teenage years and early 20s making some of the best music he created in his whole career, I think if it was released along with the 1st David Bowie selfitled album it would be popular or at least more popular than it is now.