|
Tim Burns Effect posted:I'd give anything to know how they got those snare drums sounds on "Breaking Glass", I mean drat I recall Visconti mentioning many people contacted him after Low's release asking how he got those drums sounds. His response was 'How do you think I got them?' 
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2016 09:18
|
|
|
|
| # ? Nov 15, 2025 18:46 |
|
|
The "1984/Dodo" medley is one of my favorite deep cuts, and these live versions are great. The first from the rehearsals of the 1980 Floor Show special he did, and is in a bit higher quality. The second is from the special itself, and the vocals are a bit tighter. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUGelOOcePs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJGQLFenjKs I seem to be in the minority in preferring the medley to the final version of "1984," but I think it gels really well.
|
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2016 10:41
|
|
|
Tim Burns Effect posted:I'd give anything to know how they got those snare drums sounds on "Breaking Glass", I mean drat https://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/2011/02/10/breaking-glass/ "And Davis, who Visconti later called ‘the most original drummer I’ve ever worked with,” delivers beats that had never been on a Bowie record before: Low makes Ziggy Stardust sound like it was recorded on paper drums. (It’s as if he’s trying to imitate and yet outplay the synthetic drums on Cluster’s “Caramel”.) The trick was Visconti’s Eventide Harmonizer, which Visconti legendarily claimed “fucks with the fabric of time.” For Low, Visconti used the Harmonizer to sample the drum audio and, an instant later, echo the sound, but with the drums’ pitch dropped a semi-tone. Then Visconti, in his words, “added the feedback of this tone to itself.” So when Davis hit his snare drum, he heard in his headphones the “crack” but the following “thud” never stopped, it just deepened and deepened in tone. Visconti described the latter as sounding like a man struck in the stomach (forever). At first, Bowie was unsure about the distorted drum sound, so Visconti sneakily turned down the effect in the control room but kept it on in Davis’ headphones. So on “Glass” (and other Lowtracks) Davis is dueting with his echo, in real time. He’s varying the power and length of his snare hits, especially on the one! one! one-two! one-two! pattern in the intro, and seems to be creating the massive synthesized, gated drum sound of ’80s pop music in the process."
|
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2016 13:45
|
|
|
For anyone interested, there is a whole book just about the recording of Low. It's part of the 33 1/3 series. I haven't read it yet but I've read a couple others in that series (on Brian Eno's Another Green World and Portishead's Dummy) and they were both excellent and very detailed.
|
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2016 18:14
|
|
|
Bowie In Berlin by Thomas Jerome Seabrook was also an excellent read if you're interested in that period.
|
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2016 19:26
|
|
|
I think I may go through his discography in chronological order, maybe spend about two weeks absorbing each one before moving on to the next. I'm on the 2nd album right now and it's light years beyond the fancy lad music on his first record. With 25 studio albums mileage will no doubt vary, and I reserve the right to lose interest at any point.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2016 19:57
|
|
|
Happy Hippo posted:I think I may go through his discography in chronological order, maybe spend about two weeks absorbing each one before moving on to the next. I'm on the 2nd album right now and it's light years beyond the fancy lad music on his first record. With 25 studio albums mileage will no doubt vary, and I reserve the right to lose interest at any point. If you're seriously committed this I highly highly recommend getting Rebel Rebel and reading as you go, switching over to http://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/ once you've gotten through Young Americans. I think it's an awesome experience and wish people would do track-by-track analysis of artists. You'd expect it to be a mostly dry analysis of the music, but it ends up being a biography through the lens of his evolving songwriting. Really good stuff.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2016 20:26
|
|
|
Seconded, do it. I started following the blog when he was covering Bowie's undisputed two worst albums, and it was still a great experience.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2016 00:38
|
|
|
Earwicker posted:For anyone interested, there is a whole book just about the recording of Low. It's part of the 33 1/3 series. Awesome, I'll be sure to check it out. The only book from that series I've read was the one on Devo's "Freedom of Choice" and it was fantastic. Tim Burns Effect fucked around with this message at 01:36 on Jan 25, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2016 01:07
|
|
|
Here is an excerpt from BBC's Melody Makers program in which Tony Visconti recounts the recording of "Heroes": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mp1iutsWnho
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2016 22:26
|
|
|
Ten Wasted Dollars posted:Here is an excerpt from BBC's Melody Makers program in which Tony Visconti recounts the recording of "Heroes":
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2016 00:09
|
|
|
abraham linksys posted:If you're seriously committed this I highly highly recommend getting Rebel Rebel and reading as you go, switching over to http://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/ once you've gotten through Young Americans. I think it's an awesome experience and wish people would do track-by-track analysis of artists. You'd expect it to be a mostly dry analysis of the music, but it ends up being a biography through the lens of his evolving songwriting. Really good stuff. I started doing this since I wasn't brave enough to go past Let's Dance without something like this. I've just finished the Black Tie White Noise entries. - Tonight and Never Let Me Down are completely disposable and often embarrassing. - Labyrinth is Labyrinth. - Tin Machine started interesting but I quickly lost my patience with it. Tin Machine II is better than Tin Machine I. - BTWN is the first album since Let's Dance where I actually like the feeling of it all, although the only individual tracks I really liked were Jump They Say and the Nite Flights cover. The title track is one of my least favorite things I've heard from Bowie. Looking forward to Buddha of Suburbia and onward.
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2016 01:26
|
|
|
I think Black Tie, White Noise might actually be the weakest thing from that period post Let's Dance. Tonight and Never Let Me Down are both not very good, but I at least see what he was trying to do, and there's some stuff that I would describe as interesting failures on them. BTWN on the other hand sounds like it should be playing on repeat on the adult contemporary station they keep on at offices all day. It's just so passionless and safe sounding. Outside must have been a real fuckin' shock to people who liked BTWN.
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2016 01:57
|
|
|
Never let me down never let me down. Actually, I've had blackstar on repeat for 3 days (Google briefly had it for 75% off) and the first observation I made about "I can't give" was that it would be right at home on nlmd. What a great record start to finish, regardless of the circumstances. Btwn and jump have killer chord progressions and choruses but suffer from instrumentation choices that had a short shelf life. Did he not, however, get ahead of the whole guest/featuring rapper/soul artist phenom by about a decade, REM notwithstanding? Never mind me though, I get my facts from Benetton ads.
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2016 02:39
|
|
|
Marv Hushman posted:Never let me down never let me down. Actually, I've had blackstar on repeat for 3 days (Google briefly had it for 75% off) and the first observation I made about "I can't give" was that it would be right at home on nlmd. What a great record start to finish, regardless of the circumstances. Maybe the best trolling Bowie ever did was making The Next Day sound like Tin Machine III and Blackstar sound like Black Tie White Noise + Never Let Me Down just to gently caress with the critics I think "Girl Loves Me" even shares more than a bit of DNA with "Shining Star (Makin' My Love)" Mermaid Autopsy fucked around with this message at 03:41 on Jan 26, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2016 03:37
|
|
|
All y'all can hate Never Let Me Down all you want, but I had a supremely lovely childhood and one of the only positive memories I have from that time in my life is that album, especially Shining Star. That song holds a really special place in my heart and no one can say anything that will make me dislike it.
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2016 06:51
|
|
|
"I Can't Give Everything Away" is an astoundingly great song and part of what amazes me is that it could have fit on any of his albums in the last 30 years just as easily. There's touches of everything he did in it, even these two underrated tracks from the BTWN deluxe reissue: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txrEv3jk6Lo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRgj1ST6BZc
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2016 23:39
|
|
|
Picnic Princess posted:All y'all can hate Never Let Me Down all you want, but I had a supremely lovely childhood and one of the only positive memories I have from that time in my life is that album, especially Shining Star. That song holds a really special place in my heart and no one can say anything that will make me dislike it.
|
|
#
?
Jan 26, 2016 23:56
|
|
|
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2016 03:44
|
|
|
Bowie was always ready for a threesome from what I've heard!
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2016 09:04
|
|
|
Never Let Me Down is a way better album than Tonight (if you ignore the hideous cover art.)
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2016 09:44
|
|
|
zh1 posted:Absolutely. I posted it back at the start of the thread, but Shining Star, Beat of Your Drum, the title track and of course Time Will Crawl are all great, and Day-In Day-Out and Bang Bang are at least decent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcUa65cgX9c
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2016 10:19
|
|
|
BigFactory posted:His Springsteen and Iggy Pop are pretty good! The Dylan and whoever number 3 is? tom waits? are not good. I think it's supposed to be Marc Bolan, not Dylan
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2016 20:33
|
|
|
Pablo Gigante posted:I think it's supposed to be Marc Bolan, not Dylan That was my take on it as well, given the vocal flutter.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2016 20:37
|
|
|
Pablo Gigante posted:I think it's supposed to be Marc Bolan, not Dylan Definitely Bolan. Given the song's pacing, it sorta reminds me of Beltane Walk.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2016 04:07
|
|
|
It's interesting when you watch a few Bolan documentaries you see how much Bowie was drawing on Bolan glam rock persona in the early Seventies (briefly). There is also the musical aspect. I had never previously realised that early Bolan songs are just Chuck Berry songs slowed down. I think the rock sound and slower tempos of Ziggy might be influenced by Bolan. Bowie is too often seen as an innovator - esp. in retrospect - when often in terms of music, style and presentation he was simply the best and most exciting synthesiser. If you say that Bolan and Bowie were rivals in the 70s it is easy to be dismissive and assume the influence was all one way but Bolan was hugely popular. Bolan was a big star, sold a lot and was technically a very fine musician. (In 1970 Bowie had Bolan play lead guitar on Prettiest Star.) Bowie was a better songwriter and a more interesting artist but I think that Bolan was outselling him most years, esp. in terms of singles, which were really high earning at the time. Bolan and Bowie were definitely rivals and saw each other as that. Bolan invited Bowie on to his TV show and they played together. Bolan fell off the stage.  Bolan died in a car crash fairly soon after, which was a shame because Bolan had hitched his star to the punks and was enjoying a resurgence in popularity. Visconti was Bolan's producer (until Bolan - who was notoriously tightfisted - screwed Visconti over payment) and I am sure the reason Bowie came back to Visconti in 1974 (after a break) was due to Bolan's Visconti's produced work.Likewise, Bowie fans are too dismissive of Gary Numan, who got in first with some things. Scary Monsters has been interpreted as Bowie trying to best Numan. Yes, I would take Scary Monsters over Numan's early albums but again I think Bowie was taking from Numan and raising his game, synthesising and applying more complex songwriting and production. I love Bowie and he deserves credit and praise but he wasn't as much of an originator as we think.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2016 08:45
|
|
|
Josef K. Sourdust posted:I love Bowie and he deserves credit and praise but he wasn't as much of an originator as we think. Yeah, he pretty much tried anything and everything starting out to get noticed and adapted all sorts of styles from other musicians in order to break into the business. He borrowed heavily from his many influences, but in the end he made his work his own and managed to stand out by the time Ziggy Stardust came out. I really need to finish one of his biographies sometime, made it up to before he started Man Who Sold the World in one of them. What are considered some of the better biographies of Bowie?
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2016 09:52
|
|
|
Josef K. Sourdust posted:It's interesting when you watch a few Bolan documentaries you see how much Bowie was drawing on Bolan glam rock persona in the early Seventies (briefly). There is also the musical aspect. I had never previously realised that early Bolan songs are just Chuck Berry songs slowed down. I think the rock sound and slower tempos of Ziggy might be influenced by Bolan. Agree with most of this, he saw himself almost a mimetic artist who refracted elements of other people. It's a given that the Berlin stuff from Station all the way to Lodger were probably his most creative poo poo but there's a lot of stuff post-Scary Monsters and glamrock that he tried to ape from others. He innovated a lot in the way he wrote his music and played with sounds but one of his best qualities was to reshape and translate trends for himself. Bowie's dismissal of Numan is pretty unfortunate, and almost ironic given that they both went to a Reznor-level music--Outside was Bowie's foray into that stuff, while Numan eventually turned into an industrial/darkwave artist completely. Funny how in 1984, Bowie was getting into more jangly stuff while Numan had just made Berserker, IMO one of his best records and more along the lines of what a funkier, robotic Let's Dance sound could have been.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2016 19:07
|
|
|
Josef K. Sourdust posted:I love Bowie and he deserves credit and praise but he wasn't as much of an originator as we think. It's kind of like the Beatles. They were paying attention to what others did, and they pulled it all together in their music, but they weren't just coming up with all these ideas. In some regards, it's like the saying - talent borrows, genius steals. Bowie took a lot of different stuff from a variety of influences. Everyone could see how Fame and Young Americans was inspired by American soul music, but when you're not familiar with the material, like the Kraftwerk influences on "Heroes," you might not realize where a lot of Bowie was coming from. But it was his ability to stay on top of what was happening in music and to really understand it that allowed him to have a long career. "I'm Afraid of Americans" could have been embarrassing. People could think "Oh, hey, this 50 year old man is trying to sound hip and modern." And that takes a lot of talent, and genius. Let's be happy he never decided to go back to this style though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dgmJjFUdwY
|
|
#
?
Jan 29, 2016 01:37
|
|
|
MinibarMatchman posted:Agree with most of this, he saw himself almost a mimetic artist who refracted elements of other people. I really like this take on the issue, from Iggy Pop's tribute: Iggy Pop posted:I learned a lot from him. I first heard the Ramones, Kraftwerk and Tom Waits from him. He also had a certain rigor. If he saw something in another artist he admired, if they didn't pick up that ball and run with it, he didn't have any problem saying, "Well, if you're not going to do it, I will. I'll do this thing you should have done." And that was very valid.
|
|
#
?
Jan 29, 2016 19:35
|
|
|
Cemetry Gator posted:It's kind of like the Beatles. They were paying attention to what others did, and they pulled it all together in their music, but they weren't just coming up with all these ideas. Yep. I think a lot of people think that they care about innovation in music, when what they really care about is just solid songwriting. Newness is a more objective measure than goodness, which I think attracts people to it. But really, what makes Bowie -- and the Beatles, and others -- so impressive isn't the newness of their material, it's the fact that they can consistently make good music using so many different styles and pulling from so many influences while still maintaining their own essence.
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2016 22:32
|
|
|
Read in my memorial David Bowie Rolling Stone that the Lazarus wasn't suppose to end with him getting into the closet, someone on set suggested the idea. So thumbs up to that dude.
|
|
#
?
Jan 31, 2016 04:27
|
|
|
Just listening to Young Americans, replacing It's Gonna Be Me with Across the Universe was such a bad idea IMO. That song is so freaking good and would have made for a perfect album.
|
|
#
?
Feb 4, 2016 21:13
|
|
|
I think if they used the single edit of Young Americans it would have been better. The album version just rambles a little bit, and the single is much tighter.
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2016 00:07
|
|
|
Buddy sent this to me and it is absolutely fantastic. Give it a listen http://pitchfork.com/news/63321-lis...ell-anna-calvi/
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2016 21:24
|
|
|
Langolas posted:Buddy sent this to me and it is absolutely fantastic. Give it a listen I was going to post this because I also think it's great, but I know SA is a bit weird about Amanda Palmer in general. Glad to know I'm not the only one who likes it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 7, 2016 03:49
|
|
|
Langolas posted:Buddy sent this to me and it is absolutely fantastic. Give it a listen The Anna Calvi cover of Blackstar is utterly amazing. I thought I was done crying over Bowie, but this brought it all rushing back in full force.
|
|
#
?
Feb 8, 2016 10:14
|
|
|
Anna Calvi's cover of Lady Grinning Soul is insanely good too, I think I might have posted it earlier in the thread
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 19:27
|
|
|
Off topic but i have to say that Lodger has just the best album cover.
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 20:33
|
|
|
|
| # ? Nov 15, 2025 18:46 |
|
|
That's a funny way of saying "The Next Day" there, buddy.  e: 
Cockblocktopus fucked around with this message at 00:43 on Feb 10, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 00:38
|
|
