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Bowie General > Images Vol. 28

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homebrewPosted at 2025-06-21 14:11:48(13 hrs ago) (Bowie General / Images Vol. 28)


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My apologies for missing last weekends installment. We bought a new house and it was moving day!

These articles appear just as they were posted in the Usenet group alt.fan.david-bowie by group member Jamie Soule aka AladINSAnE. I have made no attempt to alter the formatting, spelling, grammar or edit in any way.

IMAGES: Part 28


I am just as guilty as everyone else, calling Low and Heroes
"experimental" albums. Now, although they were different when compared
to Bowie's previous work, a vast departure is more like it, they were
adventurous. Bowie definitely dipped his hand into uncharted territory
as far as his work was concerned, but parts of this territory had been
previously mapped out by other artists. The music was I readily admit
"new," but was it really "experimental." Well, that point is debatable
in my opinion for this reason. If you look at the sessions for Heroes
and Low you will discover that there was not a great deal of "new"
techniques incorporated in to the recording process. I concede that
there were a "few" things done, such as the "gating" of the microphones
to get the vocal effects on Heroes, that were never attempted before.
There was in my opinion however, not enough recording innovation to
truly label those albums as experimental. I came to this conclusion by
comparing these albums to another piece of Bowie's work. I compared them
to what I believe to be a truly experimental album, Bowie's most
experimental by the way. I compared them both to Lodger.

Overlooked? Yes, I think so. I never see much written about it.
Misunderstood? Again, I believe so, or maybe what is there just isn't
recognized. It may be that many do not give it much serious thought, not
enough anyway to attempt to really understand it. I say this because I
rarely ever hear Lodger mentioned. I never see it surface it as a topic
of discussion, it appears that everyone knows it's there, but it just
doesn't seem to merit much additional attention. Truthfully, I fell into
that bracket for years. There are some tracks on Lodger I think are
amazing, Look Back In Anger has always been one of my favourites, as
well as Red Sails and the vocals on Fantastic Voyage rate among the best
work.  There are some tracks as well that I do not particularly like.
For years I just considered Lodger another great Bowie album, but
stopped short of thinking it was "special" in a way that others were
not. I felt this way for years until one day I read an article on the
making of it. That article, coupled with some others I dug up, along
with a few interviews with Bowie and the other musicians who contributed
to it, really opened my eyes. After what I read I never looked at that
album the same way, I gained a whole new respect for it, and this
respect is well deserved.

Mountain Studios could almost be considered cramped. Small, in terms of
the average studio size, and nestled in the Swiss Alps on the shore of
Lake Geneva. Bowie had already been at work for several days with Carlos
Alomar, Dennis Davis and George Murray before the remainder of the band
arrived. The four of them had been busy laying down some rhythm tracks.
By the time they arrived the rough framework for two songs, "This
Tangled Web" and "Portrait Of The Artist" were complete. These songs
later were re titled and appeared on Lodger as Yassassin and Red Sails.
Usually completing everything in the studio, Bowie would work
differently this time. The bulk of the lyrics would not be written in
the studio during the recording of the album, which was standard
procedure for Bowie, but left until early 1979 to be written in New
York. This was quite a departure from the way Bowie ALWAYS worked. There
would be many "departures" where this album was concerned, and radical
ones no less.

Bowie and Eno. This time it would be different. Eno had very little
input as to the way Low was recorded, how much could one have being in
the studio for three days and not being involved in the  engineering on
the final mix. This time however it would be different, Bowie let Eno
"run wild," and embraced his ideas. Bowie was willing to try anything
and everything on Lodger, no matter how unconventional, and he did for
the most part. Sean Mayes describes a rather bizarre idea Eno had, and
one that was used extensively on the album. Either Eno, or Bowie would
lay out a very short sequence of chords which they would have the band
play over and over again repetitively. These sequences were produced by
varying methods and most were random, thought up on the spot. One of
these methods for choosing a sequence of chords was thought up by Eno,
and it involved a series of printed cards. These cards were fastened to
the wall and printed on each one was a chord, for an example, A minor, B
flat, C, F, C minor, D and so on. The musicians were assembled together
and a very basic rhythm was played. Now, as the rhythm track played Eno
would use a pointer to select various chords at random from the cards
pinned on the wall, which were then played. This process, never before
attempted as far as I know, was used to write some of the tracks on
Lodger.  There were plenty more "unconventional" techniques incorporated
on Lodger, this wasn't certainly wasn't it by any stretch of the
imagination. Every day Tony Visconti would do rough mixes from the
recording sessions and have them transferred to 3/4 inch reel to reel
tape, and these tapes would be given to Bowie and Eno every evening.
Once in possession of the tapes Eno and Bowie would cut and splice them,
often making tape loops. These "edits" would be brought back into the
studio the following day where they could be copied and inserted using a
multi-tracking system. Although this method is out of the ordinary, it
certainly is not new. Those of you familiar with Brian Eno's work with
Roxy Music, and his solo material, are well aware of his use of tape
loops, they could almost be classified as his "signature." Robert Fripp
has also used this technique,  Frippertronics being a perfect example.
Bowie used this method as well in the past, on Heroes to be exact. If
you are not familiar with this technique I will try my best, forgive me
but I am far from being a technical person, to explain, using what
rudimentary knowledge I have.

Tape loops are exactly that, tape loops. First of all there will be a
selection of music which has been recorded on a reel to reel tape, just
like Visconti's rough mixes. What is then done is the tape is literally
cut in order to extract a certain section of music. Once the tape has
been cut, it is then spliced back together in such a way that it forms a
loop. This tape loop can then be inserted into a tape recorder and
played. When it plays of course, the effect you get is having the same
sound repeating over and over again. This sound is often used as the
"core" sound when composing a piece of music, with other sounds, vocals
and instrumental tracks laid over top to complete the composition. There
is one technique using tape loops, Eno is famous for it as a matter of
fact, that can bring a certain "sound" to a piece of music. The sound is
created by changing the speed of the tape loop as it plays, by making it
go faster or slower, a wide range of very unique sounds can be created.
If you wish to hear a good example of some sounds generated using this
technique, without having to try to decipher them amidst a vast array of
other noises, then pull out a copy of Heroes. If you give a good listen
to Blackout you should be able to distinguish these repetitive sounds
generated by using tape loops. The reason I single out this particular
track is for the reason that Blackout was composed around two
simultaneous tape loops, and therefore the sound is quite easy to hear
apart from everything else.

What was usual about the sessions however is that all of the tracks were
recorded in one or two takes, Bowie liked to preserve the spontaneity.
Most of the time everything that was recorded was left in, including the
"mistakes." Boys Keep Swinging is an interesting track, and one where
the musicians swapped instruments, Alomar on drums, Davis on Bass and
Eno on piano. The ranchos guitar solo done by Adrian Belew on this track
has got to be one of the highlights. So was the way it was recorded.
Adrian Belew was sequestered during the recording of Boys Keep Swinging,
he had never heard the song.  After the track was recorded, and Belew
still not hearing any portion of it, he was instructed to play a lead.
The lead guitar track played by Belew spontaneously was then mixed into
the final version of the released version of Boys Keep Swinging. I do
not know how they managed to achieve this but that lead fits into that
song perfectly and in my opinion is one of the best parts on Lodger. I
wish to add this as a side note. I do not know if you agree, but I found
the guitar solo done by Reeves Garbrels on the track Looking For
Satellites from the album Earthling, strikingly similar the one done on
Boys Keep Swinging. It sort of "comes out of nowhere." I happened to
read an interview with Gabrels and in it he talks specifically about
that song. The solo was not recorded the same way, it appeared under
protest, so to speak. The original take of Looking For Satellites did
not have Reeves guitar solo on it. As it so happened Bowie did not
intend on having a guitar solo at all in Looking For Satellites, it was
an after thought. After listening to the track Bowie decided to add a
guitar solo to the song. Reeves Gabrels protested and said that the
track was best left alone, a solo he insisted would not "fit," the
"ambiance" would be lost. Bowie insisted that he wanted it done so it
was done. The result?  To me anyway that solo is one of the best parts
on Earthling.. As, far as Lodger is concerned, well, the experiments
were just beginning.

AladiNSaNE

To be continued..............


""I don't begrudge any artist for finding an audience"
- David Bowie abt. 1987
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