NEUPÖLLN - ILM Artist Poll #14 - David Bowie (POLLS ARE CLOSED)

Yay!!

2. Will someone explain to me how "Too Dizzy" - reportedly left off of CD reissues of Never Let Me Down due to its inferior quality as a song - is worse than the other songs on this album?

I've made these points for years. In fact, the two songs on either side of "Too Dizzy" are far worse.

I've never done karaoke, but if I did, Young Americans is what I'd do

I've done it many times -- it's in my repertoire. I even drop down on my knees during the "Ain't there one damn song" part.

It has some of the best lyrics of any Bowie song:

Have you bee the un-American?
Just you and your idol
sing falsetto about
leather leather
everywhere and
not a myth left from the ghetto

I actually put SW and Candidate in there, love that suite enough to warrant two votes

― Iago Galdston, Saturday, March 3, 2012 1:16 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Haha, I regret not putting Sweet Thing reprise on there with the other two parts! Good job, Cider, I stand with you in protest...

Re: "Too Dizzy", seems to me to be a simultaneous mea culpa and "re-listen to the rest of the tracks, guys, they're not as bad as you remember"

"Too Dizzy," yes, not the rest.

Confession: I've never listened to "Never let me down"

So. Does the roll out - the results - start on Monday?

No -- the voting deadline is Monday night, midnight Eastern. I'm thinking about blasting through the results in two days -- all of the albums and part of the tracks on Tuesday, then the rest of the tracks on Wednesday. Fooey on long reveals. No youtubes until we get to the top 10 tracks.

Or, maybe the youtube URLs that don't auto-embed until the top 10 tracks.

less youtube is good. It breaks my laptop.

Confession: I've never listened to "Never let me down"

― an elk hunt (Ówen P.), Sunday, March 4, 2012 1:20 AM

Well, if your curiosity gets the best of you, please share your reaction here!

the sound of the drums on side one of Low... that's the greatest sound in the universe

70 ballots or bust

― Steamtable Willie (WmC), Sunday, February 26, 2012 4:58 PM (6 days ago)

hmmm...

How many ballots have you got? I'm almost done with my listening and should have mine ready tomorrow.

xp I'm gonna follow along with wordpress I think

Got two more this morning -- puts us at 53. Seventy would be a stretch, but 60 wouldn't surprise me.

I'm getting seriously excited now. Can't wait for the poll results!

i can submit a couple more ballots if it makes you happy

Sent (typed up while lisening to...T.Rex).

sent one in... put sweet thing/candidate/st reprise as one track though. it's only a quirk of labeling that it's not. i guess that might put my vote for it at risk, but damn it, it is what it is.

Zingzing, got yr ballot -- thanks for voting!

Ballot sent. Difficult to narrow down the shortlist. Ranking not to easy either.

i just sent mine in too. for me the concern was leaving out some of the tucked away album tracks that i didn't have time to reappraise.

What's the record number of ballots received for an ILM poll, again? (Sorry, I feel like I ask this in every poll thread...)

Led Zeppelin got 65 or 66.

Pavement got to 70 I believe

For anyone who wants to believe Bowie's twaddle that NLMD was a toss-off or whatever here's a rather thorough interview documenting his involvement.

http://www.teenagewildlife.com/Appearances/Press/1987/0800/cover.jpg

OK, I'm tabulating tracks -- up til now I was just looking at album rankings -- and a few people went ahead and included "Sweet Thing/Candidate/Sweet Thing (reprise)" as a single vote. I wasn't familiar with Diamond Dogs beyond its singles until this week, and I can totally understand wanting to vote for it as a whole. I'm torn on how to handle this -- I don't want to have to have to tear all this up and re-enter stuff.

most votes for "candidate" as a stand-alone track are probably for the very different demo version, which is an excellent song. i can't imagine too many people putting either part of "sweet thing" in a top 20, but i suppose it could happen. it's also possible that people just voted for "sweet thing" meaning the entire thing. i would assume that anyone who did doesn't stop liking it after it switches to "candidate," but i dunno. if i were doing it, i'd say any vote for "sweet thing" means the whole, while any vote for "candidate" means the demo of that song. it's not perfect, and probably messes with a few people's intentions, but that's how i'd do it.

Thought about submitting the 20-song Bowie mix tape I made for myself about 20 years ago, in the original running order, but no.

just sent you mine

submitted my ballot via ilxmail.

My vote for Sweet Thing was basically a stand-in for the whole sweet thing candidate reprise deal

BALLLLZ i think i forgot to vote for Look Back In Anger

it'll most likely be on mine. will be sending it in tonight. had a good time going through the best-of dvd on saturday evening. als, good to hear the sweet thing/candidate/sweet thing reprise debate is settled.

Voted.

This feels like one of those rare instances where even if none of my 20 tracks makes the final countdown, it won't matter. Whatever does make it will be great.

OK, I've slept on the it, and I'm going to allow ST/C/ST(r) as a single ballot spot. Anyone who used multiple spots on their ballot to vote for 2 or 3 of its parts is welcome to redo their ballot and send it in. Someone upthread mentioned leaving it off entirely because they couldn't decide which part to include -- you can redo your ballot and include it if you want.

If you voted for "Sweet Thing" and would like it applied to the whole suite, like hugo_w, email me or post here and I'll make that fix.

In other arbitrary tallying decisions, votes for "It's No Game" are going to be combined for the final vote count, though in some cases (1) or (2) were specified. "John, I'm Only Dancing" and "John, I'm Only Dancing (Again)" will not be combined.

BTW, last 16 hours to vote! Six more ballots arrived overnight.

Thought about submitting the 20-song Bowie mix tape I made for myself about 20 years ago, in the original running order, but no.

― the girl from spirea x (f. hazel), Monday, March 5, 2012 12:52 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark

ARE YOU ME?! Jesus man alive, I almost did the same thing, but I thought better of it. "Young Americans" was one of my MAJOR JAMS on that one though.

WmC can you just count my 3-in-a-row vote for ST/C/ST(r) as one vote for the whole thing and then bump everything below it up 2 slots on my ballot? Or I could just do it on my end and resubmit if that's easier

Do you want to fill in those two spots that are freed up at the end?

BTW, the Bowie-compiled iSelect compilation includes ST/C/ST(r) as one 8:47 track, which makes voting for it that way in this poll legit enough for me.

Hey WmC, just sent in my revised ballot. Thanks again for doing this!

Glad to! I get a stoopid amount of fun out of these polls.

This is where I remind everyone to check out the live version of "TVC15" on Stage -- it's 100x better than the studio version. Faster tempo, swings like a motherfucker, just more fun all around.

Do you want to fill in those two spots that are freed up at the end?

― Steamtable Willie (WmC), Monday, March 5, 2012 10:13 AM (27 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Nah I think I'll just keep it at 18 since I'm too busy today to go back and look for more votes. Thanks.