David Bowie - The Next Day

Just realized that the older he gets, the more Duff is rocking this weird Bowie look:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/77/Duff_McKagan_2012.JPG/220px-Duff_McKagan_2012.JPG

Thin Blonde Duke.

Like a cross between Bowie and Bryan Adaams

Listened to this album a second time tonight, on headphones while walking through NYC and riding the train home. It's a lot better than it seemed the first time.

Did you notice that that Reynolds piece contained exactly three words - "overdriven guitar clangor" - that described the music on The Next Day? As far as most critics are concerned, this might as well be a book of poetry, or a dramatic reading of lyrics, it seems. I feel like taking the exact opposite approach, writing just about the music - you know, that stuff happening in the background while David Bowie confronts his mortality, or whatever.

I feel like taking the exact opposite approach, writing just about the music

Well, sonically, the album is not that interesting - it's a pretty straightforward rock album. That's why the lyrics are a focus

There's a lot of really interesting stuff going on. Assuming one finds rock music interesting. Which I don't think a lot of critics do anymore. But they keep filing copy anyway.

Yeah, after a close listen on headphones today, Phil's otm. There is quite a bit going on, musically. More than I noticed on first blush. I'm liking this quite a bit, I actually like the Whitman's Sampler approach to his overall career that it sort of takes.

The title track is a striking opener. I like David Torn's effects on most of the tracks, and Earl Slick can play lead without going wanky. The sax blats on "Dirty Boys" work too.

Reality had cool filigrees. EVery Bowie album since 1993 'cept ....hours has tbem.

I liked "Thursday's Child" and "Seven" from ...hours. Those are the ones I remember.

here's what the CD art/packaging looks like

http://virusfonts.com/news/2013/03/the-next-day-packaging-design/

i went to a bar last night and the DJ apparently was having a "listening party" for the new bowie so he played it all. sounded good in a bar

While drunk

That psychedelic lyric poster looks so cool it might be worth the price of the album.

More and more lyrics getting posted:

Nabokov is sun-licked now
Upon the beach at Grunewald
Brilliant and naked just
The way that authors look

Clare and Lady Manners drink
Until the other cows go home
Gossip till their lips are bleeding
Politics and all

I’d rather be high
I’d rather be flying
I’d rather be dead
Or out of my head
Than training these guns on those men in the sand
I’d rather be high

The Thames was black, the tower dark
I flew to Cairo, find my regiment
City’s full of generals
And generals full of shit

I stumble to the graveyard and I
Lay down by my parents, whisper
Just remember duckies
Everybody gets got

I’d rather be high
I’d rather be flying
I’d rather be dead
Or out of my head
Than training these guns on those men in the sand
I’d rather be high

I’m seventeen my looks can prove it
I’m so afraid that I will lose it
I’d rather smoke and phone my ex
Be pleading for some teenage sex,
Yeah

I’d rather be high
I’d rather be flying
I’d rather be dead
Or out of my head
Than training these guns on the men in the sand
I’d rather be high

I have really liked both singles, just like I also liked his two 00s albums.

Sure he doesn't innovate pop music anymore like he used to, but who would expect a 66 year-old to do that? If this finds him sitting roughly around his "Scary Monsters" style like the two early 00s albums, then that is fine with me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_66_year_old_artistic_innovators_throughout_history

I would think classical composers would have been able to be innovative at 66 (if they even lived for that long), but it appears even Joseph Haydn had largely stopped composing at age 66.

Ned, don't do that again.

Van Ronk said to Bobby/"She's the Next Real Thing" Does sound better the more I listen, and the musicians seem capable of anything he wants them to do. Inner dynamics, shading, or at least suggestions emerge, but he's always been more effective when not relying this much onto the old stomp-along---his limited idea of hard rock beats. It's not like the limber precision of say, "Fame" and "Golden Years" distracted from the intimations of mortality, tension etc which are also helpfully provided here: The Next Day and The Next Day and The Next Day Thanks Dave! Although so far I kinda prefer the caffeinated variety of Tempest, esp. its sneers: So muchfor the wasted years. But, even though I keep thinking I need to take a break from Bowie's grim slabs, the music pulls me along, and yeah the last two songs make a strong ending. And even "Where Are We Now" is effective in context, as something of a breather, as time takes a cig etc.

Monteverdi wrote two operas in his mid-70s.

Mozart, Schubert and Schumann were all decomposing at 66:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VU0gyiFAJrs

i understand the costs etc, but i would have preferred the bonus tracks to have been on a separate cd as they did for heathen/reality given that they do change the mood of the final section of this album.

3 listens in and i'm loving this a lot ..

My review.

I agree w a lot of that (and yeah, headphones help a lot). Somebody pls describe bonus tracks.

loved loved loved the burning ambulance review

Yeah that's top notch.

(should point out that's the review right above dow's last post)

My favorite review.

That's the first review I've read in which no obvious clichés about Bowie, his age or his history are present. What a relief! Clearly, lots of close listening and thought went into the piece - loved reading it. (Even though I see where you're coming from when you compare "Dirty Boys" (my favourite) to the Tom Waits songs, the first thing that I associated the (use of) that sax with was Laurie Anderson's "From the Air")

I still think the record is meh but P's take was inspiring.

Okay via the official FB page:

TND AT #1 IN 40 COUNTRIES ON iTunes

"What In The World?"

The Next Day has gone straight to the top of 40 different countries’ iTunes charts and it’s also Top 10 on iTunes in another 10 countries.

Just sayin’.

I am trying to imagine Bowie himself going "Just sayin'" and it ain't happening.

that "you can set the world on/you can set the world on fire" song is fucking catchy and makes me want to strut around the office

Viral video plz

lol

"Do the St. Paul shake"

Anyway, geeta's got a good review up

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/music_box/2013/03/david_bowie_s_the_next_day_reviewed.html

That's a nice piece about Bowie framed around an album that it barely engages with, and then mostly tangentially.

Panel discussion with Simon Reynolds, Geeta dayal, and Carl Wilson:
http://www.cbc.ca/day6/blog/2013/03/12/simon-reynolds-geeta-dayal-and-carl-wilson-discuss-bowies-the-next-day/

Carl being mehh = yay!

First listen to this was yesterday when I bought the CD. Don't think I'll get tired of it for a while - it's very strong. It could do with one or two amazing, instant tunes - why can't he just knock out a 'Let's Dance' or something? - which would put it up there with his best, but even so it easily matches up to, say, Side 2 of Scary Monsters, a side that it took me at least 15 listens to love and which I've listened to hundreds of times since.

At first I thought it would be better trimmed down - 14 tracks too much. Which to lose? 'If You Could See Me' and 'I'd Rather Be High' for me, at least.

I deliberately bought the standard CD cos I hate the bonus track thing (and I was gonna avoid the vinyl which I otherwise would've bought because they include them), but then at work I listened to the album on Spotify with those tracks and they're mostly great. 'So She' is the most melodic of these new songs and should've been on the album proper. 'Plan' is the (terrific) instrumental riff that started off the 'Stars Are Out Tonight' video. 'I'll Take You There' is a straight rocker that's as good as some of those on the album. He could've made this a double album I reckon. So I might just buy the vinyl and consider it as such.

why can't he just knock out a 'Let's Dance' or something?

I don't mean this snarkily but, well, he's not 35 anymore? If you mean quick little rock tunelets, well, this album's full of them!

If you haven't seen this already

http://m.guardian.co.uk/music/2013/jan/12/david-bowie-how-made-next-day

<3 Geeta repping for Outside

see now THAT record is my best-since-Space Oddity.

why can't he just knock out a 'Let's Dance' or something?

I don't mean this snarkily but, well, he's not 35 anymore? If you mean quick little rock tunelets, well, this album's full of them!

35, 66, what's the difference? I really like this record! I don't know what quick little rock tunelets are.

The appetite to write good throwaways wanes? I mean, when you're gone 10 years you don't record in 17 days or whatever like Bowie-Rodgers did.

How long did the average Tin Machine song take to record?

just enough to make it great

You're thinking of a different Tin Machine