I tried to like them back when I was young and rebellious because that's what I thought young and rebellious - and cool - people were into. I'm no longer young, I'm still rebellious and, well, I think I'm cool, and it turns out that I always thought The Doors were overrated and Jim Morrison was a bit of a dick.
She makes it just seem so effortless. There are no gimmicks, there is no over-production; just King and her monumental talent on display. I can either have this album on as easy listening background music or I can dive into it, along with my feels. It's a Sunday morning with a coffee and hope or a Friday evening with few glasses of red wine and nostalgia. An album for all time.
Not a massive jazz fan. Mind you, I say that but then I listen to some jazz and go, "That's a bit good, init?" Maybe because shit jazz is just really soooooo shit, it ruins the rest of the stuff that ain't bad.
Anyway, I digress. This isn't shit jazz and I may listen to it again should the mood take me.
Let's not listen to the words and just sit back and enjoy the absolute bangin' beats.
Straightforward, uncomplicated hard as nuts rock; we salute you.
Although I class myself as a Bowie fan, I have never heard this album in full nor many of the tracks off of it so I was very intrigued when I saw this was my album today. I love the single 'Sound & Vision' so I thought I knew what to expect. Nope. I could hear the Bowie sound throughout the album, even in the most sideways tracks so I always knew that he was there, and that was reassuring. With Bowie, I always know I'm in safe hands even if it is a little outside of my comfort zone. This is part of his genius.
So, the second side; I read some of the reviews before I got to it and it was a mixed bag so I wasn't sure what to expect. It was either going to be magnificent or the worst thing I'd ever heard. I found it to be beautiful. 'Warszawa' made me cry (maybe it's me, but I could hear a little bit of 'Walking In The Air' from The Snowman in it, which, lest we forget' is a David Bowie movie!) and isn't 'Subterraneans' just a back-street, whisky-lovin' sexy little song? I found each track to be interesting and well-paced and I didn't get bored at all. Although, I have been listening to a lot of Night Tracks on Radio 3 recently so my tolerance, understanding and patience for 'experimental' or 'avant-garde' music and increased enormously. I'm not sure me 6 months ago would have been quite so enamoured.
What I admire so much about Bowie is that he kind of goes, "I'm into this now. Come with me." and takes us all along for the ride. He includes us.
I've just noticed that I'm talking about him in the present term, like he's still with us. And as long as I'm listening to his music, he bloody well is.
I thought I knew a Jethro Tull song but it turns out that I'm just very familiar with the image of the creepy man playing flute with his eyebrow raised to the camera (maybe a childhood formative memory!) and it's a Steeleye Span song I was thinking of.
Anyway, I didn't hate this album and I didn't hate the flute but I probably would have liked it more had it been a straight-up folk album as those songs were, to me, the strongest on the record; 'Mother Goose', 'Wond'ring Aloud' and 'Slipstream' being gorgeous examples.
Aside from 'Hymn 43', the more proggy rock songs just felt like I'd heard them before and better (Sabbath, Zeppelin,) and even 'Up To Me', although really good, had more than whiff of Bowie to it.
It wasn't the least accessible prog rock I've ever had to listen to and I would probably put this on again when I'm next in a "70s frame of mind" and see what it does. Maybe it'll be a different experience. I'll let you know...
Enough like Sonic Youth for me to like it but too shoe-gazery for me to love it. If you want to fuck me in the ear with your guitar you're going to have to look me in my eyes.
It was more than lounge room Muzak but I still found myself zoning out a bit and getting in with something while the album played in background. Nevertheless, it's a pleasant sound and I did like the beats on a few of the songs but it's firmly background stuff for me.
