443. David Bowie, "Scary Monsters"

 

When I was a kid, MTV was just starting out and one of the videos I distinctly remember seeing in those early days was "Ashes to Ashes," from this album.  It looks extremely dated and janky now, but at the time I guess it was super avant garde and artsy.


(Two side notes here - MTV went on the air on August 1, 1981, which means they were playing videos from albums that were already a year or more old, which seems bizarre now but I guess makes sense when no one really knew they were supposed to be making videos for songs yet; and David Bowie was 33 years old when he made this, which is much, much younger than I am right now.  Why does he seem so old?  Lana del Rey is older right now than David Bowie was in this video.  Wild.)

I think "Ashes to Ashes" is the centerpiece of the album, not only because it's literally in the middle of the album, but because it's between the weirder stuff at the beginning, like "It's No Game (Pt. 1)" and the title track and the more conventional rockish stuff like "Kingdom Come" and "Because You're Young" that comes later.  (Only after reading this great Stereogum piece about the album did I learn that "Kingdom Come" is a Tom Verlaine cover.  Figures.)

This is not to ignore "Fashion," the other song off this album I clearly remember from my youth, and "Teenage Wildlife," which reminds me a lot of "Heroes," not just because of the guitar part but also the way it relentlessly builds towards a huge, soaring crescendo.  It's still exciting.

This is, obviously, not the last we will see of David Bowie.

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