David Bowie |
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Tue. June 18.2002 3:21 PM EDT |
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David Bowie: Loving the AlienThe new Heathen reminds us of his command over isolation, anxiety and fear. A revealing chat with the dutiful dad and Mouse on Mars fan. by Gil Kaufman |
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David Bowie ( ) |
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David Bowie's X-file must be a foot thick: pop's resident alien has been
living in the future longer than most of us have been stuck here on earth. His
latest disc, the contemplative Heathen, was written and recorded prior to
September
At this point, Bowie is a New Yorker. The Brixton, England-born singer has spent just as much of his adult life in Manhattan as he has his country of origin. When he walks down the streets of SoHo, where he lives with his wife and two-year-old daughter, he's cognizant of the connection to the people and places around him - a vibe that has only grown since the World Trade Center tragedy. "I think one feels a slightly more obvious community than there was before," says the 55-year-old singer. "On the street, there's a real acknowledgment of each other." Bowie's Heathen offers a different kind of acknowledgment, however. After a pair of albums that tried to cast him as a middle-aged club kid, he's done an about-face and toned down the beats. Heathen focuses on song craft. Working with producer Tony Visconti for the first time in 20 years, Bowie approaches the disc with a spectral voice that's bolstered by spare, classic arrangements. It's not exactly the return of Major Tom, but with unmistakably personal tunes, Heathen has a soul and an intimacy that had been missing from Bowie's work for the better part of 20 years. VH1 spoke with the cosmopolitan pop star about his favorite '70s TV show, his appreciation of being designated a pop influence, and the fine art of aging disgracefully. He even throws in a filthy joke to prove how much of a New Yorker he really is. VH1: You recorded all of these songs prior to 9/11, yet there’s this sense of dread floating through them. "Slow Burn” actually warns of fear overhead. Did you have a feeling? David Bowie: I think there would be a number of albums recorded by a number of artists that you could say the same thing about. I think there was a certain anxiety in the air that produced that neo-apocalyptic writing. More often than not those things are manifestations of interior turmoil, so I’m not so sure they’re some kind of prescient statements. I don’t think that the themes I work with have changed in 35 years: isolation, anxiety and fear. I think it’s an unfortunate coincidence. VH1: You cover Neil Young’s “I’ve Been Waiting For You” on this album, so it seems worth noting that he recorded a 9/11 response song ("Let’s Roll") on his latest album. Did you ever consider doing the same? Bowie: A response record to a real life situation? It’s not really what I do. I’m not very good at world overview. A lot of the stuff that I write is far more impressionistic than that. It works more on feelings than gut responses to situations. I’m not terribly articulate in terms of being precise about situations. VH1: Heathen has a fair amount of cover songs. There’s the Young tune, and "I Took a Trip on a Gemini Spaceship" by the rather obscure Legendary Stardust Cowboy. And there’s a Pixies tune, too: “Cactus.” Are you a fan? Bowie: They supported us quite a lot when we were Tin Machine. I know Charles [Thompson, aka former Pixies strawboss Frank Black] pretty well. I always thought of him as one of the most underestimated writers in American bands. If there’s someone I particularly admire I often try to do something to get them a little better known than they are. VH1: Why this song? Bowie: It was arbitrary. He’s written so many great songs it would be easy to find one to cover. I just kind of liked it. I guess I did it because it’s a little more obscure. It’s a great rocker. VH1: But it also seems to fit into some of the themes you were talking about: isolation, longing. Bowie: Exactly. I have to take that into consideration as well. When you’re a prisoner, there’s a certain amount of isolation that goes along with it. Same with the Ledgendary Cowboy’s song... that song is about somebody isolated in space. VH1: You and Pete Townshend worked on "Slow Burn" by sending a computer disc back and forth. Isn’t collaboration-by-mail a little clinical? Bowie: No, I find it’s really rewarding to do that, inasmuch as it gets the job done. I really wanted him on that song. We exchanged the disc until we got it sounding great. We had hoped to do it together when he was over here for the Concert for New York, but we both got embroiled in rehearsals. He got the chance to come in and listen to all the material and [get a grip on] the feeling of the album. So he knew the context within which that song would be placed. The last time Tony Visconti and I made an album [1980’s Scary Monsters], Pete was on it. It just seemed like an ironic pick-up to have him on the new one: "We’re continuing from here, folks." VH1: Did having Pete and Tony working with you again make it feel like you were back in a familiar place? Was it nostalgic at all? Bowie: The one thing that Tony and I got off on the first time around is that he really does the windmill thing with his arm - in the studio! But this time around Tony and I were very aware that we didn’t want to repeat anything that we’d done before. We knew what our strengths were. We have a signature style. When you hear Heathen it’s very obvious that it’s a David Bowie/Tony Visconti album. We’re very precious ... A lot of people hold in pretty high estimation what we’ve done in the past, and it was very much in the forefront of our minds that we didn’t want to tarnish that. VH1: Who else among your contemporaries is still doing vital work? Bowie: I must say I don’t listen to either my contemporaries or the mainstream. So I’m not terribly familiar with what they’re doing. My interest in music has always tended to be a little bit more obscure. My personal record collection is stuff that got left behind. Going back to the Ledgendary Stardust Cowboy and going forward to the kinds of things I listen to like Godspeed You Black Emperor. I like Daniel Johnston and Mouse on Mars. The kind of stuff I find interesting has got some excitement to it and some textures that I don’t know too well. I get bored when I hear things that, almost from chord to chord, I know what they’re going to play next. I don’t like comfortable music. VH1: Dave Grohl plays on that Neil Young song. When you get together with a new collaborator, how do you find common ground? Bowie: He’s very similar to me in that he likes very outside stuff. Most of the people I admire also like pretty outside stuff. There’s a certain kind of musician that’s more interested in what’s not listened to than what is listened to. Otherwise, I’m sure I’d be in there doing songs with bloody rappers on them. VH1: Congratulations, by the way, for not doing that. Did you ever have a momentary lapse of reason where a rap break in one of your songs seemed like a good idea? Bowie: I actually did it once. It was a long, long time ago, so I guess it wasn’t in fashion. In 1987 I did a track ["Shining Star"] with Mickey Rourke doing a rap in the middle of it on Never Let Me Down. It was more tongue in cheek than anything. VH1: Which means we’re not likely to see a you hooking up with Jermaine Dupri for an all-star remix of "Slip Away?" Bowie: I’ve got to say that several of my songs have virtually become part of the trade now. I can’t count the amount of times that "Let’s Dance" has been used in either dance or rap [tracks]. It’s just insane. It’s one of the most used riffs of anything I’ve ever done. VH1: Is that flattering to you? Bowie: Yeah, I love being an influence. For me, as a musician and producer, that’s a wonderful success. It’s terribly uplifting to feel what you’ve done becoming a part of the vocabulary. You think, "Well, I’m not stupid, then. These were good ideas." VH1: What’s the greatest compliment a contemporary artist has paid to you? Bowie: [Perhaps when they mention] the basic idea of hybridization, of putting different styles together, and not being genre loyal. Up until my crowd came along, and I would include people like Roxy Music in this, it was a given that you had a style and that’s what you stayed with. You were a country and western singer, or a blues singer. I’m pretentiously suggesting that it was a kind of a postmodernist move at the time, because that was very much floating in the air with us pretentious types [laughs]. It was the idea of treating the history of rock in a slightly more detached fashion. Possibly that had some kind of effect. VH1: Time and space are once again recurring themes on this album... Bowie: I will be emphatic, I would never get on a spaceship. VH1: Then you’re not jealous of the kid from N’SYNC who is going to be the first pop star in space? Bowie: More strength to them. I think it’s fantastic if they’re going to take their holidays up there. I’ll go to Coney Island [laughs]. VH1: But what is it about the passage of time that continues to hold your fascination? Bowie: How little of it there is. My sackful is being depleted momentarily. VH1: Then why still participate in the rock world? The commercial success is not as great; you’re not even doing a video this time because you’ve said nobody will play it. Bowie: I am driven by it. I can’t stop writing. It’s not necessarily something that I particularly enjoy all the time. But it is something that I have to physically do. I couldn’t go two days without having attempted to do something. It’s just so part of what I am. I’m such a writer. It’s as corny as that. VH1: As a writer, do you think you’re growing older gracefully or disgracefully? Bowie: Now you’ve stumped me. Graceful enough to retain respect and disgracefully enough to be constantly amusing. VH1: "Slip Away" feels like a very classic Bowie song colored by a quintessential New York experience: watching the rather crazed Uncle Floyd Show. Bowie: [The Uncle Floyd Show] was such a part of my late ‘70s life - I loved the ridiculousness of it! Whenever it was on, regardless of what we were doing, Iggy [Pop] and I would dash to the nearest television set and switch it to channel 68. Half of New York was doing the same thing. [Uncle Floyd] was so faithfully funny. He created an indelible spot in my memory. If you didn’t know about Uncle Floyd you’d think the characters in the song were Bowie characters. The cause of that is my absolute affection for the show. I was not only a viewer, I used to go to the clubs when they came into town to do their live show. I had stickers on my guitar case, “I don’t avoid, I watch Uncle Floyd.” I was a total fan. VH1: Did the album title Heathen come out of a religious concept you have? Bowie: Along with “Sunday,” it was one of first songs I wrote for the album. I wanted to make sure that the bookends were firmly in place before I got on with the rest of the album. For me, appropriate often means that it’s got a heavy subtext that can be interpreted in as many ways as you can think of. It’s very hard to pinpoint its exact meaning until you really start using the dictionary to find out where it came from. I like it when something has a lot of import, but you’re not quite sure what it is. I do have a concept of it insomuch that it, for me, relates to man, especially Western man who’s lost the plot in terms of where he could be heading ... more towards probabilities than possibilities. I think we’re seriously out of touch with our interior lives and our spiritual lives in the west. I’m not religious, you must understand. I have no time for organized religion. VH1: A New Yorker at heart, but still a Brit down deep. Bowie: You think? Someone told me a joke the other day. "How many New Yorkers does it take to screw in a light bulb?" VH1: How many? Bowie: "One ... you asshole." VH1: It’s been a while since you took a lavish production on the road. With your support slot on Moby’s Area: Two tour, it seems like the days of the big Bowie show are over. Is that true? Or will you pull that gaudy glass spider out of mothballs one of these years? Bowie: It’s been talked about for the last 10 years that I should do a proper world tour. I’m not sure that I want to do that primarily because my daughter is only 21 months old and I really don’t want to be away from her for that long. Moby offered the perfect timing and opportunity to promote Heathen and not be away that long. It’s only 12-14 shows, then back home. VH1: Will you bring your own razzle-dazzle to his tour? Bowie: It’s not much of a show. I’ve got some nice trousers for it, but basically it’s just lights and songs. These days I really just do interpretations of my songs. I don’t really do theatrical things. It’s just not something that’s occurred to me to do lately. I’d like to do something like that, but it has to be right, and at the moment I’m very song intensive. VH1: Does that explain why you play everything from drums to guitar and keyboards on this album? Why were you so musically involved this time? I never even realized you played drums. Bowie: Nor did I! It’s because I have a freedom with Visconti. That’s one of the things that makes it really terrific to work with him again. He doesn’t feel the need to judge, which is really great for an artist who flails around with his instruments. I’m not the best musician in the world and I feel terribly inhibited when I’m working under the scrutiny of proper musicians. Tony is so encouraging that I start playing a lot more things myself. I think it brings an intimacy to the work. VH1: The Ziggy Stardust movie and soundtrack are being re-released this summer, and it begs the question: “Did you really want to go back there?’ Bowie: I didn’t really work on that because I don’t have the time, nor the inclination. I’ve got far too much to do with my present stuff. VH1: Is it a time you recall fondly? Bowie: If I have cause to look back at all, yes I do think those were great times. And, I suppose, in its way it was an inspired moment. VH1: You’re not embarrassed by it, are you? Bowie: No, the sartorial elements alone give me constant amusement. VH1: Heathen’s "Afraid" is about being just that. What scares you these days? Bowie: What kind of life is in store for my daughter. I don’t personalize [my fears]. As of this moment, the 21st century seems to have loomed in such a disappointing fashion. I think we all had much higher expectations of what this future would bring us than what we’re going through right now. I’m constantly thinking, “What on earth have I brought my daughter into?” VH1: Has that changed the way you write music? Bowie: I don’t know. We’ll see. I am starting to write structures for things now, but I haven’t written anything since that event. It will be quite strange to write in this new environment. The New York experience is undergoing all kinds of changes. VH1: Could you have made this album as a younger man? Bowie: No. VH1: Because of what you’ve seen or because of what you’ve felt? Bowie: I’d need a few years to puzzle that one. I wouldn’t even have approached this kind of album when I was young. This is an album that could only be considered in later years. |
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