Young Americans

In the summer of 1974, as he was traveling across America on his mammoth Diamond Dogs arena-rock tour, David Bowie got deeply into soul music. By July, he was spiking his live sets with covers of the Ohio Players "Here Today and Gone Tomorrow" and Eddie
Floyd's "Knock on Wood," but he was even more interested in what was happening in dance clubs—particularly the new disco coming out of Philadelphia International Records. Bowie booked a mid-tour recording session at Sigma Sound, the studio where Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff were constructing the sound of Philadelphia. But he wasn't working with Gamble and Huff, or indeed any of the studio's house musicians: He had something else in mind.

The soul-inspired album that came out of the Sigma Sound recordings, Young Americans, was yet another new direction for an artist who staked his career on ceaselessly finding new directions. It was also the first time he’d made an album whose chief purpose was pleasure. There’s nothing like the apocalyptic visions of Ziggy Stardust and Diamond Dogs on Young Americans; it’s as smart as anything he’d recorded before it, but also relaxed and limber-hipped enough for his hardcore fans’ less alienated big sisters and little brothers to get into. And it was the first of his records to feature Carlos Alomar, the ingenious rhythm guitarist who would become his live band’s musical director for more than a decade.

Young Americans

Station to Station

Station to Station opens with a synthesized train bumping along the ten-minute title track, and the disembodied voice of a romantic Englishman crooning, “. . . the return of the thin white duke.” The form is familiar: monster chording, pointed vocals and racing arrangements. The scenario builds until Bowie cuts away to the second phase of the song, a wrenching piece of power rock peppered with questions: “And who will connect me with love?” and “Does my face show some kind of woe?” He may not be seriously committed to rock, but when the mood strikes it all comes flooding back. Always the actor, David Bowie can assume the role of rocker and make it work.

Unfortunately, his devotion to the role isn’t unwavering, and on songs like “Word on a Wing,” the bloodless angelic choir and childish soul piano cheapen the elegant, vaguely religious passion of the lyrics and lead vocal. Yet more often than not, the material on Station to Station presents the rock Young Americans forced us to believe would never surface again: “TVC 15,” which makes the listener lust for a lyric sheet, has the sort of nondisco drive missing from Bowie’s music since “Suffragette City.” “Transition,” Bowie purrs, “transmission,” and the beat becomes a series of minor explosions. “Golden Years” has a more appealing surface and its lush R&B smorgasbord of vocal styles, whistles and classic first-line hook (“Don’t let me hear you say life’s taking you nowhere”) make it Bowie’s most seductive self-indulgence since Pin Ups.

Station to Station

W3.CSS

Man Who Fell to Earth

David Bowie's Golden Years

Young Americans

Station to Station

Here Comes the Thin White Duke