David Bowie
London Boy

THE REVIEW

I spent 4 euros to have this album in my scurvy, greedy pirate hands. I bought it for a specific reason. I wanted to listen to MUSIC. It might seem strange to you, but I only knew Bowie for a few works. I always really liked his style, his appetite to dare and entertain, impress, excite, and depress at the same time. I was only 4 years old when he amazed me with elegance and depth on the cinema screen in Labyrinth, whose soundtrack, naturally his, I still listen to today with immense pleasure, and it remains as fresh as a daisy. Even 24 years later, listening to the pieces from the movie's soundtrack evokes the vibrant excitement that a child, struck by everything, experiences...

Just hearing the Swatch commercial, set to the renowned Change, fills me with cheer and gives me chills down my spine, Christ what a piece... Bowie is that artist whose work you hear once, ONCE, and something already sticks with you, I don't know what, but it's the desire to delve deeper into these sensations that pushed me to purchase London Boy.

I'm really fed up with the current rock scene, Oasis, Morisette, Cranberries, so dull… Let's see how this guy wrote back in the '60s. Who knows what ideas he had... actually, look at this, 18 tracks, a bootleg, lots of material, but it's stuff from a thousand years ago, there must be tons of ideas here. Uhm, the original version of Space Oddity, uhm... Laughing Gnome, hey! Rubber Band, great, it has to be mine, especially at this ridiculous price...

At home, I consumed it, scrutinized it, sucked it dry and picked it apart. A wonder of simplicity, genius, and cleverness. Essential and fun. Original, tasty, quirky. I'm not going to break down the tracks, to say that the recording is what it is. I will tell you that I listened to it with one speaker to enjoy and highlight the guitar lines, that I was surprised to hear the samples from Did You Ever Have a Dream, the melancholy atmospheres of There is a Happy Land, that I laughed like an idiot with Laughing Gnome, that the a cappella track Please Mr. Gravedigger impressed me, that in terms of sound there's NOTHING old about it, that it’s a truly fun and carefree album, that it set a precedent, and that if you want to listen to some brit-rock MUSIC, well, Bowie is the right path.

But did they really get this stuff back in the '60s? What things, and today we have Spears, Hilton, Backstreet Boys... ARGH!!

In short, a bunch of ideas, a ton, and you can tell his style would spawn disciples for, uh... at least 30 years. They still copy him today. Damn if you want to write music, listen to Bowie. Am I wrong, or when I hear Beck and Damon Albarn, there’s a bit of Bowie?

Awesome. And I paid 4 euros. 4 measly euros.