From
the opening song, “Sunday”, David Bowie makes it clear that Heathen is
not going to be a pop, radio-friendly trifle.
After
his dalliance in electronica and "jungle" rhythms of Earthling, he was
clearly ready to sing again, and 2000's ...hours was a
strong return to trippy pop music. Heathen is a shocker because not only are the
songs stronger than on hours, but his voice is sounding better than it has...
well... ever.
The
music of Heathen finds Bowie with one foot firmly planted in the shadowy,
troubling techno of 1996's 1.Outside, while the other foot is kicking around in
the inspired melodies and harmonies of Hunky Dory. Working with Tony Visconti as
producer, the guy responsible for Bowie’s post-glam phase, the Mr. Stardust has found
the best mix of Beatles-happy rock and Eno pyrotechnics he's ever found. This is, simply,
the best sounding record of the year.
It
is also Bowie's most lyrically direct record in ages. About halfway through an album laced
with bittersweet nostalgia and apocalyptic vision, Bowie suddenly launches an all-out
assault on the Almighty. Yep, this one's for God: a barrage of questions, laments, and
yearnings. Basically, Heathen is the cry of a disillusioned believer who wants to
be given reason to keep on believing as the world ... and his faith ... crumble beneath
him.
Nothing
remains,
he declares in "Sunday", the bleak and anxious opener. Music and imagery paint a
devastating picture of some great disaster. Something has exploded, collapsed, fallen
apart. He is looking for bodies and, further, trying to make sense of it, trying to find
some comfort.
Look
for the cause, or signs of life
Where the heat goes
Look for the drifters
We should crawl under the bracken
Look for the shafts of light on the road
Where the heat goes
Everything
has changed.
In
the background, a chant rises that is both spooky and reassuring.
In
your fears seek only peace
In your fears seek only love
In
view of the chaos, he concludes that we must destroy the monster we have become and hope
for some kind of rebirth.
In
your fear of what we have become
Take to the fire
Now we must burn all that we are
Rise together through these clouds
As on waves
“Rise
together through these clouds” is a line that pre-dates and mirrors Bruce
Springsteen’s own hope and light found in the darkness. Springsteen's The Rising is
full of affirmations that something does remain, spiraling up in the smoke of the
destruction to arrive at some kind of resolution and peace. Bowie also adds, in a sort of
desperate hope, that “All my trials, Lord, will be remembered”, before the song
explodes into an anxious crescendo of drums. (My biggest gripe regarding this album is
that this song, my personal favorite on the record, ends just when it gets going. That
finale is exhilarating, and fades just as we’re brought to our feet.)
Next,
there's a wicked, twisted rendition of the Pixies’ dark love letter
“Cactus”, an appeal for an exchange with a lover who has either died or gone
mad. The fetishistic anxiety of the singer, who desires “something you
wore”… preferably a dress smeared with blood ... suggests the possibility that
the singer wants back someone he himself destroyed. He is haunted by clues that form a
sort of supernatural correspondence: “A letter in your writing doesn’t mean
you’re not dead.”
Strange,
specific nostalgia also runs through “Slip Away”, a yearning for the early 80s,
for a sort of childlike innocence, full of references to specific joys and experiences,
even favorite television personalities like kid-tv host Uncle Floyd: “Twinkle
twinkle, Uncle Floyd …How I wonder where you are?”
“Slow
Burn” bemoans the dying present and future as much as the past. Bowie, in
full-throated angst, mourns that we are “so small in times such as these”, as
the world spirals down into oblivion. Pete Townsend provides the groaning guitar lines.
In
the blistering,high-speed rock anthem “Afraid”, he admits his fears, and yet
finds the only thing he has faith in is “the Beatles” (a nice twist on the
lyrics to Lennon’s own “God” song), and an insistence that “my little
soul has grown.” But the singer ends up revealing that he has bought into cultural
lies, that if he can only get on television then he’ll have it made and he won’t
be afraid anymore.
The
album proceeds to move from apprehension of these horrors into a dialogue with God. Taken
one by one, some may just sound like love songs. But in context, the language goes beyond
that of alienated or separated lovers (“I’ve Been Waiting for You”),
dysfunctional relationships, communication breakdowns, to the lament over the Other’s
cruel sovereignty and the futility, or perhaps the illusion, of freewill.
Feeling
shut out, unable to comprehend God’s intentions or nature, he delivers a clear, basic
appeal for an explanation in “I Would Be Your Slave”. The confession that gives
the song its punch is that, if the singer could only meet God and receive understanding,
he would submit. He cries out, “Open up your heart to me / Show me all you are /
And I would be your slave.” But he is left disillusioned: “I don’t
see the point of it/ No footprints in the sand / I”ll be you laugh out loud at me /
at the chance to strike me down.”
In
spite of the tension and bitterness that underlies the album, there are some delightful,
humorous highlights. “Took a Trip on a Gemini Spacecraft” gives us a spell from
the angst, zipping along on an adrenaline rush of horns, drum loops, zippy guitars, and an
Ed Woodish UFO tremolo on the fringe. Even this high-spirited pop gem works in the
context to reinforce his assurance that everywhere he goes, he is thinking of the Heavenly
Other. A sort of religious weight underlies the silliest lines, even “I pulled
down my sun visor / Boy, I really felt blue / I shot my space gun / and I thought about
you.”
“Everyone
Says ‘Hi’” is an irresistible pop gem, a charming and sad love letter to a
dear departed friend, or perhaps it’s the opposite—a letter from the great
beyond. It’s one of the most contagiously singable Bowie songs in ages. But he never
trivializes his subject.
Despair
overcomes him again in the follow-up, a journal entry meditation on
despair—“5:15 The Angels Have Gone”. And as the album draws to its
conclusion, the singer's troubles get the better of him again. He declares "I
demand a better future, or I might just stop loving you."
Taken
as individual songs, these represent Bowie's strongest performances in decades.
There are intense vocal performances — from the powerful soul of “Slow
Burn” to the snarling wit of “Gemini Spaceship”. Such
artful instrumentation elevates these complaints to become a sort of flip-side to the
humble prayers, affirmations, and humble pleas of U2’s All That You Can’t
Leave Behind. While Bono is crying out to a God he believes is benevolent, Bowie seems
unsure if there is anyone listening at all, good or evil.
In spite of this, Heathen
becomes a vital, riveting work of soul-searching and confrontational prayer. It’s
hard not to think of Milton’s Satan plunging from heaven, a rebel poisoned by pride. The
frustrations are compelling, but it is also impossible to ignore Bowie insistence
on blaming God for life's
hardships. He spends no time pondering humankind's role in the destruction, nor
does he consider what might be holding us back from utter chaos, or what efforts the
Divine might have made to address the problem of evil. Love remains, in his perspective, a
feeble gesture of humankind, never an endeavor of God himself.
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