Young Americans

Side One

1          Young Americans, 5:10

2          Win, 4:44

3          Fascination, 5:43

4          Right, 4:13

 

Side Two

5          Somebody Up There Likes Me, 6:30

6          Across The Universe, 4:30

7          Can You Hear Me, 5:04

8          Fame, 4:12

 

Bonus Tracks (on RYKO/EMI re-release 1991, EMI 064 7 96434 1 - LP)

9          Who Can I Be Now (Previously Unreleased), 4:36

10        It’s Gonna Be Me (Previously Unreleased), 6:27

11        John, I’m Only Dancing (Again) (Single A Side 1979), 6:57

 

Recorded:               Sigma Sound, Philadelphia, USA

                               Electric Lady, New York, USA

(11 August 1974 – January 1975)

Musicians:              David Bowie, vocals, guitar, piano

                               Carlos Alomar, guitar

                               Earl Slick, guitar (on Across The Universe and Fame)

                               John Lennon, guitar, vocals (on Across The Universe and Fame)

                               Willie Weeks, bass

                               Emir Ksasan, bass (on Across The Universe and Fame)

                               Andy Newmark, drums

                               Dennis Davis, drums (on Across The Universe and Fame)

                               Mike Garson, piano

                               David Sanborn, saxophone

                               Larry Washington, conga

                               Pablo Rosario, percussion

                               Ralph McDonald, percussion (on Across The Universe and Fame)

                               Ava Cherry, backing vocals

                               Robin Clark, backing vocals

                               Luther Vandross, backing vocals

                               Anthony Hinton, backing vocals

                               Diana Sumler, backing vocals

                               Jean Fineberg, backing vocals (on Across The Universe and Fame)

                               Jean Millington, backing vocals (on Across The Universe and Fame)

Producers:              Tony Visconti

                               David Bowie, Harry Maslin

                               (Across The Universe and Fame)

Released:               7 March 1975

Label:                     RCA RS 1006

Since the fateful night Bowie hit Radio City with a funkadelic thud last November, I've been dreading this album's release. Could it be Dave's decided to bite the hands that feeds, post-Diamond Dogs? He can warble "Nothing's gonna change my world" on Young Americans to his alter ego's titillation, but I fear the irrecovcable worst is upon us: Bowie's thrown in the towel on rock and concept music, preferring to booggie down to prosperity instead. Okay, Dave . . . shortchange us perfervid dupes who put stock in ya, even though we knew your financial intentions all along and considered it fine because only fools don't worry 'bout making a buck.

I personally feel gypped. By stifling his contemptuous tone, skirting scorn for things pathetic and mundane that haunted his prior work, Bowie is neglecting statement. By devoting himself to disco-soul, playing a purely commercial idiom in lieu of making new strides, Bowie is shunning art. With an image attached to about seven elpees with costume changes to match, it's impossible to tell who the real Bowie is anymore. Once the Spiders disbanded, Bowie's truncated Ziggy schtick was de-sapped. Tinsel to the wayside, his act deliquesced into prophecy, warning of holocaust and a host of other chimerical feasibilities during his Diamond Dogs. Bourroughs influenced phase. Supposedly theatrical. I viewed last summer's Diamond Dogs tour as ineffectual spectacle. Sure, Dave assembled and performed a fine show, but the scenery and backup band were so disappointing that the concert became an ultimate let down. As for the last Bowie tour, it literally didn't pay to blow twelve and a half bucks in order to witness blase renderings of Bowie oldies juxtaposed with his new stuporific soul bro pastiche, regardless of the bodacious Mike Garson Group. I recall having the fierce urge to upstage Bowie during "Changes" or besiege his manager to order a month's total rest immediately after the show, because it seemed Bowie could barely manage onstage.

.Nevermind that Bowie wants to be in the mind, heart, and record racks of Young Americans; he also wants to be the Young American - a a vicarious spade, a victorious name. Never mind the title song concerns our emetic socio-political situation ("Do you remember President Nixon . . . the bills you have to pay, or even yesterday?..."), adding discodanceable components like snappy sax runs and gospelfied chorals, wrapping up with the obvious "I want the Young American.! It's disturbing enough to think how easily Bowie could finagle the latter with his chameleonlike savior-faire, knowing how a little condescension can work wonders. Bowie seems to hope he'll inveigle American youth through solidarity, relating on a common level, predicated on sheer capitalistic desire.

.I'm unconvinced Young Americans is anything but commercial, unless it's another Bowie transition. The words trite, unenthralling, and masturbatory come to mind. Young Americans ain't got the visceral verve connected with most Bowie material; it's the epitome of every shoddy, selfindulgent delusion Dave could muster, have pressed into vinyl, and to try to sell. I wonder why John Lennon even bothered to give his vocal and co-writing support ("Fame"), much less subject "Across The Universe" to Bowie's washed-out histrionics whilst accompanying the ensuing atrocity on guitar. "Fame" is structurally identical to "Time" on Aladdin Sane, repeating the title, then enumerating its consequential drawbacks. Composed by Bowie-Lennon-Alomar team, "Fame" is a study in wretched rockstar commiseration, John and Dave apparently taking turns writing lines as if an impromptu word game. "Fame - Makes a man think things over . . . Puts him there, where things are hollow." Probable Bowie-Lennon interplay, viz: ("Fame-") "What you get is no tomorrow (Dave)" "What you need you have to borrow (John)" "Is it any wonder - You're too cool to fool (John)" "Bully for you, chilly for me (Dave)" "Got to get a raincheck on pain (John)."

.Whereas open interpretation was necessary on Diamond Dogs, lyrics are included with Young Americans - although improved mix quality make them a requisite convenience which would've been appreciated more with the former cryptic david Bowie album. Doesn't matter on Young Americans anyhow: "Can You Hear Me," "Win." "fascination" rely on love themes, funky sound and beat more than lyrical content. "Young Americans" and "Somebody Up There Likes Me" temper racial motifs with overtones of pathos and dat oletime religion: "He's got his eye on your soul - his hand on your heart, He says 'Don't hurry baby,' Somebody up there likes me." An eerie two stanza Bowie tune, "Right," figuratively encapsulates his career through gauzed wide angle lenses ("Taking it all the right way . . . Never turning back"), the second verse sounding like the combined euphoria of success and cocaine has pulverized Bowie, verily gone to his head: "Flying in just a sweet place, Coming inside and sail . . . Never been no, Never been known to fail."

Not yet, perhaps. But even though I stuck with Bowie during his last stylistic change - wouldn't listen when Diamond Dogs was vilified left and right - Young Americans is a retrograde effort earning my heartsick disdain. I'd still be raving over Bowie if only he'd stop reaffirming his superstatus with tacky contrivances . . . if only he'd produce music of consistent celibre (rock, R&B, jazz, whatever - though I'd say Bowie excels in rock and wish he'd return to the fold after his filing). Hope this Young Americans in-strut-with-the-time sidetrack is just passing caprice, as was the Diamond Dogs round-the-corner cataclysm. Lord knows we need a lot more auspicious artists and lot less jive.

 

Trixie A. Balm

Diamond Wog, Creem Magazine, June 1975