Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Bowie, David
Label: Sony BMG
Released: 2003
Rating: 3.5/5
With David, you never know what’s lurking under his brilliant “attic”. The man of a thousand faces, this time decked out in a threadbare, battered “tuxedo” worn to a frazzle from too much wandering around, has undoubtedly landed firmly on the surface of the Earth’s crust in his spaceship and, somewhere along his journey through time, stopped for a moment to join us.
Pablo Picasso brings modern, highly vibrant guitar sounds backed by the rather funny pitter-patter of the rhythm section. “Pablo Picasso never got called an asshole”, the infallible, unbeatable macho who, with zero competition, swiped all the loot (read: women) from right under the noses of his rivals, in New York at least! A juicy gob of spit at the narrow-gauge “Yankees”. Wrapped in proper English black humor, Pablo Picasso, with twisted beats of Spanish flamenco, drives us onward in full rocker posture.
The backing vocals offer a colorful mix, from the warped choirs of countless Bowie sequences glued together to the female ones that deliberately lead the man into temptation. The sonic picture of most songs is once again filled with exploratory detours of guitar and keyboards, which blend brilliantly into a single story. The guitar coaxes out the most off-the-wall sounds, which thicken and enrich the soundscape in the background, and that’s definitely a special charm. The counterpart to the guitar is the keyboard effects and the piano arrangements themselves. It’s a classic Bowie specialty, but one he hasn’t used in his music for quite a while. Looking For Water is a proper rock’n’ roll assault, with a ripping bass at the heart of a traditional British sound. A truly British production with superb balance between the rhythm section and the front line. The songs mostly lean on expressive rhythms, pushed a little forward in the mix.
In She’ll Drive The Big Car, Bowie gets even closer to his roots, straight into the core of his being. Remember the sound of “Aladdin Sane” and its cover of the Rolling Stones’ Lets’ Spend Night Together? The harmonica and the vocal production in the pre-chorus completely nail the feel of Bowie’s legendary 1973 record.
One of the most beautiful compositions, where David’s sensitivity especially stands out, is undoubtedly Days, the first atmospheric peak on the record. A brilliant jigsaw of acoustics and electronics, percussion and drums in the classic sense of the word, covered in tasteful orchestral arrangements and a guitar that, once again as mere ornament, dots the “i” of the high-atmosphere mood it has captured. Perfection! Everything sounds simply built and, to the ear, wildly invasive. Try Some, Buy Some (orig. G. Harrison) does prove David’s mastery at absorbing a certain person into his own consciousness and decoding their musical language into his own personal cipher, but with its sleepy, swaying waltz rhythm it somehow doesn’t belong on “Reality”, which is mostly packed with short, punchy, relaxed and fluid tracks.
The main treat comes at the end with the ballad Bring Me The Disco King. A jazz rhythm line lifted from the mid-thirties, brushes grinding away at the drums, piano and David’s vocal as counterweight, both in sync and deliberately detuned. Pure Bowie mastery. Sad to the very end, where a man finds not a single ray of hope and, day after day, for however many are left, surrenders only to his own cynicism. A refined feeling guides David through verses extolling the unbearable puritanism of a crumbling “modern” society, of grannies slathered in every cream and potion with poodles in their laps, of concrete masses penetrating the gray sky, and the linear euphoria of the mind of a robotized, emotionally dead, ice-cold human mass, saturated with the burden of the existential absurdity of the present. The peak of parody on a decadent society led by its own sick mind toward self-destruction.
Everything on “Reality” is built without a hint of strain, the movements barely noticeable, soft, and with a delicate “feel” that’s a treat for the ears. No rambling, no know-it-all lecturing, just a calculated measure of short, simple yet cunning moves and tricks, artfully stacked together in true Bowie fashion. The new Bowie getup obviously suits the artist extremely well, as this stylistic leap gave him plenty of fresh creative freedom, and so “Reality” radiates rock-style looseness, simplicity and, at the same time, the expressive power of the artist’s own stance. “Reality” is a proper rock album, the kind Bowie hasn’t served up to the masses in a long time.
Lineup
David Bowie – vocals, guitar, baritone sax, keyboards
GUEST MUSICIANS:
Tony Visconti – guitar, keyboards, bass guitar, backing vocals Mark Plati – guitar, bass guitar
Earl Slick – guitar
Gerry Leonard – guitar
Mike Garson – piano
Sterling Campbell – drums
Matt Chamberlain – drums
Gail Ann Dorsey – backing vocals
Catherine Russell – backing vocals
Production
David Bowie & Tony Visconti
Tracklist
1. New Killer Star
2. Pablo Picasso
3. Never Get Old
4. The Loneliest Guy
5. Looking for Water
6. She’ll Drive the Big Car
7. Days
8. Fall Dog Bombs The Moon
9. Try Some, Buy Some
10. Reality
11. Bring Me the Disco King
