Bowie's "Low" vs "Heroes" ??? Which do you prefer?

I don't see that ch-ch-ch-changing.

Does anyone at school in the UK in the late '70s remember this track being used in the bits in between BBC educational programs? You know the bit with the clock before a program came on.

I like how Low was originally to be called "New music for night and day", but Heroes is more fully realised than Low I think.

Has anyone ever really got into Lodger? I've never really managed despite trying lots.

In answer to the question, 'Lodger'. Not only into it, I lodge here!

So I say Low, again. Its cover is also way scary.

Lodger is great too.

then Low.

then Heroes.

and Taking Tiger Mountain above all!

The video for "Be My Wife" is also astounding. It's probably the best music video I've ever seen; just Bowie, on another planet, in a great pair of white flares, wandering about in a white studio, vaguely singing and occassionally messing with the guitar.

I've been putting off buying that video compilation on DVD for too long I think, must get it tomorrow.

on-topic: Low is my favorite. Sometimes the effect on Bowie's voice on "Heroes" sounds too claustrophobically bathroomy to me, at other times that's what urges me to play the record...

*cries*

It's a really odd song; about those dirty punk rockers apparently. It's got a very unusual tune and arrangement. Well done Bowie!

I think the instrumental music comprise the strongest tracks on each album (albeit less so on "Heroes", which is why I think it's a better record overall).

I've just looked through Amazon and there's nothing obvious. It amazes me that you can't easily get these, Stage and David Live, and yet you can get "Peace On Earth" by Bowie & Bing Crosby for a fiver!

x-post

Can I be heretical here and say I've never really cared for "Heroes" the song?

on a far more basic level than momus's analysys: for me, the thing that always stuck out (literally) in the be my wife video is bowie's teeth. i could be remembering this wrongly, but ISTR several shots in which the fixed, desperate grin is pretty much the focus. there was a truth, an honesty about those teeth.

as for the thread: come on. low. there is no question there. heroes is merely a great album. low is LOW. it is ... unimpeachable. it is perfect.

I am really enjoying all the stuff from this era on the Stage reissue. "Beauty & The Beast" and the instrumentals especially.

Both albums are great though, but "Low" is my fave Bowie album.

I'll split my vote: first side goes to Low, second side goes to Heroes.

Unleach the hounds!

But Low is the better album, more extreme in its pop-soundtrack divide, more concise, less "rock" more "soul" in terms of the base materials for its songs...

Much as James Brown begat MC Hammer

Oh, and I agree completely w/Ned's choice waaay upthread. "Heroes" for me.

Except I hear nothing of Blur in anything by Blur. "Trouble In The Message Center" is "Heroes"-by-numbers though.

If you mean that Brown taught Hammer how to wear ridiculous clothes and sing/shout banalities over beats, then yeah.

What's going on with the reissues? I expected to see a 30th Anniversary double deluxe just like the early albums a couple years ago, but no show. There's a couple pricey 2007 issues, but I don't know if they're remastered from the 1999 Virgin version. My Rykodisc Low is sounding a little brittle to me.

There's a brand new book out about the Berlin era by Thomas Jerome Seabrook called Bowie in Berlin: A New Career In A New Town. I flipped through it. Nice pictures, but it doesn't seem to improve on the Berlin section in David Buckley's Strange Fascination. Also released since the last post, David Bowie Under Review: 1976-1979. It's next in my Netflix, will report back.

I wonder how the albums would have differed if Bowie convinced Michael Rother (Neu!, Harmonia) to join in.

The instrumentals would've been better.

Lodger tends to be overshadowed by these two, but it has a few of my favourite Bowie tunes on (Fantastic Voyage, Yassassin, Look Back in Anger). To be honest I find the instrumental tracks on Low and Heroes to be a bit of a waste, as I adore his voice so much.

Lodger's the best of the 3, and I think that's also something of an ILM consensus, not that that counts for owt.

Between Low and Heroes - Sons of the Silent Age is my favourite track on either album, so Heroes wins.

i don't understand the ILX love for "sons of the silent age," i think it's the weakest track on heroes.

Lodger's the best of the 3, and I think that's also something of an ILM consensus, not that that counts for owt

it is? i missed that meeting.

i missed that meeting too; hence the poll on the other thread :)

"Beauty and the Beast" -- my favorite cut from "Heroes" and after all these years, still can't figure out what Eno did to treat Fripp's guitar that way. First take, too.

Fripp: "Currently we are in dispute with the David Bowie estate and PPL, who refuse to acknowledge that RF is a featured performer on both Heroes and Scary Monsters albums."

I had to ask on FB what PPL does (which I forgot); it collects royalties for performers on songs, rather than just the writers. A bit stupid for the estate to not own up to this; also a bit lame for Fripp to air his dirty laundry on FB the way he did on this topic, it makes him look unbelievably petty.

Has he ever cared how he looks?

true, i just don't know what he expects to get out of that post.

Not sure, but I think this is the same tack he took when he had that brief dispute with Kanye over Schizoid Man royalties. Ask nicely and privately once and then air it out. Never again with the Endless Grief.

someone posted this on stupid steve hoffman forums which clears this all up: "At the Crimson pre-show last night, David Singleton explained that PPL informed DGM that Fripp would no longer be paid royalties as a 'featured' performer on Heroes since the production credits do not list him as such. PPL cited a law that went into effect around 1990 with regards to this issue and are arguing that even though Heroes was made in the 70's the ruling can be applied retroactively. It's another case of the music industry ripping off the artist. Lawyers for the Bowie estate are siding with this ruling.
The fact that Tony Visconti and others involved in the making of Heroes acknowledge that Fripp was a co-creator and collaborator on Heroes, as well as interview transcripts of Bowie saying the same, is being disregarded since the album does not use the words 'featured' artist/player/etc.
It's easy to see why Fripp is pissed."

I don't get what Bowie's estate gets out of siding with PPL on this.

Low is better

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xC9FkNJt1Q

Spanish language version of “Heroes” icymi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xqmu84ltzl0

"Heroes" is stronger if you want songs: Low basically doesn't have any. You know it's rough sledding when your lead single is "Sound and Vision" (fourteen lines of lyrics, and no chorus) because it's the only thing on the disc (along with "Be My Wife") that even resembles a pop song. It's mainly compositions and fragments.

But Low's instrumental side is better. "Warszawa" thru "Subterraneans" gives Side B a nice arc, while "Heroes" has a slight sense of fizzling out at the end. And I think Low has to get points because it came first.

Both are amazing; among the best things he ever did.

not sure abt yr definition of songs

heroes has 1 really really great tune but low has an almost perfect side of tunes

low 4 me

heroes is probably my fave bowie tune though, i know that's a super obvious pick but there you go