Marking
its 45th anniversary today is David Bowie's 13th studio LP, and last of
the "Berlin Trilogy", Lodger, which was released on May 25th, 1979.
Though the bromance between Bowie & Eno was cooling off, tempering
the reception of the LP at the time of its release, retrospectively, it
has become recognized as one of his most underrated albums.
The
"Berlin" era began when Bowie and Iggy Pop recused themselves from the
rock 'n' roll fast-lane and escaped to France and then Germany near the
end of 1976. Both were looking to dry out from their respective bad
habits. In the case of Bowie, it was a gargantuan cocaine addiction
that left him emotionally hollow and physically whittled down to a frail
stick. Iggy, on the other hand, had become a professional junkie, with
the result being that his band, The Stooges, had disintegrated by the
middle of the decade. Their efforts to get their shit together ended up
resulting in a string of remarkable albums, including The Idiot and
Lust For Life, for Iggy, and Low and "Heroes" for Bowie. But by the
back end of 1978, Bowie and principal collaborator Brian Eno's creative
jive was starting to run out of gas, albeit they were still committed to
knocking out one more album to cap off their adventures.
Work
on Lodger began in September of 1978 with a four month break from
touring giving them the chance to get back into the studio. They
assembled essentially the same creative team as the previous album: Tony
Visconti, Carlos Alomar, Dennis Davis and George Murray. A new
addition was future King Crimson guitarist Adrian Belew, who Bowie had
"poached" from Frank Zappa's latest tour.
In
order to push the creative boundaries of the album, Bowie and Eno
leaned heavily into Eno's Oblique Strategies system, which was a
collection of customized playing cards containing vague suggestions that
could be randomly drawn whenever anyone felt they were hitting a
creative wall and needed a nudge in an unanticipated direction. Using
this process, the musicians would receive instructions such as to swap
instruments or play a familiar musical theme backwards. Belew was, at
one point, asked to record guitar solos without listening to any of the
music or having even an indication of the key to play in. While this
methodology could spur innovation, it was not always popular with some
of the musicians, who were pushed to work well outside their comfort
zones. None of the songs would even have lyrics until the very end of
the process, when Bowie took all the musical backings to the Record
Plant studio to record his vocals.
The
results of these sessions turned out to be rather different than the
preceding two LPs and their mix of vocal and instrumental tracks. All
the songs used for Lodger ended up with vocals, and the focus was on
more pop song structures, though the feel was decidedly subversive
throughout. Musically, the tracks ventured into a variety of styles,
including Afro-rhythms, reggae, atonal post-punk discord and Middle
Eastern motifs. The lyrical themes were split on each side of the
record between concepts of travel on the first side and social critiques
on the second.
For the album's
cover, photographer Brian Duffy shot Bowie in a tiled bathroom looking
like an accident victim, heavily made up with an apparently broken nose
and a bandaged hand. This was inspired by the self-portraits of Egon
Schiele. While the facial injuries were achieved with makeup and
prosthetic appliances, the hand bandage was covering a real burn wound
Bowie acquired earlier that day from some hot coffee. Call it a bit of a
"happy accident"? Bowie was supported by a metal frame while the
camera was positioned overhead in order to create the gravity defying
final image, with Bowie looking like a fly that's been smacked by a
giant swatter. At Bowie's request, the image was taken in low
resolution by a Polaroid SX-70 type camera.
For
the album's singles, innovative videos were shot for both D.J. and Boys
Keep Swinging, the latter featuring Bowie in a series of drag outfits
ranging from a '50s bobby-soxer, to a movie glamour queen to a matronly
"Betty Davis" type character, all of whom end the video ripping off
their wigs and smearing their lipstick in a show of defiance. It's
gender bending at a time when drag was nowhere near the mainstream form
of entertainment it is today.
At
the time of its release, the pendulum of critical opinion had shifted
from the universal praise bestowed on "Heroes" to a muddle of middling
approval or outright disdain from some who felt it was a stop-gap album
and dismissed it as a faltering miss-step after the previous album's
confident successes. The consensus was that it was the weakest of the
triptych of Berlin LPs, losing the focus and clarity of the previous
releases. Yet it has undergone significant reappraisal in later years,
with critics and fans giving it a second listen. The album received a
complete remix in 2017, which helped to revive interests. Both Bowie
and Visconti were never quite satisfied with the original mix, and the
updated version does actually offer some clarity and body that is
lacking in the original.
A few
years ago, I wrote a piece on this album from a more personal
perspective, looking at my relationship with it, how it was my first
Bowie record and how it has remained one of my favourites throughout his
career. You can find that piece here.
