Dancing about architecture There were three propositions concerning the first album I should write about. In the order of entry: Patti Smith, Califone and David Bowie. Me myself I actually wanted to start with the Thin White Rope. All three suggested albums are extremely difficult to review. The Patti Smith anthology is about 160 minutes long and I have only listened to the first disc with the classic "hits". The Califone disc I have not yet gotten into completely. I need some more time for those two. In the meantime I even received another CD: Lucky 7 by Reverend Horton Heat. It was the bonus for subscribing to the German Rolling Stone. I start with David Bowie's Low then: Probably the most complex of the lot. I have never been a fan of David Bowie, the only albums I got from him are from the nineties and certainly not his most accomplished. Low is the first album of the so-called Berlin trilogy which is regarded by many as his creative climax. Philip Glass the composer of pleasant-sounding minimal music even did an orchestral version of it some time ago, an honour only very few pop records receive from the "classical" (in German I would have said "E-Musik" for earnest music) camp. I can't really do justice to Low as it is an album so full of ideas and depth that I will probably revise and enlarge my review in the future when I hopefully will have digged a little deeper. For example right now it is absolutely impossible for me to rate it. I can't say that I hate it but I can't say neither that I love it nor that it leaves me cold. It is a rather difficult listen that is for sure. And it will probably grow on me. Low was released in 1977 and stands somehow very apart from its time. There is hardly a trace of glamrock which Bowie helped defining in the first half of the seventies. And there is absolutely no sign of punkrock which had just started. What can be heard in Low is the very strong influence of Brian Eno's sound sculpting later known as ambient. Eno collaborated as composer, played most of the synthesizers and according to the liner notes sang (does anyone know on which song?). The eleven tracks of the record can be split into two parts. The first six songs are comparatively (!) conventional rock music with Bowie singing (except on the brilliant sparkling instrumental opener "Speed of Life"). With "A New Career in a New Town" the second part starts. The listener is now drawn into ambient soundscapes with a first culmination in the next song "Warszawa" from where Ian Curtis and bandmates got the name of the first incarnation of Joy Division. It is a weird piece of music co-written by Eno. The first four minutes are dominated by a calm slightly vibrating brooding synthesizer sound. Out of nowhere unintelligible vocals join in which hint to world music as for example Peter Gabriel's later soundtrack Passion. The next track "Art Decade" is characterised by long sustained notes and strange underwater noises. The last two tracks have an almost mystic feel to them. "Weeping Wall" with xylophone and a humming choir at the end sounds very spacy. The last song "Subterraneans" is the most orchestral one. It is later on accentuated by baritone (?) saxophone play and has Bowie singing seemingly disjointed words. It finishes on a brighter tone with an open end. Almost like a jazz improvisation. I much prefer the second half of the record to the first as I have always found David Bowie's voice slightly irritating. That part is also much more experimental and avant-garde than the first. The 38+ minutes of Low don't contain any filler and don't sound dated at all today. That probably is a sign that this is a milestone in pop music. Sorry for these incoherent incomplete (hardly anything on the first half of the record which has challenging lyrics) ramblings. I should probably have started with a simpler record like UB40 for example.