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An avant-garde pop album rich with tension and fear, 1980’s Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) marked a pivotal point in David Bowie’s career. Standing at the bleeding edge of the new decade between the experimental Berlin Trilogy (Low, Heroes, and Lodger) and 1983’s wildly successful Let’s Dance, it was here Bowie sought to bury the ghosts of his past and the golden decade of the 1970s to become a global superstar reaching millions of new fans.
Featuring fresh insights and exclusive interviews with close collaborators, Adam Steiner’s Silhouettes and Shadows uncovers the studio stories, meanings behind, and secret history of Scary Monsters. Steiner gives a nuanced, memorable portrait of Bowie at a personal and professional crossroads, drawing on his own struggle with addiction, growing paranoia, and political turmoil. Despite the album’s confrontational themes, it included the hit singles “Fashion” and “Ashes to Ashes,” with Bowie riding a new wave of inspiration, from the post-punk of Joy Division, The Specials’ two-tone revolution, and the stadium synth-pop of Gary Numan.
Most importantly, it marked a final goodbye to Major Tom, Ziggy Stardust, and The Thin White Duke, characters and personas that had defined his career: in this rare moment, David Bowie, the costumed clown of romance, suffering, and song, let his mask slip to reveal David Jones, the man within.
Published | 15 Jul 2023 |
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Format | Paperback |
Edition | 1st |
Extent | 298 |
ISBN | 9781493065646 |
Imprint | Backbeat |
Illustrations | 23 b/w photos |
Dimensions | 222 x 156 mm |
Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing |
Steiner writes potently and poignantly of the artist’s late-'70s personal turmoil, and comes up with a workaholic inventor at a crossroads who deals with inner madness by spewing bile, grief, the tenets of unrequited love, and a goodbye to Major Tom across one tight avant-post-punk-electronic classic. That’s a lot to chew on, and Steiner does so nobly.
Variety
Essential reading for David Bowie fans and those interested in rock-and-roll history.
Foreword Reviews
Steiner ... takes us on the thrilling, identity-splicing journey with him, and as he does so offers a compelling, vital insight into this key Bowie album with the dexterity and insight of a novelist as well of a skilled biographer.
3:AM Magazine
Full of surprises and unexpected comments and critical revelations ... gloriously readable and informative.
International Times
[Steiner] details the creation of this oft-overlooked LP ... There is quite a lot to be learned within the pages of Silhouettes and Shadows.
BraveWords
Adam Steiner has written an in-depth discussion of David Bowie’s ‘last great album’ … It’s a convincing argument and backed up with an in-depth analysis of the social, cultural and political landscape of the time … Steiner seems to have read everything anyone’s written about Bowie’s work, and he’s also done his own interviews too.
Louder Than War
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