DAVIDBOWIE: ALBUMTOALBUM

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S5 Ep4: Gail Ann Dorsey on Young Americans (Part One) Feb 23, 2025

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Buckle up listeners, we’ve got a very special guest in today and it’s none other than Gail Ann Dorsey, legendary session musician/singer/songwriter and bassist who accompanied David Bowie on tour and in the studio between 1995 and 2013. In that time, she became a core of the Bowie band, loved by David, bandmates and fans alike for her innate musicality, soaring vocals and cool, calm and stylish presence on stage.
Gail’s story stretches out way before Bowie, and has thrived afterwards too. In this episode, the first of two, we talk about Gail’s solo career, growing up in a big family in 1970s West Philadelphia, digging the city’s sizzling soul and R&B scene, as well as immersing herself in the best of the era’s music, from solo singer songwriters to the thunderous sounds of Cream, Queen and Slade – and that British guy, who had come to Philadelphia in 1975 to record an album that blew her mind…
Follow Gail’s current activities on her Facebook and Instagram and check out her solo discography and concert dates on Spotify here
Many thanks to Leah Kardos for the original music used in this podcast!
Image courtesy Mark Adams

S5 Ep3: Nicholas Pegg on Tonight (Part Three) Feb 02, 2025

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Nicholas Pegg and I are back for the final instalment of our three part extravaganza about David Bowie's 1984 album Tonight and its a good one - you'll have never heard anyone explore the joys of 'Tumble and Twirl', 'I Keep Forgetting' and 'Dancing With the Big Boys' in quite such vivid detail before. In making this series of episodes, I've changed my mind about 'Tonight' to some extent. Going in, I'd dismissed it as a load of old horse manure, but having heard what Nick has to say has made me if not love it, at least appreciate it a bit more, especially, 'Tumble and Twirl', 'Loving the Alien' and even 'Don't Look Down'. Still can't be doing with 'God Only Knows' though. Some things will never change.
Thanks to Nicholas Pegg for his time and generosity in sharing his insights and research into 'Tonight', a huge thanks to Leah Kardos for crafting the beautiful music bookending this and previous 'Tonight' episodes and of course thanks to YOU, dear listener, for taking the time to reassess this most esoteric and divisive of albums.

S5 Ep2: Nicholas Pegg on Tonight (Part Two) Jan 27, 2025

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Nicholas Pegg and I continue our voyage into the heart of darkness as we venture deeper into the depths of Bowie's 1984 album 'Tonight'. Can we find our way back from the sadness of 'God Only Knows' into the light? Will there be redemption with Tina Turner on the title track? How do the ongoing Iggy covers fare? And what on earth does the surreal 1960 TV series 'The Strange World of Gurney Slade' have to do with the wonderful 21 minute mini epic 'Jazzin For Blue Jean' produced to promote one of the album's clutch of solid gold bangers? It's real, it's 'Tonight' and we're here for it.

S5 Ep1: Nicholas Pegg on Tonight (Part One) Jan 19, 2025

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Returning to albumtoalbum for a long-overdue reunion is renowned actor, occasional Dalek and author of The Complete David Bowie, Nicholas Pegg.
Nick's an old friend of the podcast and has tackled some of David Bowie's most acclaimed albums in previous episodes - as well as exploring entire eras (our 198More series of chats take an overview of Bowie's singles, soundtracks and various off-extramural activities 1981 - 1989). Now, he's back to tackle one of the most challenging artefacts in the Bowie oeuvre - the much-maligned 1984 album Tonight.
A rag-tag bag of semi-sentient cover versions, marimbas, an absolutely bracingly brilliant long-form promo video (very 1984) a couple of superb Bowie evergreens, some blue-and-brown-eyed reggae and uncharacteristically insipid production, Tonight might not be the worst album of 1984, but it fell short of what long time Bowie fans had come to expect. Clearly geared to what Bowie assumed were his new Let's Dance-era fans, the album was recorded almost straight after the massive Serious Moonlight tour, without the satisfying thwack that conceptual cohesion and creative conviction characterising Bowie's best work to date.
Here, Bowie opted to work with a young British producer, Derek Bramble, who had little awareness of Bowie's work. As Nick says in this episode, Bramble's lack of public profile might have appealed to Bowie, after the megawatt presence of Nile Rogers on Let's Dance. Fair enough. But then, getting happening, in-demand producer, most recently with The Police, Hugh Padgham on board, in the junior role of engineer, wasn't Bowie's brightest idea.
In this episode, we kick off by looking back at the lead-up to the album's recording (in Canada), a cast of characters including Derek Bramble, Hugh Padgham, Iggy Pop and Carlos Alomar and the album's first three tracks - Loving The Alien, Don't Look Down and the unforgettable cover version of the Beach Boys' God Only Knows.
With thanks to Nicholas Pegg, and Leah Kardos for the background music. During the conversation, we have references from Chris O'Leary, Charles Shaar Murray and that Bowie resource par excellence, bowiebible.com

S4 Ep7: Earl Slick on Station to Station Jan 28, 2024

Show notes

Back in 1974, Earl Slick was a 22-year old jobbing session guitarist fast developing a reputation for his supple, searing style and versatility in all idioms. Hired by Bowie to join his Diamond Dogs tour, Slick then had to suddenly pivot from apocalypto-rock to sleek Philly soul at a moment's notice - but acquitted himself so well, he was invited to play on tracks destined for Young Americans before forming the core band, alongside Carlos Alomar, Dennis Davis, George Murray and Roy Bittan to cut the extraordinary Station to Station, in LA, during October 1975.
Bringing his charismatic flair to the sessions, Slick rose each time to Bowie's demands for an esoteric sonic palette, turning in one bravura performance after another despite, by his own admission, almost matching Bowie's ridiculous drug consumption levels at the time. Although his boss's directions could be at times gnomic - Bowie instructed him on one occasion to simply play a Chuck Berry riff repeatedly throughout a track - the pair sparked off each other, forging a deep bond. Despite a contretemps between Bowie's management and Slick at the end of the sessions, Earl returned to the Bowie band in 1983 for Serious Moonlight and then again during the early 2000s, when he became again, a key member of the group, up to The Next Day.
Today, Station to Station stands out as one of Bowie's finest records, the pivot from Young Americans' funk and soul to the electronic abstractions and experimental textures which would emerge fully with Low. Despite the frenzied sessions, the album's six tracks are each mini-masterpieces.
In this episode, the first of two devoted to the album, we take a leisurely stroll down memory lane and begin with Earl's reminiscences of pre-Beatles America, his first audition for Bowie and Visconti, bafflement at the Philly soul era, meeting and forgetting (and then meeting again) John Lennon, and the intense sessions that made up the first side of Station to Station.
Thanks to Earl, Oliver and of course the regal Tank for all their time and help in assembling this episode and as ever, please do let me know what you think of our chat and share this podcast far and wide!
Follow Earl Slick on Instagram and Facebook
Intro/Outro music by Leah Kardos

S4 Ep6: Leah Kardos on The Next Day Part 4 Dec 31, 2023

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In this episode we analyse The Next Day Extra, November 2013's accompanying min-album chock-full of tasty treats, rambunctious remixes and some songs that inexplicably never made it onto the album proper. Never mind. Now they get their moment in the sun and thanks to Leah Kardos's encyclopaedic knowledge of all things late-era Bowie, a fascinating conversation ensues in which we gallop across this collection and appreciate anew the understated and undersung treasures that await within.
Thanks again to Leah for all her time and insights and for making this conversation so enjoyable and illuminating. You can find out more about her work here and follow her here on Twittex.
The opening and closing music on this and previous episodes is also composed by Leah - follow her musical adventures here!

S4 Ep5: Leah Kardos on The Next Day Part 3 Dec 26, 2023

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Stadium rock! Ziggy! Morrissey? John Cooper Clarke? The Singing Detective! Join author of Blackstar Theory: The Last Works of David Bowie, musician and director of The Visconti Studio Dr Leah Kardos as she continues her full-spectrum analysis of The Next Day, David Bowie's masterful penultimate album from 2013. In this episode, we look at the final three songs of the album - (You Will) Set The World On Fire, You Feel So Lonely You Could Die and brooding closer Heat.
This is the third of four episodes devoted to The Next Day and its unruly children on The Next Day Extra.

S4 Ep4: Leah Kardos on The Next Day Part 2 Aug 28, 2023

Show notes

We're back! And by we, I mean me and musician, writer and academic Leah Kardos, amongst whose many achievements is the critically-acclaimed book 'Blackstar Theory: The Last Works of David Bowie' which takes a thoughtful and informed view of Bowie's final projects. She is also a friend and trusted collaborator of Tony Visconti's, founding The Visconti Studio at London's Kingston University. Currently, Leah's working on her next book, exploring Kate Bush's 'Hounds of Love' album.
In this conversation, we continue our deep dive into The Next Day, with anecdotes, opinions, random theories and what we hope are facts, all of which will hopefully entertain you as much as they did us, in the making of this podcast.
Huge thanks this episode to bowiebible.com for tons of helpful information, a shoutout to our writing hero Chris O'Leary and thanks again to Leah for her custom-made theme music for this episode.

S4 Ep3: Leah Kardos on The Next Day Part 1 Mar 24, 2023

Show notes

The Next Day is 10. And what a sprawling, dense forest of darkness, enervation and guttural thrills it is. The perfect halfway point between the charismatic rock of Reality and ethereal elusive Blackstar, it's often overlooked and overshadowed by that monumental successor. But there is a lot here to unpack and to do it, I could think of no one better than Leah Kardos, senior lecturer in music at Kingston University where she co-founded the Visconti Studio with Tony Visconti, the leader of The Stylophone Orchestra, a frequent contributor to The Wire magazine and author of the universally acclaimed Blackstar Theory: The Last Works of David Bowie a wonderfully engaging tome that offers a rich reading of Bowie's final works through the eyes of a musician, musicologist, historian and fan.
In this, the first part of our conversation about The Next Day, Leah and I discuss the background to the album's recording, the uniquely long timespan of sessions that indicated a very different approach from Bowie and Visconti, the wealth of themes emerging in the text and quite a bit of tangential chat too along the way. And as you'll hear, this is an album that really does fascinate Kardos - she has oodles of Bowie related material including performances, talks, podcast and song analyses on YouTube that are really worth checking out too.

S4 Ep2: Mike Garson on Aladdin Sane Oct 09, 2022

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In this episode we talk to the one and only Mike Garson, pianist extraordinaire!
From playing with the Spiders from Mars to improvising one of the most extraordinary passages in pop music – that utterly frenetic piano solo in Aladdin Sane – to the elegance of 2003’s Reality - Garson was one of the only musicians to have played with Bowie across decades, sculpting the sound for Aladdin Sane, Pin Ups, Diamond Dogs, Young Americans, Black Tie White Noise, Outside, Earthling, Heathen and Reality. And, as he explains here, he was originally only hired for eight weeks…!
In this episode, Mike talks us through his story, demonstrates his process live and reflects on how, almost half a century later, people still love that solo.
Check out everything Garson here

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