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12 Bowie albums in 12 months: Scary Monsters and Super Creeps

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Dave Amitri on Scary Monsters and Super Creeps

While the rest of you have been compiling your best of 2021 and trying to avoid Last Christmas by Wham I’ve been listening to Scary Monsters and Super Creeps. My final Bowie album of the year.

Released in September 1980 just as many of his musical disciples were hitting their stride. Adam and The Ants were about to go full dressing up box with Kings of the Wild Frontier, The Associates had just released The Affectionate Punch, Visage were readying their eponymous album for release (more on them later) while Japan would release Gentlemen Take Polaroids in November 1980. All these bands and more had listened and watched and taken influence musically and visually from Bowie and now here they were releasing albums alongside him. What would Bowie come up with? His 12th album in under 10 years, 10 years of wildly varying styles and sounds that delighted, inspired, baffled and frustrated the music buying public in equal measure now competing with those he influenced.

There was a real hope that I could sign off on a 100% stone cold classic, where all the stars aligned and I could declare myself fully indoctrinated into the David Bowie fanclub. So with a mixture of excitement, trepidation and some relief that my self imposed Bowiethon was coming to an end I dropped the needle (pressed play on Spotify), sat back in my favourite armchair (the drivers seat of my car on my journey to work) and once again immersed myself in a Bowie album (listened when I could between work and life)….

The cover image was instantly recognisable and the track listing favourable, four songs I knew, two of which were massively popular. This would be blast.

It’s No Game (Pt 1) kicks off with a sound effects intro that has hints of Depeche Mode and a 1,2,3,4 gear change into some spoken Japanese words that instantly put me in mind of the spoken French in Visage’s Fade To Gray. Then some guitar I recognise as Robert Fripp (get me) and then it’s all about Bowies vocal histrionics which take him from a Dave Grohl scream to the very edge of his range and back again. It’s a heady, exhilarating start as Fripp’s guitar takes centre stage in between all the vocal shenanigans.

Up The Hill Backwards next. Imagine a song that starts with Dave Edmund’s Queen Of Hearts, Buddy Holly’s Not Fade Away and Bow Wow Wow’s I Want Candy all mixed up to make the intro then drops into a rather monotone lyrical delivery over a marching drum sound reminiscent of Arcade Fire before switching back again to the mix of the intro. Yep, that’s Up The Hill Backwards. Not one of my favourites and a surprising choice for a single but very, very Bowie.

Scary Monsters and Super Creeps follows and Bowie’s lyrical acrobatics are at the fore again and it reminds me of The Psychedelic Furs Pretty In Pink in sound and vocal. Maybe a hint of Human League’s Sound Of The Crowd in the outro. There’s also the first flash of something in the whole feel of the song that increases over the next couple of tracks. We’ve arrived at the sound of the Blitz Kids….

Ashes To Ashes is so familiar to everyone there’s little I can say that can possibly bring anything new. It’s a remarkable song and it had that video that was so visually stunning and included an appearance by Steve Strange. One of those “I remember when I first saw it” moments. How could it not be an influence? Hold on to your fancy hats here Bowie lovers but it’s obvious how much Bowie’s look and sound influenced the already formed Spandau Ballet and Duran Duran. Listen to John Taylor’s bass on Save A Prayer and the bass on Ashes To Ashes. Then of course the look and style of what became known as the New Romantics….

Fashion follows and it’s such a new romantic anthem. Whenever clips are shown of The Blitz or The Rum Runner in one of the endless 80’s music documentaries the chances are the kids are dancing to Fashion. Dressed in tablecloths, bin bags and leather with striking hair and make up moving jerkily to the beat. Bowie and Roxy Music nights defined that era and spawned loads of bands that are oft derided by the same people who cite Bowie as a genius. They were his creation. Without him they would have just played guitars wearing jeans and t shirts. Fashion is an absolute tune by the way. It is however the last song of the New Romantic Genesis Trilogy. Maybe Bowie was bored of influencing a generation but there is no doubt in my mind that he had. What does surprise me is the overlap in 1980. I had it fixed in my head for some reason that Visage, Spandau Ballet and Duran Duran had been created and followed this version of Bowie entirely. Visage and Spandau released their first hits in 1980 and Duran Duran early in 1981. A really quick turn around but the influence is too obvious to ignore. Either way the whole melting pot was an incredibly exciting period for pop music and as I’ve said. It’s all down to Bowie…

Teenage Wildlife follows and to my ears is a middle of the road song that could have come from the mid seventies or the mid eighties. Bowie’s ever more desperate attempts to lift it with ever more vocal cartwheels and some hair guitar solos fail to lift it for me. Sorry…

Scream Like A Baby is another flat song that you can’t believe is from the same album as Fashion. Theatrical Bowie comes up from the footlights again before the daleks join in for a Dr Who interlude. I’m lost. You tell me what I’m supposed to hear here…

Kingdom Come is a funny little song. I’ve mentioned a few times how much Dr Robert from The Blow Monkeys must have been influenced by Bowie’s vocals. This actually sounds like Bowie is trying to mimic Dr Robert (I realise this is an analogy rendered impossible by time) such is the exaggerated vibrato in his vocal. It’s lifted by Fripp’s guitar and some interesting backing vocals but for me fails to scale the earlier heights.

Because You’re Young starts like a scene from Scooby Doo as Scooby and Shaggy try to avoid this weeks monster. It then veers of into some Stranglers keyboards and Bowie trying to build some drama. It has a decent chorus and I like the idea of Bowie going full Tarzan at the end but again, for me, it just doesn’t match the earlier part of the album.

It’s No Game (Pt.2) closes the album. It’s clear there was something profound going on in comparison to (Pt 1). It’s calmer and more considered but instantly forgettable. The last song of my Bowie odyssey and I’m none the wiser. “Children round the world put camel shit on the walls. They’re making carpets on treadmils or garbage sorting”. Seems like an apt way to close.

Oh David Bowie you scamp. Scary Monsters like so many before offers so much yet remains completely baffling to me. Maybe it’s me, maybe my narrow musical mind schooled on hooks and hits can’t see or hear what others do. Like a child staring at a Picasso enjoying the pretty colours but unable to see the depth. Then I look at Spotify and the numbers perhaps support my view. Ashes To Ashes 52 million plays , Scary Monsters 14 million, Fashion 12 million, the rest in the low millions (still millions though Dave). Scary Monsters and Super Creeps has some of the highest Bowie highs and a couple of the lowest lows. I really, really wanted to love it but it encapsulates the over riding feeling of this whole exercise in one record. Not the ending I was hoping for but when I come to write an epilogue for this project I’ll be able to appreciate it for those highs and accept the lows as part of the overall Bowie legend.

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Comments

  1. For me, it’s very similar to Van’s ‘Moondance’ album in that Side One is a wall to wall corker, and Side Two is a bit of a letdown. ‘Moondance’ fairs better though, overall, to my ears.

      • Nope. Side 2 is very weak by comparison. Noticeably so. Apparently the working idea was Bowie’s ‘Sgt Pepper’ but it clearly didn’t work out, as S Pepper, regardless of varying song quality at times definitely works brilliantly as a collective whole.

    • I’m a Bowie tragic and I agree with this. The first side really is unutterably brilliant, the second side is fine but…. apart from No Game 2 (which is great but makes zero sense outside of the context of the album) it doesn’t do it for me. I want Teenage Wildlife to be the epic it is supposed to be, and of course Fripp plays like a dream, but the song itself doesn’t quite make it. DB’s Tom Verlaine impression on Kingdom Come is actually pretty irritating. The other two songs come dangerously close to being filler.

      Fashion blew my mind when I was seven. To hear something that bizarre coming out of the radio was a life-changing moment. When I heard Fripp strangling his guitar like that I thought, ….”Is that even allowed?” He makes Hendrix sound like Hank Marvin.

  2. You are bang on with your take about the influenced catching up with the ur-influencer. Take another listen to Teenage Wildlife, it’s about exactly that (allegedly about Gary Numan in part), but it’s also in any decent Bowie top ten song list (okay, maybe top twenty).

    I love reading all these, Dave. The albums have been part of my musical DNA for 40-plus years so it’s really difficult for me to hear them fresh without any preconceptions, and that’s what makes these reviews so much fun.

  3. I’ve really enjoyed this series. I feel like I’ve heard this stuff through new ears. I love how honest you are through all of this: you describe what you hear and how you feel, not the usual received wisdom.

    And yes, Fripp is amazing on this album.

  4. It was the first Bowie album I was old enough to buy the day it came out. It’s No Game 1 is still my favourite album opener. It’s astonishing, like nothing I’d ever heard at age 15, and the album just goes on like that, opening one door after another – to funk, atonal guitars, cut-and-jumble lyrics, shouting Japanese ladies… I love it.

    I suppose I’m biased because this came out just as that moment when I was ready to go beyond chart music and three-minute singles, not the it doesn’t have a couple of those on it. It was the first album I owned that I’d dare to take to school, tucked ostentatiously into the top of my bag so the cool kids might notice it, and 41 years later I think it’s still my favourite Bowie album, and his last great one.

  5. May I thank you, Dave, for this engaging series. As a Bowie acolyte lite (as in, à la AW: ” only have x of his albums etc etc), this has opened my eyes and, a lesser extent, ears, to those albums missed out along the way, which, for me, the singles apart, meant everything after Pin Ups, which I have always loathed, and still do, until, gulp, Let’s Dance.) I have now remedied the gaps I felt I needed to fill, aka the Berlin trilogy.
    Shame you aren’t going to continue: after Let’s Dance and until The Next Day I doubt I even know the singles.

      • I didn’t. Seems to me to a bizarre idea. What’s to stop some junior Nick Kent swiping it off you and cracking it over their knee, or indeed over your own greasy bonce?

        Keep it safe at home, kids. Advertise your good taste with some tuneful whistling.

        • The only times I brought albums to school were on a couple of occasions when I flogged some I didn’t like to classmates with inferior taste… 😉
          And once I brought a Queen album (brand new) that a friend wanted to borrow. It only happened once because when she gave it back she casually said, “Oh, I dropped it and it got a small scratch, but you can barely hear it!” 🙁

      • Prep school weekly boarder 1981/2. Myself and friends were progheads (we even had a 3 piece attempt at a band for a while). We’d delight in sharing the music, artwork etc. Floyd and Genesis were the obvious titans, and I introduced Yes and King Crimson into the mix. A friend was very into ELP but they never really caught on that much with me. We all adored The Beatles of course. We’d spend many evenings up way up in the tiny music room with a piano, snare drum, cymbal, and my first acoustic guitar

          • Yes indeed. They hadn’t become ‘uncool’ even in that environment in the early 80s. I was most impressed that the Assistant Matron went to see The Stranglers at Guildford Civiic Hall. We dug them. The punk band that proggers and proto hippies could like. She was rather foxy, and liked me. I’d get the odd crafty slice of afternoon toast now and again if the coast was clear.

      • I took records to school on Fridays, when the more dedicated of the teachers would put on a 3 hour social club from 3.30, bless ’em. During the day it was always inevitable that we would compare what we’d brought in. Good times.

  7. I regard Scary Monsters as a summation of Bowie’s seventies. There isn’t anything really new, just variations of old magic tricks he’d found rummaging through his bottom drawer. It feels like a conclusion rather than a beginning. For the first time, a Bowie album didn’t seem to be coming to us mortals from some point in the future. And you are quite right, Dave, Side One is way better than Two. Kingdom Come and Because You’re Young are a struggle, proving conclusively that Pete Townshend does not belong on a Bowie album.

    I agree with most of your assessment, however, I love Teenage Wildlife because it’s possibly Bowie’s first mid-life crisis, brought on by a visit to The Blitz. It’s a barbed gift to his successors, the longest track on the album and by no means an easy listen. Fripp actually attempts to reduce its prickliness, softening his “Heroes” solo. Both Roy Bittan who plays piano and Chuck Hammer guitar synthesiser bring an old-fashioned Rock feel. But, mainly, Bowie sounds as if he’s having a nervous break-down. Teenage Wildlife is epic, a stadium filler, a Springsteenesque performance.

    The saddest aspect of Scary Monsters for me is the end of George Murray and Dennis Davis, his finest ever rhythm section. The detail they add to Scream Like A Baby, for example, I find spellbinding. Fashion was the last track they recorded. Their march into the distance for the last minute and a half brings a tear to my eye.

    I was a regular at The Rum Runner around this time, when Nick Rhodes was the DJ on the Bowie/Roxy nights. I didn’t see much leather (too expensive). More make up on the men than the women, though. I sported a faux tartan pair of trousers.

  8. That’s your 12 done Dave – a rollicking ride no doubt, and have enjoyed sharing your journey.
    However, my worry at the start of this for you was “Finishing with Scary Monsters. Oh …”
    It’s not a duff album by any means – and as said above It’s No Game is a fine start to proceedings.
    For me (and I might need my tin hat at this point) of those 12 albums in 10 years, this one sits at number 12.
    (and I might need 2 tin hats here – I actually think I prefer Tonight)

      • I like Tonight. But me. Your family is a football team! It’s got a fkin cool sleeve too.

        For the more traditional view, here’s Marcello:

        https://nobilliards.blogspot.com/2014/05/david-bowie-tonight.html

        Spoiler alert: plenty to enjoy here if you really don’t like David Bowie. the famous Melody Maker review of Tin Machine II was mild compared to this, because MM were just rehashing all the trashings of DB that had been standard in the UK music press for the previous ten years. Marcello approaches Tonight, as he does everything else, with an open mind …..and nonetheless finds himself shuddering with hatred.

  9. I recall the BBC reporting that the Ashes to Ashes video cost 14 thousand pounds as that was an unfathomable amount of money for a video. It was number one for a few weeks and each time it was shown on TV, it felt like an event – there was so much in that few minutes. He didn’t perform it live at the time, all we had was the video. In terms of fashion influence, he was undoubtedly the father of the new romantic scene but Steve Strange and pals were firmly in their element and appear in the video fully-formed. What I’m saying is that Bowie had picked up on this scene and allowed *them* to influence *him* when producing the video for Ashes to Ashes and the artwork for the album – and then he stopped. I don’t recall Bowie using the clown costume and make up in that way ever again – his look reverts to normality even by the time we get to the Fashion video and the cover of the ChangesTwoBowie compilation. Job done.

    My own theory is that with the new decade approaching he knew how influential he was but was feeling old and washed up. When the New Romantics came, he jumped in quickly and made the most of his own well-established “brand”. He was bang on the money with Scary Monsters. Right place, right time.

    • The NME said at the time that 1980 was the year that Bowie “finally became a genre”.

      In the ads at the back you could get “Bowie trousers”. They looked like a pair of vertical airships.

          • That’s certainly why he left New York for Switzerland. He was scared – and if you read his promotional interviews for this album he was in a pretty dark mood about the state of the world anyway. You can hear it on It’s No Game and Up The Hill.

            John and Yoko were due to see Bowie in the Elephant Man on the night Lennon was shot, which must have given an added personal resonance for Bowie.

            He also kind of went on strike in 1981-2 because he was sitting out his RCA contract in disgust. Ironically, SMASC became the first album of his to produce three proper hit singles (actually the only one apart from Let’s Dance). And in those days, in the UK at least, hit singles really solllllllllld.

  11. Great series of articles Dave.

    Ironically, I suspect you might find the Dame’s next one Let’s Dance more to your taste. For me though, Scary Monsters was his last great album and one which hit me at just the right age (I was 13 when it was issued) to work backwards from.

  13. Nice review! For my generation SMaSC was often regarded as *the* David Bowie. Maybe it’s the influence it had on relatively turgid early 2010s indietronica. I always thought it was alright, but not much more than that. Fashion is a banger though.

  16. In the second half of the seventies Bowie’s vocal style changed then with Station To Station and Low he got the band he needed. Scary Monsters is where that era ends. Don’t think there’s much influence from anyone else with this album. It’s a continuation. I just think of it as a bigger, louder version, at least on side one. One side of brilliance is enough to make a great album I reckon. I agree side two is less impressive. Like many Bowie albums, the big single is maybe five times better than anything else on the record. Ashes To Ashes I think of like Sound And Vision in terms of class. It’s also a kind of electronic funk/soul piece like he’d done before but never better. I think the old guard struggled to adjust to the music of the new generation that took over. Bowie ended up more of a follower than a leader, trying to keep up.

        • Are we going to have the Speaking in Tongues and Naked conversation yet again? 😉

          Appropriately enough, the earliest I can remember somebody making an album designed specifically to exploit the length of the CD format was Eno’s Thursday Afternoon – 1986 I think.

          For no reason I can readily understand from that day to this, hip-hop albums suddenly became longer than standard LP length in 1988 – a spate of them came out very close to each other (PE’s Nation of Millions, A Salt With A Deadly Pepa, Schoolly D’s Smoke Some Kill, Stetsasonic’s In Full Gear). We’re looking at four different labels there, and at that time the format of choice among yer b-boy brigade was still very much vinyl, and would remain so until into the 90s. I wasn’t complaining – more bang for your buck, of course. I just don’t know why it happened.

          • There were early bonus tracks to entice us to pay twice as much as the records. These days you sometimes pay twice as much for vinyl to get less tracks

  17. Well done Dave. I’ve really enjoyed your run through the albums – and can’t wait for your summary! (Can you work out the 3 albums you’d recommend?)
    I listened to Scary Monsters a lot when it was released & far preferred it to Lodger. Now, my opinion has completely reversed. Lodger had an element of “contractual obligation”. He discovered that Stage would only count as one album to fulfilling his contract, so the co-writes, changing instruments, and backwards All the Young Dudes, were his way of finding inspiration.
    Scary Monsters was more polished & commercial, acting as a calling card for his next record deal.
    Bowie then busied himself with acting & provided RCA with the bare minimum (Baal) while the company released as much material as they could
    During the downtime, he studied how the Rolling Stones made all their money from touring & merchandise, before returning, using a known hit producer (Nile Rodgers) allowing him to take charge, produce & arrange the songs, while Bowie made a lot of money.

  18. I’d heard some hits on the radio before, but THE moment when I became aware of Bowie was when the brand new video for Ashes To Ashes was shown on TV, between two regular shows (this was unheard of at the time). It blew me away, the song, the video; I was spellbound. But I didn’t buy Scary Monsters as my first Bowie album, I bought the Best Of Bowie vinyl, which was all killer, no filler.
    I didn’t buy the actual albums until perhaps fifteen years ago (after getting the Platinum Collection on CD first), a few at a time. So I have zero nostalgic feelings towards the albums, but plenty for individual tracks. My personal favourites have become Aladdin Sane and Diamond Dogs, but none of the albums are perfect. While following your Bowie project (very entertaining and interesting!) I’ve often looked up the album in question and seen that tracks which I can’t remember, but your descriptions of makes me want to hear again to see if I agree, are tracks I’ve deleted from my computer because I didn’t like them – definite proof that I have no nostalgic attachment to the albums as artefacts!

    I’ve really enjoyed your reactions, sometimes agreeing, sometimes violently disagreeing, and I hope we’ll see more of your writing on the AW, whether a new “series” or stand-alone reviews!

    • The Best of Bowie album was perfectly timed and quite a massive improvement on the only other compo available at the time, ChangesOneBowie. So often the artist doesn’t know best. Literally.

      • When was that out, the Best of Bowie? I got into Bowie through the ChangesBowie CD version, which was a fantastic run through all the hits and important points. In hindsight there was a lot missed off, but that only made it more fun as I worked through the albums. According to Wikipedia, it came out in 1990, which seems about right. I think it was in the couple of years after that the albums started getting re-released and you could actually find them in the shops again. Here’s the tracklist:

        1- Space Oddity
        2 – John I’m Only Dancing
        3 – Changes
        4 – Ziggy
        5 – Suffragette City
        6 – Jean Genie
        7 – Diamond Dogs
        8 – Rebel Rebel
        9 – Young Americans
        10 – Fame (1990 remix!)
        11 – Golden Years
        12 – Heroes (truncated version)
        13 – Ashes to Ashes
        14 – Fashion
        15 – Let’s Dance
        16 – China Girl
        17 – Modern Love
        18 – Blue Jean

        Actually, looking at that list it’s astonishing what was missed off. No Sound and Vision! No Boys Keep Swinging! No Starman!

  21. All comments are obviously very welcome. I’m glad that some have agreed with my ramblings and equally happy that some have been left scratching their heads at what my cloth ears have heard. Those comments that have directly stated that somehow I’ve actually made a real impact with this project have blown me away. I won’t be doing this again any time soon with any other artist. I’m not sure I could but I’ll address that when I get round to the epilogue. It has exceeded all my expectations and I want to thank everyone who got involved and never left me feeling like I was just shouting to an empty room.

    • Not empty, I for one have awaited your reviews every month with some anticipation. I love the connections you make., and the fresh perspective you’ve brought to this. I sense you still don’t really see what the fuss is about with DB, but at this stage that’s hardly the point – you’ve clearly enjoyed the process* and we certainly have done.

      (*occasionally in the Franz Kafka sense)

  22. Fabulous stuff Dave – like others I have really enjoyed this series even though Bowie has been an artist I have dipped in and out of rather than followed throughout. ‘Station to Station’ is one of my all time favourite albums by anybody, but I have never heard ‘Scary Monsters’ apart from the singles on it. Your review means you’ve done it so I don’t have to. Not really – actually every review has sent me to seek out or re-listen to the album in question and this will be no exception.

  23. (I might as well post this here, rather on the “summary & mop up”)
    With “It’s No Game” Bowie finally got to use a song he’d had hanging around since 1970.

  24. I would like to say how much I have enjoyed this thread and the comment and debate it has invited. It appears that Dave is reluctant to continue with this series despite there being some demand for this. I would be happy to take this on and do a second Bowie 12 for the next year.

    My qualifications for this – 1) Massive fan of the 70’s work who stopped following post Lets Dance so would be coming to most of this with a fresh ear. 2) I’m needing a bit of a writing project as mid life and career blues are looming and in an effort to shake things up I am undertaking a couple of short writing courses (Life Writing and then Journalism).

    As to the standard of my writing and critical ear – I really cannot say – although I have been following music now since 1972 and have one or two ‘interesting’ theories of my own.

    So if that’s alright with everyone (and especially if I have Dave’s blessing) I’ll start in January with Lets Dance and take it from there.

    • Fantastic!

      I support this absolutely. In fact, there are only twelve studio albums left for the whole of the rest of his career, if you exclude Tin Machine and Toy.

      Something to look forward to in 2022. Well volunteered!

    • Oh crikey. Remember you said you’d do all 12, when March rolls around 😋

      It’s mostly fabulous after that, with some nice detours from the usual. Looking forward to these, and thank you for stepping up!

    • Hey Stan, that’s just fine with me. 12 months is enough 🙂 It will be good to hear about the next 12 from a different perspective. Look out for Bowie fatigue around May. Slight delirium by August. Massive relief come December. Good luck 👍

  25. Thanks for taking one for the team, @Stan Deely !

    (Actually, I’m really interested in this, as I’m in pretty much exactly the same position as you, having never gone beyond Let’s Dance.)

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