Lou Reed's Berlin vs David Bowie's "Heroes"

[Taverner]

I think they both strike at the same issue (doomed lovers in Berlin, in the days of the wall)

But at the same time, they are two separate takes

Different stories

Still doomed

Still Berlin

But different...

[miscsoc]

1. voted heroes since i have never heard berlin

my dad keeps telling me to listen to stuff by lou reed so i'll ask him about it.

[Taverner]

2. Listen to it - its amazing

As good as Heroes

Possibly better (?)

[mitchum]

4. Your dad has very good taste

listen to your father :)

[Book Lover]

6. Listen to your father!

Here, I'll help:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qi3TzhYm-1Q

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYEC4TZsy-Y

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvY0vGOzCSA (live!!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FdWPeHFAMk

[mitchum]

3. I honestly couldn't choose...

even with a gun to my head

[Sebastian Doyle]

5. Gotta go with Bowie

Who else could write "I wish I could swim like dolphins" in a "love song" and get away with it?

[Taverner]

7. and make "I get drunk all the time" become a sigh of relief...

[Amerigo Vespucci]

8. Apples and oranges

"Transformer" by Victor Bockris is probably the best book I've read about Reed, because it acknowledges him for who he is, but doesn't approach the subject with the star-struck awe and softball analysis of too many similar "rock star bios." Bockris is obviously a fan, but he doesn't go easy on reed...not by a long shot.

The short version of the Reed-Bowie dynamic, in Bockris' mind, is:

1). With "Transformer," Bowie guided Reed to his first post-Velvets hit, something which gains even greater significance in the wake of the disaster known as "Reed's first solo album"

2). Bowie needed Reed's sleaze, his street-level cred.

So it wasn't so much a friendship as a businessa agreement from two guys who both needed something from one another.

But my guess is that Reed's been to places, in real life and in his own mind, that would scare the living piss out of Bowie.

"Berlin" was brutal and misunderstood, which drove Reed into the whole "Rock & Roll Animal" phase, which drove him to progressive levels of the downward spiral, which ultimately and inexplicably led to his rebirth and resurrection.

Bowie didn't go through any of that. He's had periods of albums that sucked simply because they sucked and were uninspired, not because he was dragging hismself through his own personal, self-destructive Hell.

Apples and oranges.

:toast:

[Taverner]

9. Not to knock Reed, but I think Bowie's been to some scary places too

Consider LA 1975-76 where he lived on a diet of milk, red peppers and cocaine - saved his finger and toenail clippings in a fridge, and when he wasn't cowering in a corner scared out of his mind he was drawing pentagrams and trying to travel from Kether to Malkulth.

Of course, like Reed, he channeled his fears and angst into music, the product being "Station to Station," one of his greatest albums.