Tony Visconti has been bearing David Bowie's albums aback Space Oddity in 1969. They've formed calm on abounding of Bowie's greatest triumphs, including Heroes, Young Americans and Scary Monsters. Afterwards a continued break, they abutting armament afresh in the aboriginal 2000s for Heathen and Reality. Two years ago, he started alive with Bowie on his long-awaited new album, The Next Day.
Rolling Stone batten to Visconti about the pair's abstruse sessions, how medieval English history aggressive some of the songs and why it's absurd that Bowie will bout – admitting a individual appearance charcoal possible. As the ambassador noted, his added longtime collaborator, Morrissey, has the adverse plan. . . but he'll get to that.
Was there anytime a point over the accomplished few years area you anticipation that Bowie would never almanac again?I was a little afraid afterwards he had his affection condition. He had a little alarm himself. I didn't allege to him for a year afterwards that. He was just convalescent and just not talking to anybody. But I was one of the aboriginal humans he emailed afterwards and we were steadily in acquaintance aback then. But he never absolutely brought up music until two years ago. So he never said to me he retired, and every time I saw him in person, he looked in absolutely acceptable health.
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All these rumors started traveling about about his health. Every time I had cafeteria with him, or coffee with him, I'm searching at him and my baby old acquaintance was searching absolutely good. But music didn't absorption him until two years ago; that's if he fabricated the call. He said, "How would you like to accomplish some demos?" And I was a little shocked, absolutely honestly; it was just so casual. It was just the next affair in the discussion.
How did the action begin?I was alive on addition activity in London, and he didn't apperceive that. He said, "Well, if are you traveling to get back?" I said, "In a few days." The next morning afterwards I returned, I was in the flat with him arena bass. We had Sterling Campbell on drums, Gerry Leonard on guitar and David on keyboards. We were in this little flat down in the East Village accomplishing demos for a week. I was avidity myself. I couldn't accept it was absolutely happening. From nothing, appropriate into this audience situation.
Did he accept fleshed-out songs at this point?Yes, he wrote them at home. He had an eight- or 16-track agenda recorder. They were absolutely fleshed out. He had nice bass bandage account and boom patterns. We bound took down the names of the chords and we scribbled it out on paper. Gerry Leonard and I apprehend from the ambit sheet. The allowance was about eight-by-eight, which included a boom kit. We were on top of anniversary other, asthmatic for air afterwards an hour or two.
What sparked all this? He had been gone for so abounding years at this pointHe just said, "I feel like autograph again." I don't apperceive continued above-mentioned to that he began writing. He just came up with about eight songs.
How abounding canicule did you absorb demoing in that East Village studio?We spent 5 days, and we didn't almanac annihilation until the endure day. We just kept autograph down notes. On the fifth day, it was harder to try to bethink what we did on the aboriginal day. But we got them down and this guy at the flat had a basal Pro Tools rig, and we got them down. This is November 2010. Afresh he abolished for four months and said, "I'm gonna alpha autograph now." So he wrote added songs and afresh he fleshed those out even more. He came up with lyrics and melodies, which he didn't accept at first. But that's archetypal of every almanac I started to plan with him. Scary Monsters, every anthology started out with maybe one accomplished song and 10 ideas, so this is typical.
What happened next?In April of 2011 we went into a city New York studio. We alone formed for two-week periods. We would yield as continued as two months off afterwards anniversary period, and he would go and address some added stuff. I would accept to it and get some ideas, account out some overdub things, and we'd be in connected advice during those periods. So this is about 18 months ago. If you added up all the weeks in the studio, we apparently in fact spent three-and-a-half months.
You've said that the aboriginal single, "Where Are We Now," isn't like any added song on the album. Do the added songs attending aback on his activity like that one? Not really; that's the alone one. It's absolutely the alone one of its kind. Aggregate abroad on the anthology is affectionate of observations. He's autograph in the third person. Some of them accord to his life, but some of them are things like amusing commentary. He was account a lot of medieval English history books, and he came up with one medieval English history song. That's the appellation track, "The Next Day." It's about somebody who was a tyrant, actual insignificant; I didn't even apperceive who he was talking about. But if you apprehend the lyrics, it's absolutely a alarming story.
You've said there are 5 rockers on the album.Yeah. "The Next Day" rocks out. Same with "The Stars (Are Out Tonight)" – that rocks out, too.
Are the non-rockers added mellow? What's their vibe?They're added funky, mid-tempo songs. Actual evocative. "Dirty Boys," the additional song on the album, is actual sleazy.
Sleazy in what sense?It's aphotic and it's sexy. There's a absurd sax solo. You know, David plays baritone sax, but he arrive his acquaintance Steve Elson to do the baritone on this album. I anticipate Steve was in the Saturday Night Live band. He's a little guy, and he's got a huge baritone sax, and he plays this bedraggled abandoned in it that sounds like stripper music from the 1950s. Old bump-and-grind stripper music . . . It wouldn't be out of abode on Young Americans.
Tell me about "Dancing Out in Space."That's a actual uptempo one. It's got a Motown exhausted to it, but the blow of it is absolutely psychedelic. It's got actual chiffon vibe. There's a guy alleged David Torn who plays guitar, who we use; he comes with huge amounts of accessories that he creates these aural landscapes. He uses them in a bedrock ambience with all that ambient sound, and he's angle his tremolo arm and all that. It's just crazy, absolutely crazy complete on that track.
How about "Boss of Me?"That is one of the slower, blue ones. It's absolutely solid. There's a little Young Americans in there. But that's absolutely not able . . . It's a new affectionate of administration for him, melodically. Doesn't complete like archetypal Bowie, that track. But it's a actual acceptable track.
OK. Acquaint me about "Heat."Well that's the afterpiece of the anthology and it's actual dramatic. And I'm not absolutely abiding what he's singing about on it, but it's a archetypal Bowie ballad. He's singing in his handsomest voice, a actual deep, actual aureate voice. And I can't accord too abundant abroad about it because honestly, I don't apperceive absolutely what it's about, if it's about getting in a absolute bastille or getting confined in your mind. Again, it's absolutely not about him; he's singing as the articulation of somebody.
Tell me about "I'd Rather Be High."There's a few songs about apple wars, about soldiers. One is "How Does the Grass Grow" and it's about the way that soldiers are accomplished to annihilate added soldiers, how they accept to do it so heartlessly. "How Does the Grass Grow" is allotment of a carol that they're accomplished as they attempt their bayonets into a dummy. "I'd Rather Be High" is about a soldier who's appear out of the war and he's just burnt out, and rather than acceptable a animal getting again, I anticipate he laments, "I'd rather be high/I don't wish to know/I'm aggravating to abolish these thoughts from my mind."
Who absolutely is the bandage on the album?We had two drummers. The capital bagman was Zachary Alford, and Sterling Campbell played on several tracks, too. It's unfortunate. Sterling was at the audience sessions in the alpha but afresh he didn't apperceive if the anthology was gonna start, and he already committed to a bout with the B-52s. We alleged Zach in to acting for him, and Zack played amazing drums on the album. But Sterling is in there as able-bodied on songs like "Valentine's Day" and "(You Will) Set the Apple on Fire," which is addition steamer, addition big bedrock song on the album.
Bass was predominantly Gail Ann Dorsey, and she played phenomenally able-bodied on the album, and she aswell did some advancement vocals with David. The added bass amateur who played on about four or 5 advance was Tony Levin. The guitars are Gerry Leonard who played on Heathen and Reality, and he's David's music director. David Torn on the added ambient guitar. And afresh we got Earl Slick to play some absurd guitar solos and abundant guitar on some tracks. I played bass on the anthology for two songs, and that's about it. David played his own keyboards; he played aswell some acoustic guitar, some electric guitar as well.
How harder was it to accumulate this a secret?It was actual simple to accumulate it a abstruse because we're actual loyal to him. I've accepted him 45 years, and everybody knew him for added than 10 years in the band. We just adulation the guy. He said, "Keep it a secret, and don't acquaint anybody. Not even your best friend." I said, "Can I acquaint my girlfriend?" He says, "Yes, you can acquaint your girlfriend, but she can't acquaint anybody." So everybody had to explain why they were abrogation for plan in the morning, you apperceive area they were traveling and who they were recording with.
The absolute ambush was just not cogent even your best friend. Bowie admirers are just capricious – if they apprehend account like this, the awning would accept been destroyed years ago. Now one getting did aperture it, but cipher believed him . . .
Who?Robert Fripp! He was asked to play on it, he didn't wish to do it and afresh he wrote on his blog that he was asked. And cipher kinda believed him. It was a little flurry for a few days, but anybody said, "How could that be true? We haven't heard it from anyone else?"
The big question: Do you anticipate Bowie will tour? He says that he will alone play if he feels like it, but no tour. Like, if capital to do the odd appearance in New York or, I don't know, London, he would if he acquainted like it. And he fabricated that actual bright to the characterization that he wasn't traveling to bout or do any affectionate of ridiculously continued anthology promotion. It was his abstraction to just bead it at midnight on his altogether and just let things avalanche.
Do you absolutely anticipate it's accessible he'd do just one show?It's possible, if he feels like it. I don't know. I batten to him two canicule ago and he said, "I'm absolutely determined I'm not gonna do a tour." And he said, "If I might, I ability do one show." But who knows when.
The album awning is array of arresting . . . I alone just got that. I wasn't abiding that was the cover.
It's real.I anticipation some fan fabricated a antic cover.
I admitting that too, but it's real.[Laughs]
Thoughts on that?I anticipate it's great! It gives him a nice amplitude to assurance his autograph in the average of it.
Do you anticipate that you and Morrissey will anytime plan calm again?Hopefully we will. I'm traveling to see him Friday night in Brooklyn. We email a lot. We allocution a lot. He's actual afraid to accept a accord with anybody. 'Cause nowadays, the botheration is, if a characterization signs you – appropriate now, he has no characterization – so if I assurance a new characterization deal, he has to assurance a 360 deal. They wish a section of everything. If you address a book, if you address a song, if you're in a movie, they wish allotment of your fee for all these things. So that's the accord that the big labels are alms now and that's because sales are so low and they accept to accomplish up their money some way. He's absolutely adjoin that. He's old-school. In fact I don't accusation him.
He could cull a Radiohead and column it online for a fee.I know. He's aswell old academy about paying for it himself. Traditionally, the label's gotta pay for him. I accept that, and there's an old adage in appearance business that you never advance your own money in a show. It kinda follows assimilate recording to some extent, but that attitude has changed.
He could aswell assurance to an indie characterization that wouldn't accomplish him assurance a 360. . . But above that, he has abundant admirers that he'd accomplish a killing charging $10 for an anthology online?
Yeah, he'll accomplish his money back, yeah. He's arena his new songs onstage, they're getting recorded on corpuscle phones every night of the anniversary and they're admirable songs.
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