Product Description

STATION TO STATION was the soundtrack to Bowie's nightlife.This time around he fashioned himself as the king of slick,the "Thin White Duke/Throwing darts in lover's eyes". This new persona enabled Bowie to show his sensual side and his affection for American soul music--something that would have seemed out of context on previous efforts.
The album's smooth vibe is evident in the funky guitar of "Golden Years", and mixed with a dangerous charm and the "side effects of the cocaine" on "Stay". Bowie had miraculously done it again--he picked up a new musical identity, and molded it to perfection.
STATION TO STATION was a refining period for Bowie.Gone was his other-worldly sexuality; The Thin White Duke was right here on Earth, no alien veneer, just a man completely run by his desires. It is then purely appropriate that the medium through which he expressed this lustful angle wouldbe soul music. Carlos Alomar's biting guitar on "Golden Years" is straight out of the James Brown catalogue, while the frantic drums and background vocals of "Stay" are pure strobe light disco.

Track Listing

1. Station To Station
2. Golden Years
3. Word On A Wing
4. TVC 15
5. Stay
6. Wild Is The Wind

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2314 in Music
• Released on: 1999-09-20
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Enhanced

Amazon.co.uk Review
An eerie dispatch from the furthest reaches of Bowie's cocaine paranoia, Station To Station has not become easier to listen to with the passing years. At this stage, Bowie was wrapped up in his peculiar--even by his standards--Thin White Duke period, which revolved largely around dressing like a fugitive war criminal and not blinking, at least not in public. Appropriate to such a detached, deranged persona, Bowie set about making what was effectively a soul record devoid of any soul whatsoever. He did it, as well. Station To Station spawned one lingering hit, in "Golden Years", but the album was littered with malevolent miracles. Bowie crooned like a replica Sinatra on "Word on A Wing" and "Wild is the Wind" and may have single-handedly invented the New Romantic movement with "TVC15". He sounds throughout on the verge of cackling dementedly and wandering off into the night; Station To Station is an absorbing postcard from somewhere you're kind of glad you haven't been. --Andrew Mueller

Customer Reviews

Less is more.
Station To Station, as many reviewers have pointed out, is a fairly short album in terms of the number of songs that are recorded on it. However - the album still clocks in at a decent length. And song for song, it's a very strong line up. Bowie's vocals are great throughout - and each tune engages the listener accordingly (even the cover of Wild is the Wind - not many male artists could pull that off with so much repressed emotion).

STS is a great listen - and I for one would rather have 6 strong songs than 11 or 12 that have been padded out (heresy it may sound but I think Aladdin Sane and Diamond Dogs are guilty of this - only by one track but it illustrates how less can sometimes be more).

But it's the mystique behind the album, the relentless progression of Bowie musically, if not socially - that grips you as you listen. Tales of him not being able to remember anything of it's recording are littered about the web - but who cares whether or not he does? If I were able to come up with an album of this quality - delivering vocals of this standard - I wouldn't care what edge of reality my life was on at that particular moment.

Diamond Dogs (despite my comment above), Young Americans and Station to Station are all singular entities, and somewhat unique - but all three contain some of Bowies most ambitious and, IMHO, best work. 5 stars, easy.

Ps The story of Iggy Pop's acid dream influencing TVC-15 is always going to bring a smile, regardless of the amount of truth in it.

Good; but not quite great
The presence of TVC15 on this record is enough to deprive it of 5 stars. That song is quite simply a stinker in the Bowie canon and should be excised somehow from the original tapes of this otherwise excellent, if rather short, album.
The best tracks on the album are "Stay" and "Word on a Wing". Stay is a colder take on songs like "Right" or "Win" from Young Americans; superb opening guitar riffs introduce a pulsating bass line leading into the coolest ever Bowie vocal performance. Word on a Wing, by contrast, is the musical prayer Madonna later aspired to, full of an emotional intensity which is rare in the Bowie of that period. It is a like a window into his dark, cochaine ridden LA period, a glimpse of the true man behind the thin white curtains.
Golden Years is Young Americanesque, and slightly out of place on this record.
The title track is a great sprawling mess of a song, clearly geared towards taking the stadia by storm on the 76 world tour.

Finally, there is the saccharine sweet and heart rending cover of "Wild is the Wind";many fans favourite vocal performance from DB. It is great, but, then again, it is a cover.
The next phase of Bowie's work would need no covers, as his creative spark was re-ignited by the influence of Eno,Iggy, and Berlin. The European canon would soon be here. Station to Station was of significant passing interest, but not as important as the 2 albums which followed, and which sealed his status as the most influential musical star of the early and mid seventies.

In this age of grand illusion ...
Although Station to Station contains only six songs, they are the most memorable that Bowie ever recorded. The fast-paced title track Station to Station falls in a genre of journey songs - emphatically not the familiar rock road song - like Kraftwerk's 1977 track Europa Endloss on Trans Europa Express that creates the impression of a train ride with constantly changing scenery.

In the disco era, the French singer Patrick Juvet recorded a 14-minute long suite I Love America on his Got A Feeling album that was a musical tour through the United States. Closer to Bowie's style was the hypnotic I Travel with its propulsive rhythm by Simple Minds.

The tempo slows down somewhat for the melodic Golden Years with its catchy hooks, poetic lyrics, appealing rhythm and soulful tonality. What a gem of a song! Next comes another masterpiece, this time a devotional one. Word on a Wing is a sublime ballad with an enchanting tune and lyrics expressing spiritual yearning that match any poem in the English literature on this theme. The vocal arrangement is spectacular on many levels, including subtle segments and soaring sections.

There is some similarity in literary technique here with the Ben Jonson poem To Celia that was set to music as Drink to me Only with Thine Eyes and recorded by artists as diverse as Kathleen Ferrier and Swans. The similarity lies in the ambiguity; parts of both compositions contain phrasing that seems to deal with romantic love but the overall tone is clearly spiritual.

TVC15 is a powerful uptempo number in a sort of proto-disco style whilst Stay's nervous guitar-driven rhythmic texture and tempo shifts place it firmly in the rock tradition. Then follows the theme song of the 1957 movie Wild Is the Wind, written by Dimitri Tiomkin & Ned Washington, originally recorded by Johnny Mathis and later covered by Nina Simone on her album Wild Is the Wind. As a melodious ballad with a wistful air, it perfectly complements Word on a Wing.

The enhanced album has live versions of Word on a Wing where Bowie sings with a blocked nose (a cold or what, hmmm?) and Stay, both recorded on the 1976 Station To Station tour. They are both beautiful and appealing in their slightly different arrangements and vocal delivery. In my opinion Station is Bowie's best album, surpassing even the influential The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust in song quality and emotional depth.