Happy 40th Anniversary to David Bowie’s fourteenth studio album Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps), originally released September 12, 1980.
“I’ve heard a rumor from Ground Control.”
I can still remember the moment. As a young child there was this quirky, strange sound coming from the radio. It sounded like…well, nothing I had ever heard before. A springy piano sound, a step forward step back groove, and this high-pitched whisper that terrified me and electrified me. It was mysterious, otherworldly like I had received some alien transmission.
There in the dark, I listened as this voice informed me, “I’m happy / Hope you’re happy too.” There was a man singing, and beneath it a man mumbling. Talking about some Major Tom. Who was that? And with it a warning, clear as day, “You better not mess with Major Tom.” This wasn’t anything I had heard before. My love of KIϟϟ, Alice Cooper, Cheap Trick, Prince, Michael Jackson and Blondie had introduced me to theatrics within music, but this felt truly otherworldly.
I waited for hours, finger hovering the record button of my cassette radio to hear the song again and snatch it up for repeated listening. And when I caught it, or really it caught me, I was hooked. And so began my introduction to David Bowie.
Listening to the song, it conjured up images of the abyss of space, loneliness and drifting into the darkness. Each passing of the song filled my head with images. The abyss of space. A shiny spaceship. A balding astronaut. Floating into darkness. But nothing could prepare me for the music clip. Who was this freaky clown dude? What’s with the pink earth? Why is a bulldozer following them? Why is he in the water? Why is this so freakin’ cool!
I saved my pocket money to buy the 7” release and then saved more to buy the album that featured Bowie in his full Pierrot regalia. And listened to the album over and over. There was something almost threatening embedded into the grooves of the record. And I had to hear more.
“It’s No Game, Pt. 1” began to play and again Bowie has me scratching my head. This wasn’t like “Ashes to Ashes.” This felt almost anti-Ashes. It was dirty, grimy, a punkish mix of swampy rock and a Japanese lady talking throughout it. And he was singing but kind of off-key, his voice straining and strangling certain notes. It was raw and then at the midpoint it switched to a very sing-song structure—with a melody and groove that would be lifted by Blur in 1994 for their hit “Girls & Boys.” And there at the end was Bowie screaming out “Shut Up!!!” I wasn’t entirely sure what to make of it. And if I’m one hundred percent honest, I’m still not entirely sure.
But if I wavered, the next track “Up The Hill Backwards” got me back in line. With a musical-esque choral and Bo Diddley inspired beat, the song carried me along its bouncing beat and had me swaying and floating through the music. The production of the track placed Bowie and co in the middle of the mix rather than the fore, making you have to almost lean into the mix to be part of it.
It was almost as if as the record continued, clarity in the sound and production increased. As if fine-tuning to its frequency. Contrast the murky mix of “It’s No Game Pt. 1” to “Pt. 2,” the album’s closer, and Bowie is more present in the mix, the sound glowing and pristine. The rough edges polished off, made to glimmer.
It happened with rocking foreboding dread in “Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps),” which has Bowie’s vocals phase in and out between verse and chorus. The track chases you, breathing down your neck and disorienting you within its swirls into a wonderful cacophony.
The swirling gathers you up again on a track like “Kingdom Come” that surrounds you with guitar histrionics courtesy of Robert Fripp (who features heavily on the album), soul-backing vocals and a rocking beat that leaves the walls heaving. It would be much later that I discovered this track was actually a cover of Tom Verlaine. A quirky fun side note to the album.
The theatrics are well and truly present in the epic “Teenage Wildlife,” which nods back at “Heroes” and then takes it a step further with its onward marching beat and arrangement, and in “Scream Like A Baby” that looks towards—or is that looks back?—at a futuristic landscape and tells the story of political imprisonment. To my young ears, this was like a Walt Disney read-a-long book on acid set against a new wave jag. The album rounds out the eerie telling with the skipping pop rocker “Because You’re Young” featuring Pete Townsend on guitar.
Without a doubt, the shining moments on Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) belong to the eternally enthralling “Ashes To Ashes,” which to this day remains one of my Top 20 tracks of all time, and the skittish pop drive of “Fashion.” As the one-two punch of the album, they square up nicely, showing both sides of Bowie’s brilliance. “Ashes To Ashes” is the quirky, Avant-Garde artist in full flight, while “Fashion” is the swagger ready Blue-Eyed Soul that would dominate his next outing, the massive crossover hit that was to be Let’s Dance (1983).
These two tracks alone cemented me into a Bowie fan and the album was my entre into a world fresh with imagery and theatrics and a sprawling musical landscape that would have me exploring his rich catalogue and going along for every surprising ride that followed.
Whilst Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) isn’t the definitive Bowie album for me, it was a great introduction to a multifaceted artist whose influence continues to be felt. When word of his death hit the news in early 2016, I was taken back to the moment of first discovering him. Drawn back to the moment of pure intrigue and delight. And once again I travelled full circle, back to “Ashes To Ashes.” Back to where it all began for me. And all that echoed in my head was, “Oh no, don’t say it’s true.”
LISTEN: