Best Bowie closer

I'm gonna go Bewlay Brothers, but big shout outs to Rock n Roll Suicide, Lady Grinning and Secret Life.

... and "Red Money". It's far from the best song there but, come on, "Rock 'n' Roll Suicide" - that's what you call an album closer

Oh, but what about "Chant of the Ever Circling Skeletal Family"!!!!!!

Rock'n'roll Suicide is the archetypal album closer, my vote couldn't go anywhere else. Actually I'd probably vote for it on a poll of best album closers ever, not just Bowie.

(have we done that poll?)

Rock'n'roll Suicide is the archetypal album closer

Day in the Life, surely?

That's the other archetypal album closer

Lady Grinning Soul, although Bewley Brothers is good as well. Law ("I DON'T WANT KNOWLEDGE, I WANT CERTAINTY") is OK too.

"Lady Grinning Soul" cos I prefer my albums to end with a whimper.

Rough Top 5:

1. "Lady Grinning Soul"
2. "Bewlay Brothers"
3. "It's No Game (Part 2)"
4. "Chant of the Ever Circling Skeletal Family"
5. "Wild is the Wind"
6= "The Supermen"
6= "Rock and Roll Suicide"

I'm going out on a limb and saying "Heathen (The Rays)." When I heard it summer '02, driving home around 2:30 in the morning, it evoked – those massive synths, the multiracked Bowie vocals – the personal apocalypse I was experiencing.

Rock n' Roll Suicide. But he's clearly better at opening than closing.

Damn, homey knows how to end an album! I'll be the one vote for "Secret Life of Arabia," thank you.

Not going to vote for it, but 'Strangers When We Meet' is one of the best late period Bowie songs.

That's okay - it got my voe!

"It's No Game (Part 2)"

Partly because it's also the "closer" for a whole series of great records, and in retrospect, sounds like it knows it

"Wild Is The Wind".

"We were so turned on....in the mind-warp pavillion!"

i think the last chord of Rock'n'Roll Suicide is the best closer of any album, but i still don't know what i'd vote for here.

i have a HUGE soft spot for Secret Life of Arabia (no laughing)

heavy drug experience w/grinning soul in high school tilts balance for me

I love that he got the whole gimme your hands thing from Judy Garland's rapport with her gay fans in her concerts--the guy knew how to steal. (R n R Suicide)

"Strangers When We Meet" is a gorgeous song, beautifully song.

I have a HUGE soft spot for Secret Life of Arabia (no laughing)

― goole, Thursday, December 3, 2009

No shame there, my #2 choice--love it!

I voted Secret Life mainly for the moment where the hand claps come in near the end. Also love how he pronounces Arabia the first time he says it.

Lady Grinning Soul would be my second choice, some of the most beautiful piano playing I've ever heard on a song.

love how he pronounces Arabia the first time he says it.

A-raib-ee-aaaah!

Where does he get his vowels from?

wild is the wind

"Arabia" is much better than "Wild is the Wind," which is to say: Bowie-diva showstoppers are gross beside gossamer Euro-funk.

"Wild Is The Wind" is great because it's hollow: all that emoting seems to signify nothing in the singer's burnt-out soul; and so it's a splendid closer for an album of burnt-out alienation. Or to put it another way: it's like what you get when you take a soul album and suck out all the soul: this is what's left.

Strangers when we Meet, for me.

I voted Secret Life mainly for the moment where the hand claps come in near the end

^^^This this this

Does anyone remember Billy McKenzie's version with BEF?

apparently he feld DavBow's singing was a bit understated...

"Lady Grinning Soul". But these are considerably weaker than the openers.

so nobody's going to vote for fame?

Where Have All The Good Times Gone? A killer punch at the end of a killer album.

so nobody's going to vote for fame?

― rent, Friday, December 4, 2009

"Chant of the Ever Circling...."

Not least for its "BRO-BRO-BRO../"RUN RUN RUN" fade-out.

I love that he got the whole gimme your hands thing from Judy Garland's rapport with her gay fans in her concerts--the guy knew how to steal. (R n R Suicide)

I don't know for sure, but he must surely have heard Jacques Brel's "Jef"

I love that he got the whole gimme your hands thing from Judy Garland's rapport with her gay fans in her concerts--the guy knew how to steal. (R n R Suicide)

I don't know for sure, but he must surely have heard Jacques Brel's "Jef"

― ILX Blob 59 (Tom D.), Saturday, December 5, 2009

I don't know that one, tell me more (he covered Brel's "Amsterdam" so he must have known the one you refer to...

"The Secret Life Of Arabia"

Can I just say ... I fucking hate Subterraneans.

I went with "Fame," even though I like James Brown's version even more.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

I don't know that one, tell me more (he covered Brel's "Amsterdam" so he must have known the one you refer to...

LOL, on googling "Jef" I discovered that the first line of the English language version (by Mort Shuman and Eric Blau) is "No, love, you're not alone"!

subterraneans was robbed

but i suppose i only like it coz it's really an eno song with bowie joining in with brief witterings at the end

But Bowie wrote it

In fact, I don't even think Eno's on it!

to Tom D. - something doesn't actually have to be written by ArtistX in order to be "an ArtistX song"

True

Ugh – one of my least favorite Bowie songs won. I can't listen to him singing "Time lakes a cigarette, puts it in your mouth " without giggling.

Coming at Bowie from the wrong angle if you expect his lyrics not to be ridiculous.

Although having said that, the one about time having a wank is a bit much.

and then time lakes a cigarette, apparently.

A post wank fag is always nice.

his zing is you and me, boy

quaaludes, red wine, and a fag are even better.

Didn't do Billy Dolls much good though