David Bowie '1. Outside' What are your five favourite tracks?

When did you first hear this album?
How do rank it post-Scary Monsters?
What would your 10 track version be?

 

First heard it when my sister bought the c.d. upon its release. Went to the L.A. Forum to see the show for it. Reminds me of my junior year of high school, and it was a tough year. The album served as a soundtrack. I haven't ranked it, but it is up there among Bowie's classics.

 

1. I'm Deranged
2. Small Plot of Land
3. Thru These Arch Eyes
4. The Motel
5. Voyeur

Let me just say that I LOVE this album. From the opening fade in I feel engulfed in tranquility and blessed familiarity. This is top 3 Bowie for me. #1 Bowie if you catch me on the right day. I love every inch of this record (well, okay, maybe not "Wishful Beginnings"). It's epic, it's exciting, it's layer upon layer of mystery and intrigue. I want to play it right now just talking about it.

First heard it on the day of release. Bought it on CD at "Nobody Beats the Wiz". I didn't run out and buy his previous album or two (Black Tie, TMII) so clearly I heard something I liked in the debut single.

Easily his best album post Scary Monsters in my book. Hell, I think it's better than Scary Monsters. Best album since, Low, how about dem apples?

10 track version? I can't do it. I want the whole thing.

 

I Have Not Been to Oxford Town is one of my favorite Bowie songs.

The album's narrative is intriguing, but I've never been able to make it add up entirely. Maybe the proposed but ill-fated sequel would have brought a little clarity. Maybe it would have further muddied the waters!

Shalom, y'all!

L. Bangs

 

First heard it on Friday Music 2x white vinyl.
Favorite tracks are side 4 and give or take something else, they're all good.
Would not cut it back whatsoever. Without the narrative, not sure what the point of the album would be.
Think it's one of Bowie's best albums period. Barring nostalgia for his 70s albums , it's hard not to recognize what a consummate craftsman he became in the later years.

 

Yum, easy!

Plot | Spaceboy | Voyeur | Prick | Deranged

 

Only top 5... come on! :

The Hearts Filthy Lesson
A Small Plot Of Land
Hallo Spaceboy
I Have Not Been to Oxford Town
I'm Deranged

Post-Scary Monsters, this is quite possibly my favorite album, remeniscing the avant-garde moments of Diamond Dogs and the Berlin trilogy while also managing to capture the mid-90s feeling of paranoia also present in the movies of the time ("The Usual Suspects", "Seven"). I first heard it about two years ago when, after long searching for it, I found it in a bookstore which had some copies of the old 2003 pressing in stock after his death and I bought it in an instant, having only known Hearts Filthy Lesson before. Instantly loved it!

10-track version: not possible.

 

Wasted no time buying it after release, because it was his best album since Scary Monsters. I don't really believe in re-arranging an album (sequencing or removing), but I would have liked it without the segues.

The tour that followed was - ignoring ticket sales - one of his very best.

 

Number....

————- 1 —————
o u t s i d e

 

I went with Motel /Oxford / No Control / Voyeur / Prick - but would def add at least Outside too if possible.

I remember getting the disc shortly after it came out as I had tickets for the show in Portland OR. Honestly it took me awhile to really love it. Still not crazy about the segues and always thought the "hits" (Hearts Filthy Lesson and Spaceboy) were kinda derivative of other electronica stuff at the time (Prodigy?).

Of course I've grown to love it as most Bowie fans have - but I really wish that I had absorbed it more when I saw the show. It turned out to be the only time I got to see him and I can't say I enjoyed it at the time as I much as I would have later. While I considered myself a pretty big fan at the time, I later realized that I still had quite a bit of homework to do.

No matter though. I love that he did it the way he wanted and couldn't be bothered with me not getting it yet.

 

A Small Plot of Land
The Motel
Voyeur
I'm Deranged
Thru These Architect Eyes

 

Tough choice, but I went with:

The Motel
I Have Not Been to Oxford Town
The Voyeur of Utter Destruction (As Beauty)
I’m Deranged
Thru These Architect’s Eyes

First heard the majority of the tracks live on 1995-09-14 in Hartford, CT — the opening night of the Outside tour. I followed the U.S. tour for the first two weeks, so don’t think I heard the album proper until I returned to the U.K. at the end of the month.

“The Motel” was a fantastic opener to the European shows. David hiding behind the amps for the first half of the song. So many great memories.

My favourite post-Scary Monsters Bowie album. Love it with a passion. Have no desire to reduce it down to ten tracks, and consider it a fool’s errand to try.

 

What are your memories of that show?

 

First heard it probably late 90's, early 00's, when I bought the CD used back in college.

I would rank it easily as his best studio album after Scary Monsters, and at least up until Blackstar.

Fully agree with others here that a 10-track version is impossible.

My picks:

Heart's Filthy Lesson
The Motel
Oxford Town
No Control
I'm Deranged

The three-track sequencing of "The Motel", "Oxford Town" and "No Control", one after another, is among some of the best in his catalogue as far as I'm concerned. Sublime stuff.

Really hoping that they do a 25th anniversary deluxe edition in 2020. Bring on the Leon Tapes!!

 

Yes, I thought the very same thing earlier as I was listening.

 

You heard the Leon stuff?

 

I’m Deranged.

Loved it as the opening for Lost Highway

 

I went the same but with I Am With Name over Spaceboy.

 

Did you catch a live show from the tour?

 

I got back into Bowie through Outside. I saw Hello Spaceboy on TV and got reacquainted with him after a decade of refusal (buying the Pixies, Danielle Dax, Bauhaus, Sonic Youth and Stereolab instead) and got enthused enough to buy the cd and see him live. HS was hard-hitting, full of energy and had some classic archetypical ambiguous mysterious Bowie magic in the lyrics (but was subsequently totally ruined by that awful PSB remix which just didn't show any understanding of Bowie or his art).
I wish I'd bought the original vinyl, but I have the black MOV and the white Friday Music records.

I wanted to vote for more but couldn't. This is tough, but in the end I went for the title track (which as Now was the true Bowie rebirth imo), Plot, Motel, Oxford, Voyeur. I would have liked to have voted for Leon Takes Us Outside, because it's such a great opening and it gives me shivers when I hear it.
It is his only album which can genuinely stand next to 1969-1980, and I think that is because he was being true to himself, not his public.
If most people don't like it that confirms its greatness to me.

 

I love you, oldbird, but it's Hallo Spaceboy.

 

Why? No-one says Hallo except Neu! Anyway, he sings "Hello" not Hallo.

 

Very, very Twin Peaks-esque, isn't it? Especially The Motel could easily be used in a David Lynch movie (no wonder he started using Bowie's songs after Outside came out). Very atmospheric and sublime music, a unique listen.

 

Send him to the gallows!

 

Nothing could convince me there was a better way to spend Autumn / Fall 1995 than doing that. Sigh....