Line #44 Music/Heathen


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/22_heathen.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:''"And nothing has changed. Everything has changed."'']]
3
4	->''"Classic Bowie, circa 2002."''
5	-->--'''{{Tagline}}''' from the album's advertising campaign.
6
7	''Heathen'' is the twenty-third studio album by Music/DavidBowie, released in 2002 through ISO & Creator/ColumbiaRecords. The album reunites Bowie with longtime collaborator Tony Visconti for their first album together since 1980's ''Music/ScaryMonstersAndSuperCreeps''. Visconti would go on to produce all of Bowie's subsequent albums up until his death.
8
9	Initially, Bowie had planned on releasing an album called ''Toy'', which consisted mostly of re-recordings of his pre-''Music/SpaceOddity'' material. However, the plan to release the album didn't come to fruition and the sessions led into the recording of ''Heathen'' instead[[note]]''Toy'' would eventually see a release in November of 2021, five years after Bowie's passing[[/note]]. Although it's claimed that all songs featured on the album were written before the attacks of September 11 2001, it is widely agreed the events had an influence on the album.
10
11	Sound-wise, the album continues the neoclassical brand of synth-heavy art rock that first appeared on ''[[Music/HoursDavidBowieAlbum 'hours...']]'', but turns it in a more darker, brooding direction influenced not only by the September 11 attacks, but also Bowie's general anxieties about living in America as well as the success of Music/{{Radiohead}}'s similarly moody and electronic ''Music/KidA'' and ''Music/{{Amnesiac}}'' earlier in the decade (Bowie himself was a fan of Radiohead).
12
13	''Heathen'' peaked at 14 on the Billboard charts, becoming Bowie's highest-selling album in the country since ''Music/{{Tonight}}'' in 1984. The singles from this album are "Slow Burn", "Everyone Says 'Hi'" and "I've Been Waiting for You". Notably, none of these singles were released with a music video; Bowie, who was 55 at the time of the album's release, came to feel as if he had become too old to remain relevant on television, and decided to refrain from the music video format as a result. A video for "Slow Burn" ''was'' shot in August of 2002 however, and eventually [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23IdK0yZMvE saw release]] in 2011. Bowie would ultimately walk back on his statements and return to releasing music videos-- all but two of which starred himself (and in the case of the second of those two he was only absent on account of being dead)-- for his next (and last) three albums[[note]]that said, the music videos for ''Music/TheNextDay'' and ''Music/BlackstarAlbum'' were primarily intended for viewing on WebSite/YouTube rather than television; the music videos for ''Music/{{Reality}}'' did indeed air on TV, though[[/note]].
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15	''Heathen'' is also notable for being one of only five albums in Bowie's discography (alongside ''Music/{{Reality}}'' and reissues of ''Music/TheRiseAndFallOfZiggyStardustAndTheSpidersFromMars'', ''Music/ScaryMonstersAndSuperCreeps'', and ''Music/LetsDance'') to see release on the Super Audio CD format, with slightly longer versions of several songs plus four bonus tracks. Unlike the other four albums, this one only features a single Scarlet Book audio layer, with no Redbook audio layer, and as a result is the only one of the four Bowie [=SACDs=] to not be compatible with a standard CD player. To this day, the extended version of ''Heathen'' remains exclusive to the SACD release, with the extended songs and most of the bonus tracks not seeing further release on any reissues (despite the whole SACD version of the album being long enough to fit on a single Redbook-compliant Platform/CompactDisc uncut) or even compilations.
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17	Not to be confused with the Bay Area ThrashMetal band.
18
19	----
20	!! Tracklist:
21
22	# "Sunday" (4:45)[[labelnote:*]]4:47 on SACD[[/labelnote]]
23	# [[Music/SurferRosa "Cactus"]][[note]]Originally by Music/ThePixies.[[/note]] (2:55)
24	# "Slip Away" (6:05)[[labelnote:*]]6:14 on SACD[[/labelnote]]
25	# "Slow Burn" (4:41)[[labelnote:*]]5:04 on SACD[[/labelnote]]
26	# "Afraid" (3:28)
27	# "I've Been Waiting for You"[[note]]Originally by Music/NeilYoung.[[/note]] (3:00)[[labelnote:*]]3:16 on SACD[[/labelnote]]
28	# "I Would Be Your Slave" (5:14)
29	# "I Took a Trip on a Gemini Spaceship"[[note]]Originally by the Legendary Stardust Cowboy.[[/note]] (4:04)
30	# "5:15 The Angels Have Gone" (5:00)[[labelnote:*]]5:25 on SACD[[/labelnote]]
31	# "Everyone Says 'Hi'" (3:59)
32	# "A Better Future" (4:11)
33	# "Heathen (The Rays)" (4:16)
34
35	[[AC:SACD Bonus Tracks]]
36	# "When the Boys Come Marching Home" (4:49)
37	# "Wood Jackson" (4:44)
38	# "Conversation Piece"[[note]]Re-recording of the BSide for the original 1970 non-album single version of "The Prettiest Star"[[/note]] (3:49)
39	# "Safe"[[note]] Originally written for ''WesternAnimation/TheRugratsMovie'' in 1998, before it was cut from the final product, and re-recorded as the B-side for the single release of "Everyone Says 'Hi'"[[/note]](5:53)
40
41	----
42	!!"Hark, who are we? So small in tropes such as these?"
43	* AlbumTitleDrop: Averted with "Heathen (The Rays)".
44	* ConceptAlbum: Generally believed to be one by fans and analysts. A recurring theme on the album is the decay of human society; among others, topics covered on ''Heathen'' include an imprisoned man spiraling into psychotic obsession, overly-nostalgic people retreating from the world around them in fear of modernity, a man mourning a failed relationship, and a boy processing the news of his father's death.
45	* CoverVersion: Three of them pop up in this album, the latter two of which were originally intended for inclusion on the never-released ''Music/PinUps'' sequel ''Bowie-ing Out'':
46	** "Cactus" (Music/ThePixies)
47	** "I've Been Waiting for You" (Music/NeilYoung)
48	** "I Took a Trip on a Gemini Spaceship" (The Legendary Stardust Cowboy)
49	* CreatorProvincialism: "Slip Away" is deeply rooted in Bowie's adopted home of New York City. The main characters of Bones and Oogie were puppets on ''The Uncle Floyd Vivino Show'', which was a huge deal in the tri-state area but fell apart when it attempted to go national. There's also a reference to the New York Yankees, although this is more accessible to the general public.
50	* DarkerAndEdgier: Compared to ''[[Music/HoursDavidBowieAlbum 'hours...']]'', ''Heathen'' is much more dour in both lyrical and musical tone. While Bowie testified that the songs had been written before 9/11, he admitted that the nationwide mood afterwards affected the bleak tone of the final product (heightened by the fact that he lived in New York City).
51	* DisappearedDad: "Everyone Says 'Hi'" is about a boy struggling to accept that his father had passed away, thinking his father was this instead; according to Bowie, the song was inspired by his mother's passing in 2001.
52	-->''Said you took a big trip. They said you moved away\
53	Happened oh, so quietly. They say''
54	* EpicRocking: The 6 minute "Slip Away". "Safe" on the SACD release comes close, being just seven seconds short of the 6-minute mark.
55	* FadingIntoTheNextSong: "Slip Away" segues directly into "Slow Burn". Also, "5:15 the Angels Have Gone" segues directly into "Everyone Says 'Hi'", which in turn segues into "A Better Future".
56	* ImmediateSelfContradiction: The lines "and nothing has changed; everything has changed" in "Sunday".
57	* MonochromaticEyes: Bowie is depicted with a pair of glowing, metallic eyes on the front cover; Bowie biographer Nicholas Pegg claims that the effect was intended to resemble a fish's eyes, alluding to the ichthys in first-century Christianity.
58	* NostalgiaFilter: The primary theme of "Slip Away".
59	-->''Down in space, it's always 1982.''
60	* RealLifeWritesThePlot:
61	** In an interview with ''The Daily Beast'', Bowie stated that the album's broodingly introspective tone was influenced by his feelings working at Allaire Studios in Shokan. The studio was built on a mountaintop, and the surrounding rural environment was so overwhelmingly breathtaking that it put him in a reflective mood throughout production.
62	** Bowie stated that "Everyone Says 'Hi'" was inspired by his mother's death in 2001.
63	* RearrangeTheSong:
64	** "Slip Away" (formerly "Uncle Floyd") and "Afraid" were initially recorded for ''Toy'' and are included in the version that leaked in 2011. Both songs were both re-recorded for ''Heathen'', and consequently are omitted from the finalized 2021 release of ''Toy''. While the two versions of each song sound fairly similar enough to one-another, "Slip Away" removes "Uncle Floyd"[='s=] lengthy intro consisting of sampled audio from ''The Uncle Floyd Show'', presumably due to copyright issues.
65	** On the SACD release, the bonus track "Conversation Piece" is a re-recording of a BSide from 1970, specifically that for the original version of "The Prettiest Star" (which itself was re-recorded for ''Music/AladdinSane'' nearly 30 years before this album). The original version of "Conversation Piece" would eventually be retroactively incorporated into ''Music/SpaceOddity'' for its 50th anniversary remix in 2019.
66	* ReCut: The SACD release features slightly longer versions of "Sunday", "Slip Away", "Slow Burn", "I've Been Waiting For You", and "5:15 The Angels Have Gone", which combined with the added bonus tracks pushes the album up to a total runtime of 71:08 (compared to the standard edition's 52:08).
67	* ReligionRantSong: "A Better Future" is a "Hate the God" variant, featuring Bowie threatening God that he'll stop believing in Him if He doesn't ensure, well, a better future for mankind.
68	* RhymingTitle: "I Took a '''Trip''' on a Gemini Space'''ship'''".
69	* SharpDressedMan: The album cover portrays him as this, although the MonochromaticEyes do make him creepy.
70	* ShoutOut:
71	** "Sunday"-- and by extension the album-- opens with a stuttering synth riff that audibly recalls that of "Everything in Its Right Place", the opening track to Music/{{Radiohead}}'s ''Music/KidA''. Bowie was a noted fan of the group.
72	** Carrying over from the Pixies' version, the D-A-V-I-D chant in the bridge of "Cactus" is a shout-out to a similar technique used by [[Music/MarcBolan T. Rex]] (who Bowie had previously name-dropped in "All the Young Dudes", the song Bowie wrote for Music/MottTheHoople).
73	** Coney Island is name-dropped in "Slip Away", itself a tribute to ''The Uncle Floyd Show'' (an American variety show that ran from 1974 to 1998 and was [[PeripheryDemographic surprisingly popular among rock musicians]]).
74	** The first pre-chorus of "Afraid" includes the line "I believe in [[Music/TheBeatles Beatles]]," referencing the infamous line "I don't believe in Beatles" in Music/JohnLennon's solo song [[Music/JohnLennonPlasticOnoBand "God"]].
75	** "I Would Be Your Slave" does this for ''Film/{{Labyrinth}}'':
76	-->'''Jareth''':"I ask for so little. Just fear me, love me, do as I say and I will be your slave."
77	** "I Would Be Your Slave" also lyrically alludes to "Footprints in the Sand", a famous Christian allegorical poem depicting God carrying a man during the darkest moments in his life, represented by two trails of footprints on a beach occasionally turning into one.
78	** Yes, Ziggy Stardust was named in tribute to The Legendary Stardust Cowboy, who Bowie covered with "I Took a Trip on a Gemini Spaceship".
79	* SingerNamedrop: "Cactus" spells out "David" during the bridge.
80	* SpecialGuest:
81	** Music/LisaGermano provides violin parts throughout the album.
82	** Jordan Rudess of Music/DreamTheater provides keyboard parts throughout the album.
83	** Kristeen Young provides both backing vocals and piano parts throughout the album.
84	** Tony Levin of Music/KingCrimson plays fretless bass on "Slip Away".
85	** Pete Townshend of Music/TheWho plays guitar on "Slow Burn".
86	** Music/DaveGrohl plays guitar on "I've Been Waiting for You".
87	* SpellingSong: In "Cactus", the P-I-X-I-E-S chant in the bridge is changed to D-A-V-I-D.
88	* StudioChatter: An unidentified voice giving a count-off can be faintly heard in the intro to "I Would Be Your Slave".
89	* TitleDrop: Subverted with "I Took a Trip on a Gemini Spaceship"-- the lyric in the song is "I Took a Trip on a Gemini Space'''craft'''"
90	* TitleTrack: "Heathen (The Rays)".

Context Music / Heathen