The song begins on a tonic chord ( C major 7th) piano and strings, thereafter moving up in semitones: D ♭add6th, D minor7, E ♭7, F7.
According to James Perone, it features a "standard British pop song structure", with "clearly defined" verses, choruses and middle-eight sections. While primarily in 4/4 common time, the time signature changes to 2/4 twice (on the lines "different man" and "necks in it"), and four simultaneous bars of 3/4 feature different chords on each bar and are accompanied by Woodmansey's drum fills. He recalled: "He the finest selection of songs I have ever heard in one sitting in my entire life.I couldn't wait to get into the studio and record them." Bowie plays a saxophone solo on the final recording – his first feature of the instrument – which he recollected was recorded "when I was still going through ideas of using melodic saxophone." Bowie has said that the track "started out as a parody of a nightclub song, a kind of throwaway". He recalled in 1995 that he met with Bowie in late June 1971 at Haddon Hall in Bakewell, Derbyshire, where Bowie played him demos of "Changes" and " Life on Mars?" in "their raw brilliance". He had previously played Mellotron on Bowie's 1969 self-titled album. Wakeman, a noted session musician and member of the Strawbs, was asked to play during the Hunky Dory sessions and accepted. Co-produced by Bowie and Ken Scott, he recorded it with pianist Rick Wakeman and the musicians who would later become known as the Spiders from Mars: guitarist Mick Ronson, bassist Trevor Bolder and drummer Mick Woodmansey. "Changes" was recorded sometime between June and July. Work on Hunky Dory officially began at Trident Studios in London on 8 June 1971 and concluded on 6 August.
Featuring Bowie on piano, the demo contained different lyrics than the final recording and remains unreleased. One of these tracks was "Changes", which he demoed between May and June 1971. In total, he composed over three-dozen songs there, many of which would appear on his next album Hunky Dory and its follow-up The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Several artists have covered the song, including Australian singer Butterfly Boucher for the 2004 film Shrek 2, whose version featured new vocals from Bowie.Īfter completing a promotional tour of America in early 1971, English singer-songwriter David Bowie returned to his home at Haddon Hall in Beckenham, London, and began writing songs. The song has appeared on numerous compilation albums and is the namesake of several. Bowie performed "Changes" frequently during his concert tours it was the final song he performed on stage before his death in 2016. His biographers have viewed the track as a manifesto of his entire career, predicting a constant change of musical styles.
It has also appeared on several best-of lists. Retrospectively, "Changes" is regarded as one of Bowie's best songs, with many praising Bowie's vocal performance and Wakeman's piano playing. RCA later chose it as a B-side for the reissue of " Space Oddity" in 1975, which became Bowie's first UK number-one single. It wasn't until the success of its follow-up The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars that the song garnered success.
Upon release as a single, "Changes" flopped like its parent album. Musically, "Changes" is an art pop song that features a distinctive piano riff. The second verse concerns clashes between children and their parents, urging them to allow their children to be themselves as teenagers, a topic Bowie had spoken out about before. The lyrics of "Changes" reflect this, with the first verse focusing on the compulsive nature of artistic reinvention and distancing oneself from the rock mainstream. The song also marks the first instance of Bowie playing the saxophone on one of his recordings.Īt this point in his career, Bowie had experimented with numerous musical styles, all of which failed to earn him stardom. Co-produced by Bowie and Ken Scott, it featured Strawbs member Rick Wakeman on piano and the musicians who would later become known as the Spiders from Mars: guitarist Mick Ronson, bassist Trevor Bolder and drummer Mick Woodmansey. Written following his promotional tour of America in early 1971, "Changes" was recorded at Trident Studios in London between June and July that year. RCA Records then released it as a single from the album on 7 January 1972. " Changes" is a song by English singer-songwriter David Bowie, originally released on his 1971 album Hunky Dory.
0 kommentar(er)
