Reviews
 Keep It Simple
Van Morrison
Roger McGuinn @ the Huntington IMAC, Long Island, NY - April 4, 2008
Emily Saxe @ the Allen Room/Jazz at Lincoln Center - April 5, 2008
Another Country
Tift Merritt
Be Your Own Pet
Get Awkward
Paul McCartney – The McCartney Years (DVD)
Juno – Music from the Motion Picture
Various Artists
Yes - Their Definitive Story
Day and Night Driving
Seven Mary Three
InterMedia Arts Center 2/2/08
Huntington, NY
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David Bowie
Welcome to the bottom of the barrel. As far as Bowie’s work goes, this is as bad as it gets, which is to say that all things considered, it still isn’t awful. It only seems so bad because it’s David Bowie who we’re talking about, a renowned visionary who has etched a career by avoiding the predictable. Here, he seems to lack that vision. It’s not like Bowie is out of ideas, or concocting bad songs, it’s only that he’s simplified (lowered) his artistic target. The album lacks focus and ambition, which strips it of the most potent ingredients that have been so reliable in Bowie’s work up till now.
Never Let Me Down suffers by its inherent design. The standard to which it aspires never rises from the wreckage of the production techniques that are utilized, which are so ordinary that it paints Bowie to be just another hack succumbing to formula. Considering his penchant to avoid anything that even resembles the conventional, it’s almost depressing to hear something as bland as this. His lyrics are as oblique as ever, and still interesting, but the entire project is burdened by overtly commercial arrangements that ultimately backfire. Booming drums and compressed rhythms get mangled underneath the deep echo that laces the entire album, making it sound instantly dated and just plain ‘blah’. Even "Let’s Dance," Bowie’s previously most commercial effort, could boast more attitude. Here, the songs don’t even sound as if Bowie arranged them, but nobody else can be blamed, since Bowie handles the production himself (with David Richards).
Many of the songs here sound as though they might have been quite good if they hadn’t been so compromised. "Time Will Crawl" and "Beat of Your Drum" are well written and might have been interesting if they weren’t so artlessly damaged by overtly commercial techniques. The same could be said for "New York’s in Love" which could have been a great vehicle for Tin Machine, but is rendered toothless here. How in the world could fashions have changed enough to make the always futuristically inclined Bowie sound obsolete? They didn’t. It’s simply that Bowie himself has (temporarily) abandoned his futurism. Looking at it from the bright side, this may be Bowie’s worst album, but it’s still more interesting than anything by Blur, or the Pet Shop Boys, or any other Bowie-derivative act.
Grade: 
 
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