Did David Bowie even make his Berlin trilogy in Berlin?
Yes, I know you’re here to read about David Bowie, but allow me, for just a brief moment, to make this about myself.
I am the sort of person who, upon every weekend trip to any given European city, comes home with a plot to push a long-term move there. Starting afresh in the cool streets of Copenhagen, where my regular consumption of hot dogs can be offset by a healthy sauna culture, is a fantasy I dream out daily, but this year, it was a destination almost knocked off its perch by another European hotspot.
That city was rather unsurprisingly Berlin. Four nights spent in the German capital gave me an energetic lease of life that reinvigorated this idea of moving, leaving behind a broken Britain for somewhere that felt inherently diverse, creative and open-minded. Because when you are in the heart of Berlin’s nightlife, that is the most palpable feeling, almost like a meeting place for every liberal in the world.
In 2025, that idea has grown into a fully fledged flower, but in 1976, the seed was merely being planted. The societal ruins of the Second World War rolled on into the growing Cold War, and rather than widespread liberalism, it flourished in small underground pockets.
Not yet apexing in terms of its trend but still showcasing a compelling sense of artistic creation, it was unsurprising that a perennially forward-thinking David Bowie descended on the city. Long before it was dubbed a cultural “hotspot”.
“It just seemed like such a romantic, historically interesting place,” Bowie explained when asked why Berlin felt like the natural next step. But the reality was slightly different, according to guitarist Carlos Alomar, who explained, “David went to Berlin with Iggy for isolation. It was to humanise his condition, to say, ‘I’d like to forget my world, go to a café, have a coffee and read the newspaper.’ They couldn’t do that in America. Sometimes you just need to be by yourself with your problems. Sometimes you just wanna shut up.”
Either way, that burgeoning essence of culture swirled around Bowie upon his arrival, inspiring him to lay down some of the most important records in music history. Now dubbed ‘The Berlin Trilogy’, the three iconic albums Low, Heroes and Lodger are all attributed to the city and now live in its pantheon of cultural lore.
But were they all even recorded in Berlin?
The first of the two, Low and Heroes, recorded in 1977, were definitively Berlin albums.
While Low had parts produced in France, it was largely a product of Bowie’s Berlin experience. More so than Heroes, it’s considered to be a part of the Berlin sonic fabric, with the almost dystopic synths, colliding guitar parts and general brutalist soundscape, it set a stall out for how music would be considered in the city.
But his 1979 effort Lodger was more of a willing participant in the narrative, being produced mainly in Switzerland and the USA. And maybe that showed, with it arguably being the weakest of the three, and lacking the distinct idea of its counterparts.
