Remembering Tears for Fears’ rendition of the David Bowie classic ‘Ashes to Ashes’
Throughout David Bowie’s lifelong collaboration with the producer Tony Visconti, the duo always wanted to sit down and sweat over every single element of an album the way that The Beatles had done before them. Visconti recalls that before every record they made together they would pronounce, “Let’s make this our Sgt. Pepper’s! We’re gonna take nine months and we’re gonna do everything we want to do.” But for one reason or another the pair never quite found the time, as Visconti adds that Heroes was recorded in “just four weeks.”
In part, this was because Bowie’s lifestyle was a bullet train, and he was moving too fast to take pause. Cocaine and a creative cornucopia had him crashing and burning in a blaze of glory but as the 1980s dawned he was able to take pause and enjoy a sobriety of sorts. Thus, with Scary Monster (And Super Creeps), they managed to catch a break in the calendar and, thanks to the success Bowie enjoyed in the 1970s, the resources were there to finally make their own painstaking epic, “this was our Sgt. Pepper’s,” Visconti proudly proclaims and adds that it was his favourite Bowie album.
‘Ashes to Ashes’ represented Bowie’s moment of pause, his return to Earth as it has often been touted. Major Tom returned—the man who floated off in his first hit. He was now declared a junkie. His severance was that of an outsider who had pushed things too far and floated into oblivion. Bowie had seen the brink of that.
The song joyously reflected that musically too. It was avant-garde enough in some ways to hark back to Bowie’s early clown and mime madness (hence the outfit) but it also had a pop hook. He was now entering the mainstream and he meant business. This made it almost the perfect fit for Tears for Fears.
You see, Tears for Fears were often assimilated into the new romantic clique on the surface, but they always seemed to sit outside of it. Amid their polished pop was a sense of indie obfuscation. Tracks like ‘Mad World’ should make that very clear, “the dreams in which I’m dying are the best I’ve ever had” are a world away from ‘Girls on Film’.
Their version of Bowie’s Scary Monster (And Super Creeps) epic also shows how much of a handle they had on things. Their rendition is a seamless one. At first, you think it’s simply Bowie’s version but it’s been mixed slightly differently, but after that familiar handshake eases you in, broken down and abstracted flourishes make it worthwhile when it comes to originality. With a fitting voice and an appreciation for the vital moving parts, this all comes together to form a cracking Bowie cover.
