Round 2 Match 5 G gets C***ed

[rayge]

A David Bowie – London Boys



B The Sapphires – Who Do You Love?

[bungo the mungo]

'london boys' is an established nugget from bowie's 60s output but it never fails to thrill.

B is pleasant enough if a little forgettable.

A

[Deleted]

A is a good pick from Bowie's kitchen sink canon. 

[Crunchy Col]

A is an oddity and I've always found it sort of comical. His vocal is absolutely ridiculous, just hammy theatrics. No surprise he didn't make it big for a few years yet. It's interesting, the arrangement is fine, I don't know, it's David fucking Bowie taking himself far too seriously again.

B is beautiful, I can go for pretty much anything in this genre as long as it's competent. This one is far more than that.


B

[Deleted]

B

It's almost 70 at 11 am on a sunny late morning and this wins just for the complimentary mood it creates.

[lokie]

[DarknessFish]

A sounds like Bowie's audition for Kes: The Musical, with all that brass and the lyrics about the meter being dead. It's a ludicrous mess of a vocal against a really unlikable parping bobbins of a track. A flat-cap Scott Walker.

And B sounds like it's from a Test Card: OST compilation. The only interesting thing about it is the amount of hiss and reverb on the bad recording. Which kind of went for that Bunker Hill track, but this is less well served by the poor quality. But I guess it sets out doing what it wants to do, being vaguely pretty but dull.

B

[Deleted]

London Boys isn't simply Bowie's best 60s record but is one of his best records full stop. Let's count the ways...1. A wonderfully sparse, wintry arrangement featuring swabs of oboe, flute and organ. You don't get instruments like that on records anymore and its marvellously evocative 2. A raw to the bone lyric exposing the existential emptiness at the heart of the mod lifestyle 3. A vocal that moves from a haunted loneliness to a liberating defiance. The soaring triumph of his voice from 2.30 onwards is as powerful as anything in his catalogue. What a record!

B is pleasant but rather dated fare. Its a likeable record that sticks within its very modest genre ambitions.

A

[dipstick]

B - I like that music like this exists. Just breezy vocals floating on the saxes.

[fange]

Great match. Both very much in my wheelhouse. A's one of my fave Bowie 60s songs, a little theatrical but saved by his emotional vocal performance. And B is lovely, another Swan records '60s gem with the making of the Philly soul legacy right there. I just looked it up and Kenny Gamble did the vocal arrangements for it. Very nice.
Tough match, but i'll go with A.


A

[Deleted]

Bowie, before he figured out how to be interesting vs. Clean, yet less than exciting Philly soul....Vote B, for it being pleasant enough..

[toomanyhatz]

My love for transitional records means I should really dig A, as it's the sound of Mod Bowie morphing into Anthony Newley Bowie - but the music hall arrangment is slightly at odds with the subject matter. He's coming into his own as a writer, which is nice, but the stuffy arrangment does him no favors.

I can't decide whether B stands out because it's well-done, or just an average version of something that we need more of.

Either way, as it's going up against a BCB god (by extension a Preludin god?) it deserves more votes than it's going to get.

[rankingted]

B was going to need to be special to beat A. Its pleasant but not exactly a stand out in its genre. Its definitely young master Jones here.

A

[osgood]

Sorry but I have never heard anything from early Bowie that I rate above medocrity and A is no exception. B is an absolute gem, with sweet vocals and lovely arrangement.

B

[Reactionary Rage]

b