Where Are We Now? is not my favorite David Bowie song. Really, not by a long shot.
Favorite or not, though, I’m happy to see him making new music—I had all-but given up hope of ever hearing the words “new music from David Bowie” used in a sentence together, and that made me sad.
It’s interesting to see him revisiting Berlin, the site of the creation (with some involvement of Tony Visconti, who is being credited as producing the new album) the three of his albums (Low, “Heroes”, and Lodger) that would seem to most effectively bridge the gap between the avant-garde leanings he’s always shown and the trim, effective pop songs he’s always been so good at producing. So I’m interested to see where it all ends up.
Incidentally, I am amused by the mention of KaDeWe in the lyrics of the song. I remember the one trip my family made to Berlin when we lived in Germany, back in 1983. My grandfather bought a pair of Zeiss binoculars in KaDeWe. It’s interesting to note that that same trip came up in a post here almost 10 years ago (and that on the 10th of February of this year, this blog will be 10 years old).