The Commute [scrawled into a tiny notebook]

Fallout
Leaves bleed, drip like fire
Rapid transit through reclaimed wilderness
Numb buzz clung to the tin of the tongue
Low in the grove lizard pressed against the mold
Architectural carcasses, vacant textures
Mud of life scooped out in clumps
Sunset paint splayed veins of plants
The opulent helicopter from bunkers' shape of mansions
Flares of forges smoldering
Hollow old electronics howled epileptics
Houses cast dull aqua
Minor players roll like dice across a rusted table, dusting a stage
Old factory smell
Wires string gonorrheal landscapes
Emergency evacuees await secreted instructions

Colors flutter through skin

The cliche is that Bowie is a chameleon; the myth is that chameleons change color to fit in with their surroundings. 

In The Book of General Ignorance, John Lloyd & John Mitchinson write, 
"Total lie. They change color as a result of different emotional states. If they happen to match the background it's entirely coincidental. Chameleons change color when frightened or picked up or when they beat another chameleon in a fight. They change color when a member of the opposite sex steps into view and they sometimes change color due to fluctuations in either light or temperature."

In this way, David Bowie is totally like a chameleon: shifting in response to an alarming environment.

In an interview in 2003, Bowie said,
"My entire career, I've only really worked with the same subject matter. The trousers may change, but the actual words and subjects I've always chosen to write with are things to do with isolation, abandonment, fear and anxiety---all of the high points of one's life."

Perhaps the only sane response to excessive stimulation & rampant alienation is constant change. Splintered by schizophrenic reality, you hurtle through a flurry of hues, shapes, textures, belief systems, philosophies, movements, hair styles, costumes, literary modes, sexual orientations, technological innovations, on the search for peace amongst the pieces, only to discover that your skin was yours all along, channeling the flux inwardly, constructively, to combat the anxiety of external disorder.

The placement & coloration of his eyes, too, evoke the chameleon.

More informative chameleonic fun from General Ignorance: 
"A chameleon's skin contains several layers of specialized cells called chromataphores---from Greek chroma (color) and pherein (to carry)---each with different color pigments. Altering the balance between these layers causes the skin to reflect different kinds of light, making chameleons a kind of walking color wheel...The word chameleon is Greek for 'ground-lion.'"

Prayer App: Downloadable Deities

- Download the god of your choice for Mac or Windows (Linux version coming soon)
- Send prayers through IM, e-mail, Facebook or Twitter, or use the app's special "Supplication" key (Note: Preview version allows only five supplications per month) 

- Use our thesaurus feature to select superlatives for your deity   
- To complete a worship service, cycle between recitations of praise and humility
- It's easy to change gods; just click "Convert" and export your settings
- Tag your prayers to increase traffic towards your account
- Don't forget to set your religious profile as "Tolerant" or "Intolerant"

*(Bowie quote: "I guess it's just this Greco-Roman notion of turning something  nebulous into a personification that you can recognize, like a deity. You know, back then, they would transform a set of emotions into a god. I just convert ideas into people. It's just easier to handle that way.")

Low notes

I was inspired to listen to David Bowie's Low for the first time in years after reading Hugo Wilcken's treatise for Continuum's 33 1/3 series. The following are [basically] verbatim from notes taken while performing sit-ups:

Jagged guitar shreds scribbled over by sine waves
Drums: locomotion, changing phases, imploding into itself, hurling forward, swept into & swallowed by a cyclone
Motions of a rock record, but only as passage through a tunnel to altogether more interesting territory
“You” as often as “I”
Hope!
The sound of a band playing together, subverted, splintered, defaced
Hooks in service of sound, not traditional song structure
Layers built up [1. band 2. overdubbed effects 3. vocals] & then stripped back down. [Isolating the middle invents tension organically]
Apex of experimentation: Throw everything in, see what works
Plenty of previous works that were darker, grimier, infused with more self-hatred. Here, the flames of hell lick at his heels [as he runs towards the horizon]
Salvation through creation
Forged from fire
1. Speed of Life: Hurtle into positive atmosphere
2. Breaking Glass: Insular blues
3. What in the World: Loopy joy
4. Sound and Vision: Dance, funk
5. Always Crashing in the Same Car: Finally some terror
6. Be my Wife: Lyrics and music most successfully at odds
7. A New Career in a New Town: Then, finally, throw out words altogether
8. Warsawza: Hope despite desolation---the majesty of survival after devastation. Rediscovery of ritual? [Primordial, before language & meaning] Jettison content from language, substance created in the absence of objective truth (substance and subjectivity)
9. Art Decade: Decay creates art
10. Weeping Wall: Beautiful. Riding flow of melody. Voice producing sound instead of imparting meaning
11. Subterraneans: Again, beautiful

Sound and vision
Sound: texture
Textures creating pictures (vision)
Vision: foresight

{End of album; end of notes}