Bowie, Through A Lens Darkly (and/or Italian)

Over the past couple weeks, two different David Bowie tribute albums have hit my eardrums, each with interesting takes on Bowie's material. From the British label BBE, Modern Love features artists of color connecting with Bowie's catalog. Curated by DJ and music executive Drew McFadden and BBE founder Peter Adarkwah, the covers compilation was assembled to highlight the influence of Black music genres like soul, R&B, jazz, funk, and gospel on Bowie’s diverse catalog.

“I felt that the connection between Bowie and R&B, jazz, funk, gospel and all things soulful, had never really been explored before — at least not so much in covers, which tend to lean more towards rock and pop,” McFadden explains. “Certainly, there’s been plenty of Bowie covers over the years, but none that have really tapped into what seems to have been a big part of his core musical style and direction.”

Speaking of other directions, the Italian jazz trumpeter Paolo Fresu recently released Heroes Expanded: A Tribute to David Bowie, featuring Italian artists offering their collective spin on material ranging from "Space Oddity" to "Blackstar" and all stops in between. Here's a sampling:

As you can hear, the arrangements are knotty and intriguing, provided you can tolerate the female vocalist clearly singing outside her native language (which lands better on some tracks than others). It's clear that Bowie's Blackstar sparked Fresu to conceptualize Bowie's catalog in that musical idiom, and as such, it's a more cohesive listening experience than the aforementioned Modern Love.

Personally, after hearing most of these songs in their original form for decades, it's nice to have a bit of a melodic refresher, even if there's a slight aftertaste at times. After all, it's not like Bowie's catalog has vanished, so I can always go back to the originals if an interpretation strikes out into unexplored musical territory. I mean, I know when to go out and when to stay in.

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