David Bowie was never one to conform to a predetermined path for his artistic journey. In fact, he approached his creative endeavours without rigid notions of where they should lead. Unlike many of his peers, Bowie didn’t intentionally set out to compose a ballad, a rock anthem, or even a love song with a singular focus. Instead, he preferred to let the music and art naturally course through him, guided by authenticity. However, this doesn’t imply that the musician never delved into the realm of love songs from time to time.
As you might expect, these songs tend to diverge somewhat from our conventional notions of a typical love song. Bowie rarely indulges in excessive sentimentality or overt romanticism. Instead, he chooses to convey his affection through abstract lyrics, contemplating the all-encompassing force of this emotion and its ability to simultaneously enrich and challenge our existence.
For example, ‘Golden Years’ was the first song Bowie recorded for his 1976 record Station to Station and remains one of his most tender lyrical ventures and notable vocal performances. For a long time, the song’s inspiration remained unknown and was assumed to be about Elvis Presley, but Bowie’s ex-wife Angie claims that it was actually about her and their relationship. With a warm 1970s hue, Bowie sings: “Don’t let me hear you say life’s taking you nowhere, angel, come get up my baby, look at that sky, life’s begun, nights are warm and the days are young.”
For Bowie, powerful love songs have the ability to face you with “the sound of ghosts again”. At least, that was the case with his song ‘Lady Grinning Soul’, which he explained “was written for a wonderful young girl whom I’ve not seen for more than 30 years”. Bowie also claimed that songs can make you feel so close to the past that you can “almost reach out and touch it”, which rings true for ‘Lady Grinning Soul’, whose recipient still appears in her 20s in Bowie’s nostalgic mind.
The singer’s self-titled LP from 1969 featured a song called ‘An Occasional Dream’, which detailed his infatuation with Hemroine Farthingale, a trained dancer he met alongside Lindsay Kemp. It also appears as one of Bowie’s most blatant romantic pieces. “I was a classically trained ballet dancer, and like many a dancer, I continued training myself with ballet classes,” recalled Farthingale. “So I was recruited, as people were, from the Dance Centre. It was an audition, and we went along. Lindsay sort of snuck David in because David wasn’t a trained dancer, so really, he shouldn’t have been there. But it didn’t matter. It was only a minuet. It was about sixteen people doing a minuet around the room. And that’s where we met.”
‘Letter to Hermione’ was also a love song composed for Farthingale and demonstrates Bowie’s ability to pour out his heart while exuding significant vocal power. The song’s origination came from Bowie deciding to compose a song about Farthingale rather than writing a love letter. “That’s me in a maudlin or romantic mood,” Bowie once said, “I’d written her a letter and then decided not to post it. ‘Letter To Hermione’ is what I wished I’d said. I was in love with her, and it took me months to get over it. She walked out on me, and I suppose that was what hurt as much as anything else, that feeling of rejection.”
Bowie added: “We just started going out with each other, and I just fell head over heels. I think actually it was mutual; we were very much in love with each other. And as young love often does, it sort of, you know, went wrong after about a year. I wrote this song really as a way of trying to communicate with her again.”
One of Bowie’s forgotten muses, Romy Haag, along with his time in Berlin, also inspired a lot of his songwriting. Along with many songs in the Berlin Trilogy, Bowie sings openly about how much the city had an impact on him, along with those he met along the way. ‘Heroes’, for instance, remains one of his most poignant contributions.
While Bowie grew apart from many individuals who had a profound influence on him, such as Haag, his albums still serve as a testament to the various ways he explored and expressed love in its diverse manifestations.
