Outside (David Bowie album)

David Bowie formalised his marriage to model Iman in a June 1992 ceremony that featured numerous celebrity guests, one of whom was multi-instrumentalist Brian Eno,[1] whom Bowie previously worked with on his late 1970s Berlin Trilogy.[lower-alpha 1][2] Primarily known for his work in the ambient genre at that time, by 1992, Eno was a highly respected producer; his recent work on U2's Achtung Baby (1991) received considerable praise.[lower-alpha 2] BBC radio presenter John Peel commented: "He's one of those people ...who has drifted into a kind of elder statesman media role where people take everything he says terribly seriously."[3] At the wedding, Bowie gave Eno a tape that showcased the styles Bowie would explore on his then-upcoming album Black Tie White Noise (1993). It piqued Eno's interest and the two discussed the idea of collaborating again. After hearing The Buddha of Suburbia (1993), Eno contacted Bowie and agreed to collaborate.[3][5]

In late 1993, Bowie and Eno sent each other ideas or, in Bowie's words, "mini-manifestos" so they would be prepared before going into the studio.[4][7] Bowie's former Tin Machine bandmate Reeves Gabrels, who would work on all of Bowie's projects for the remainder of the 1990s,[8] received some of these faxes while on tour with Paul Rodgers, recalling that one idea was the equivalent of "a mathematical problem".[4][7] According to biographer Paul Trynka, the ideas formed by Bowie and Eno "harked back" to the former's discovery of numerous musical styles during his first trip to America in early 1971.[4] Looking for inspiration, the pair visited the Gugging psychiatric hospital near Vienna, Austria, in January 1994, which contained a wing that encouraged patients to express creativity in a form of therapy.[9] Speaking with Ray Gun magazine, Bowie stated: "They paint and they sculpt and they do all these fantastic things, and they're allowed to sell their work;"[10] the patients were well-known for their "Outsider art".[11] Bowie later told Interview magazine: "Some of them don't even do [their art] as an expression of themselves; they do it because their work is them."[4] The experience gave the upcoming album its title.[9]

Additionally, Bowie was intrigued by the mythical figure from classical antiquity known as the Minotaur. He painted the figure throughout the early 1990s and, after seeing a New York Times article discussing it, incorporated it as a motif for Outside.[lower-alpha 3][5] By 1994, Bowie's interest in contemporary art grew to the point where he joined the editorial board of Modern Painters magazine.[3] His interest in performance artists such as Rudolf Schwarzkogler, a Viennese Actionist who posed among imagery themed around self-harm,[13] to the extent where he was falsely rumored to have castrated himself;[14][15] Ron Athey, a man who impaled himself with needles; Chris Burden, whose work included being shot;[lower-alpha 4] and Damien Hirst, who displayed a series a dead animal exhibits, all influenced the concept of the new album. Regarding the concept of death as art, Bowie told Vox magazine:[5][7]

Apart from this unhealthy, almost obsessive interest in ritualistic artists, [...] [Outside] also has some sort of a feeling of this new paganism that seems to be springing up with the advent of scarifications, piercings, tribalisms, tattoos and whatever. It's like a replacement for a spiritual starvation that's going on [and] like a tribe with dim memories of what their rituals used to be. They're sort of being dragged back again in this new, mutated, deviant way, with so-called gratuitous sex and violence in popular culture and people cutting bits off themselves. For me, it seems like a natural kind of thing.

The concept of Outside originated on 12 March 1994, during what Bowie called a "blindingly orgiastic" recording session.[5] As the band improvised, Bowie conceived numerous new characters on the spot, playing each out "for maybe five minutes at a time". He later revealed that "Almost the entire genesis for [Outside] is contained in those three and a half hours".[9] In what Bowie labeled a "non-linear Gothic drama hyper-cycle",[3] he developed a world where "Art crimes", which Jason Draper of Dig! magazine described as "murder and mutilation for public consumption", pervade society,[9] and "concept muggings" merit their own police division funded by the "Arts Protectorate of London".[30]

In late 1994, Q magazine asked Bowie to write a diary for 10 days as a way to contribute to their 100th issue. Fearing the diary would be boring if presented as a pure day-by-day account, he revised the Leon concept and wrote what became the basis for Outside: The Diary of Nathan Adler or the Art-Ritual Murder of Baby Grace Belew.[7] The same story, with mild revisions, appeared in the CD booklet for Outside. According to Gabrels, "David ...looked into [the Leon concept] further and revised and rewrote. [...] The order and plot were imposed/invented ...after the fact." While characters were, in O'Leary's words, "moving in and out of focus" on Leon, they now had distinct personalities and motives on Outside, similar to the board game Cluedo or Clue.[7] Taking influences from the television series Twin Peaks, Outside concerns the fictional Oxford Town, New Jersey and its inhabitants, including: a detective named Nathan Adler; a jeweler named Ramona A. Stone; a 14-year-old girl named Baby Grace Blue; a 78-year-old loner named Algeria Touchshriek; a mixed-race "Outsider" named Leon Blank; Paddy, one of Adler's informants; and a shadowy figure named The Artist/Minotaur.[5] Bowie stated that he based all the characters on himself,[7] which Roch Parisien of AllMusic found "therefore, a component of all the previous personas Bowie has enacted over the years."[30]

A diary entry from the CD booklet of Outside. The entries provided more insight into the concept and story.[7]

The story of Outside takes place over the course of 23 years, between 1977 and 1999, and is presented in a nonlinear narrative. Additionally, Bowie portrays all seven characters. The album's CD booklet contained the diary entries of Adler alongside the song lyrics which were sometimes distorted and unreadable.[31] The album also invokes several spoken word segments as between-song segues, which give more insight into the story and characters' thoughts. Parisien considered the segues reminiscent of the "Cockney campiness" of Bowie's 1960s tracks "Please Mr. Gravedigger" and "The Laughing Gnome".[lower-alpha 8][30][32] Described by reviewers as a concept album,[33][34] Paul Gorman of Music Week found the use of narrative on Outside a callback to Ziggy Stardust (1972) and Diamond Dogs.[24] The protagonist is Adler, whom Bowie described as an individual who uses nostalgia to look back on simpler times: "He's really rather despondent that things are broken into this fragmented chaotic kind of state." O'Leary considers the character "more terse" on Outside than in Leon.[7] Adler's perspective is shown in "The Hearts Filthy Lesson",[35] "No Control" and two segues.[36][32] The villain is Stone, who begins as a punk rock "no-future priestess" and ends as a "good time drone" running a jewelry store. To portray her voice, Bowie manipulated his own using various synthesisers.[7] Stone's point of view is given in a segue and "I Am with Name".[36][32]

The dismembered body of Baby Grace Blue is found in a town museum. The scene is described in detail in the CD booklet while on the album, the girl's last words appear in a cassette tape ("Segue – Baby Grace (A Horrid Cassette)").[32] Bowie stated that Grace's voice meant the most to him as he based it on a close friend who was struggling with a relationship at the time.[7] After the body is found, Adler's primary goal is to find the murderer.[31] The character of Algeria Touchshriek "deals in art-drugs and DNA prints". Based on numerous characters from Bowie's 1960s songs, Touchshriek is described in a segue as walking near the museum where the body was found and that he "knew Leon once".[7] Blank, one of Stone's former lovers,[9] is an outsider artist and murder suspect. Bowie characterised him as a blend of musician Tricky and painter Jean-Michel Basquiat. Throughout the album, he is primarily viewed through the eyes of others ("Leon Takes Us Outside", "The Motel" and "Strangers When We Meet"),[36] but is given his own perspective on "I Have Not Been to Oxford Town",[37] where he denies his involvement with the killings;[7] Blank is also ascribed to "Thru' These Architects Eyes", although the track has little to do with the Outside narrative.[38] The Artist/Minotaur is a figure who "lurks behind the art-ritual murder" at the narrative's centre.[5] His point of view is given during "The Voyeur of Utter Destruction (as Beauty)", "Wishful Beginnings" and "I'm Deranged".[7][36][39] The residents of Oxford Town convey thoughts on "A Small Plot of Land",[40] while "We Prick You" concerns the ideals of the Members of the Court of Justice.[41]

Outside contains a wide variety of musical styles, including rock, jazz, electronica, industrial rock and ambient.[31] Writers for The Independent and BBC News retrospectively categorised it as art rock and industrial rock.[42][43] Adam Trainer of PopMatters similarly described the music as "chiefly industrial and trip hop, as filtered through the lens of art rock".[44] He further argued that the album's "soundscapes" showcased "the rock/electronic hybridity" that would be labeled by music analysts and the mainstream as post-rock.[44] Biographer Christopher Sandford finds the music evocative of the "faux-jazz stylings" found on Aladdin Sane (1973),[45] while in Spin magazine, Barry Walters noted the presence of progressive rock.[46] Other commentators, including Nick DeRiso of Ultimate Classic Rock, recognised styles of techno, grunge and industrial over "the electronic soundbeds" that exemplified the Berlin Trilogy.[47] Bowie's biographers also acknowledged the presence of dark ambient ("Leon Takes Us Outside"),[31][48] acid jazz ("The Hearts Filthy Lesson"),[31] funk ("I Have Not Been to Oxford Town", "The Voyeur of Utter Destruction (as Beauty)"),[49] avant-garde jazz and classical ("The Motel", "A Small Plot of Land"),[3] and conventional pop ("I Have Not Been to Oxford Town", "Strangers When We Meet");[3][50] Furthermore, biographers note that certain tracks, such as "The Hearts Filthy Lesson", "I'm Deranged" and "We Prick You", combine elements of jungle and drum and bass, genres Bowie would fully explore on his next studio album, Earthling (1997).[31][51]

Discussing the overall sound of Outside, Buckley describes it as "dense and textural, underpinned by a booming rhythm section".[3] Writing for Rock and Roll Globe, Lee Zimmerman stated: "The music flow[s] in a continuous surge of sound and expression, a forward thrust that left little room for melody, but shared an intriguing atmospheric ambiance instead."[52] Indeed, author James Perone finds many tracks act as "mood pieces" for the entire album rather than as standalone tracks.[31] According to writer Alan Franks: "The songs have a slow, careful build into the pay-off line but they're absolutely not written as pop songs and they're not particularly written as rock songs. It's almost like what Jacques Brel would be going now if he'd gone heavy."[3] Biographers have also compared certain sounds on Outside to Bowie's previous albums, such as Diamond Dogs,[23] Lodger (1979),[53] Scary Monsters (1980),[38] and Tonight (1984).[32] Regarding the segues, Pegg characterises their musical styles as mostly ambient, with guitar, piano and synthesiser backings.[32] Trainer commented that they "speak to the role of the Leon suites in the development of Outside".[44]

The album opens with "Leon Takes Us Outside", which segues into the title track. Both tracks musically set the stage for the rest of the album.[23][54] "The Hearts Filthy Lesson" contains an almost atonal groove that Pegg calls "a slab of industrial techno-rock" over an "eccentric jazz-piano figure".[3][35] Continuing the jazz flavour is "A Small Plot of Land",[23][31] which builds to a climax to become, in Pegg's words, one of the album's "more challenging tracks".[40] "Hallo Spaceboy", which was developed from an instrumental written by Gabrels titled "Moondust",[4] is an industrial track characterised by Pegg as "a hardcore maelstrom of sci-fi noise, hypnotic high-speed drumming and an insistent, speaker-hopping four-note guitar riff."[3][55] Spitz calls it Bowie's "most convincing rocker" since "Rebel Rebel" (1974).[23] "The Motel", described by Pegg as the album's centrepiece,[56] is compared by Buckley to the Walker Brothers' "The Electrician" (1978),[3] while Perone compares "I Have Not Been to Oxford Town" to Queen's "We Will Rock You" (1977).[31] "No Control" brings a darker tone to the album, featuring a "hard-edged synth bassline".[57] Later on, "I Am with Name" reprises the "atmospherics" of the album's opening.[58] "Wishful Beginnings" evokes "a mysterious, abstract melody over slowly building, layered, synthesized electronic sounds."[31] "I'm Deranged" conveys similar musical styles that pervade the rest of the album.[59] Compared to the original Buddha of Suburbia version, the remake of "Strangers When We Meet" contains a more lush arrangement influenced by U2's The Joshua Tree (1987), which Eno had co-produced.[31][50] Pegg writes that it resolves the album's "angst and black comedy" with a "soothing slice of conventional pop".[50] On the other hand, Trainer considered it an "odd" way to end the album, writing that it was "clearly an attempt to...inject a sense of calm whilst perpetuating the noir-ish air of mystery".[44]

Described by Gabrels as a "three-hour improvised opus", the Leon recordings are available through bootlegs in three separate "suites", each between 22 and 27 minutes long. A fully mixed 70-minute reel was also released by a private collector in 2003. According to Pegg, the released piece is significantly more uncommercial than the final Outside album, featuring a slew of "ambient soundscapes" and longer versions of the segues found on Outside. It also features numerous repetitive phrases and loops amongst interplay between the musicians.[7][60] Trainer found the recordings to be "underdeveloped" compared to Outside, describing them more as "loose jams" characterised by "plodding beats and unformed repetitive structures that lack the dynamics [the finished Outside album] would yield".[44]

The first suite is divided into three movements. The first, titled "I Am with Name", is a ten-minute track that contains longer and more obscene variations of the Stone and first Adler segues. O'Leary notes that more voices appear on Leon than Outside, highlighting a character who "sounds as if rats are climbing over his body" four minutes into the suite. A more melodic five-minute movement titled "We'll Creep Together" follows, which features Garson's "rippling" piano over a slew of sound effects such as gunshot noises. "I'd Rather Be Chrome" follows, which displays a repeating phrase throughout and contains more narration from Adler over, in Pegg's words, a "prowling, catchy riff", before the lyrics delve into topics previously explored on Low.[7][60]

The next suite, titled "The Enemy Is Fragile", is categorised by O'Leary as the centrepiece of Leon. It features patterns similar to "A Small Plot of Land", along with funk playing from the backing musicians, numerous sound effects and narration from Adler and Stone. Some of the narration reflects themes present in The Silence of the Lambs (1991). The piece builds to a climax with various repeated phrases before ending with a drum fill.[7][60] The rest of the suite consists of the first appearance of "the Artist/Minotaur" and various synthesisers, with additional piano and saxophone. One section, titled "Nothing to Be Desired", was issued as a bonus track on "The Hearts Filthy Lesson" CD single, and remains the only material from Leon that was officially released. Following "Nothing to Be Desired" is lengthy variations of the "Baby Grace (A Horrid Cassette)" and "Algeria Touchshriek" segues.[7][60]

The final suite, titled "Leon Takes Us Outside", further develops the character of Blank; the opening section became the opening to Outside. It begins as a jazzy instrumental with guitar, piano and synthesisers, with more repetitive phrases and narration from Adler and Stone; one sequence fully conveys Adler's story. According to O'Leary, the suite closes with feedback and a drum fill. Shortly after the release of Outside, Bowie expressed interest in making the Leon material officially available, although the idea never came to fruition.[7][60]

Bowie (right centre) with his band visiting then-US president Bill Clinton (right) in October 1995, shortly after the release of Outside.

By 1994, Bowie was without a label for the third time in three years. Outside's release was delayed while Bowie attempted to find an American distributor, later commenting, "Nobody would take Outside when we first recorded it."[7] In June 1995, Bowie signed a contract with Virgin America Records,[5] telling Music Connection in September that the label were "extremely supportive" regarding the Outside concept and allowed Bowie full creative control in the studio.[61] Additionally, Virgin acquired the rights to Bowie's work from Let's Dance (1983) to Tin Machine, reissuing them throughout the rest of the year with bonus tracks. In Britain, Bowie entered a new deal with BMG, who issued Black Tie and Buddha in the country. BMG were now affiliated with RCA Records, Bowie's label throughout the 1970s and whom he had departed in 1982.[5][62]

The album's release was preceded by "The Hearts Filthy Lesson" as the lead single on 11 September 1995.[7] It was accompanied by a music video directed by Samuel Bayer, the director of Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" (1991). The video featured provocative imagery that caused its initial banning from MTV until an edited version was provided.[3][35] Bowie asked Ron Athey to appear in the video but he declined.[44] Commercially, the single performed poorly, peaking at number 35 on the UK Singles Chart and number 92 on the US Billboard Hot 100. Pegg and Trynka state that Bowie desired to display a video of "artistic merit" rather than for chart appeal.[3][4][35]

1. Outside – The Nathan Adler Diaries: A Hyper-cycle was released on 25 September 1995 by Virgin America in the US and Arista, BMG and RCA in other territories on LP and CD formats.[11][5] The CD release was the full 75-minute album, while the LP release was an abridged version titled Excerpts From 1. Outside. The single LP featured shortened edits of "Leon Takes Us Outside" and "The Motel" and removed the tracks "No Control", "Wishful Beginnings", "Thru' These Architects Eyes", "Strangers When We Meet", along with multiple segues. The Japanese CD release included the outtake "Get Real".[5][63] The cover artwork is a 1995 painting on canvas by Bowie himself titled Head of DB. Commercially, Outside peaked at number 8 on the UK Albums Chart and number 21 on the US Billboard 200; Bowie's profile in America had been raised through the popularity of Nirvana's MTV Unplugged version of "The Man Who Sold the World", as well as artists who cited Bowie's influence such as Nine Inch Nails, the Smashing Pumpkins and Marilyn Manson.[3][5] Due to advance orders, Outside became Bowie's fastest-selling album since Tonight.[45]

For its release as a single, "Hallo Spaceboy" was issued in remixed form featuring English duo Pet Shop Boys (pictured in 2013).

Bowie promoted Outside through various television appearances.[64] "Strangers When We Meet" was issued as a double A-side single with a new recording of "The Man Who Sold the World" mixed by Eno on 20 November 1995. It peaked at number 39 in the UK and was supported by a music video, again directed by Bayer.[65] Bowie performed the song at the European MTV Awards the same month.[64] "Hallo Spaceboy" was released as the third and final single on 19 February 1996 in a new remix featuring English duo Pet Shop Boys.[64][66] The idea for the remix came from Pet Shop Boys member Neil Tennant, who insisted on adding lines referencing Major Tom from "Space Oddity" (1969). Although Bowie was hesitant at first, he accepted.[7] Pet Shop Boys subsequently appeared in the song's music video, directed by longtime Bowie director David Mallet, and performed the song with Bowie at the Brit Awards in February and on Top of the Pops on 1 March. The single itself performed well commercially, peaking at number 12 in the UK. The remix later replaced "Wishful Beginnings" on the March 1996 European reissue of Outside titled 1. Outside Version 2.[55]

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[30]
Blender	[67]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[68]
Entertainment Weekly	B−[69]
Los Angeles Times	[70]
Pitchfork (2021)	8.2/10[71]
Q	[72]
Rolling Stone	[73]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide	[74]
Select	2/5[75]
Spin	6/10[46]

Critical reviews of Outside were mixed on release. While the majority praised the music as challenging, many felt the overarching concept was hard to follow,[44] with some finding it "pretentious".[33][76] Among positive reviews, critics considered Outside Bowie's best record since Scary Monsters.[lower-alpha 9] A writer for Time Out magazine elaborated: "[The] edifice of sounds, cultures, rhythms, samples and textures, with randomised lyrics that don't much tell a story as create word-moods, regards the open-minded listener with Bowie's best album for 15 years."[5] In The Daily Telegraph, Charles Shaar Murray welcomed "an excellent David Bowie album, a genuine creative rebirth. Threatening and murky ... His gift for the charismatically disturbing seems to have reasserted itself."[5] Later on in Mojo magazine, Murray considered it Bowie's "official" comeback album. He praised the music as a callback to the Berlin Trilogy and concluded: "[It's] a mad, bad, dangerous album – by turns, chlling, pretty, ugly, scary, gripping and vastly intriguing."[33]

Some reviewers found the music among Bowie's most innovative;[78] a writer for Melody Maker announced that Bowie "is poised to be a healthy influence once more on a fifth generation of glamorous chameleons."[5] Furthermore, an NME reviewer stated, "Bowie's scalpel is certainly closer to the pulse than for years."[5] While most praised the music, other publications, such as Today, considered Bowie's vocal performances throughout the record some of his finest.[45] Regarding the lyrics, David Fricke of Rolling Stone appreciated them as "smart", "effective" and "sly", especially on "I Have Not Been to Oxford Town" and "A Small Plot of Land".[73] However, he criticised the spoken segues, arguing that they "damn near sink the record".[73] Likewise, a Billboard reviewer found the album "stumbles" on the segues, stating that they "advance the plotline but hold little musical interest". They argued that if listeners "cherry-pick" throughout, Outside "stands a chance of reestablishing Bowie as a vital artist".[34]

Other reviewers expressed more mixed assessments. Entertainment Weekly's David Browne found the majority of the record sounding like "fodder" and felt that it would benefit from a visual aid, such as through tour performances.[69] Sandy Masuo of the Los Angeles Times was also mixed, praising certain tracks but felt overall, Bowie was experimenting in genres that, by 1995, were being made more successfully by other artists.[70] Select magazine's Gareth Grundy also found a lack of innovation in the music, albeit highlighting "Hallo Spaceboy", "No Control" and "We Prick You" as standouts.[75] Some reviewers believed the album would appeal to Bowie's longtime fans, but displease newer ones.[46] Q's Tom Doyle explained: "Regulars might feel short-changed on the tune front and those legions who came in on Let's Dance will most certainly be left completely and utterly bewildered. Perhaps, though, that's entirely the point."[72] The album also attracted negative responses. Grundy, in particular, negatively compared Outside to Bowie's previous collaborations with Eno, describing it as "the daftest thing Bowie's done" since the Glass Spider Tour. Additionally, Ikon's Taylor Parkes complained that "Bowie's desperate desire to be considered 'highbrow' has snuffed out any potential of accidental alchemy" and promptly dismissed the record as a "sorry sack of shit ... facile, confused and immature ... quite simply, rubbish."[5]

The opening act of the tour's American leg was Nine Inch Nails, led by Trent Reznor (pictured in 1994). The partnership resulted in multiple collaborations between him and Bowie in subsequent years.

In an interview with Music Week in early 1995, Bowie expressed no interest in performing the Outside material live, calling it "far too ambitious a project".[24] Nevertheless, after enduring pressure from Virgin, Bowie rescinded and began rehearsals to tour America in August 1995, thereafter extending the number of dates by early September and adding a European leg; it would become Bowie's biggest tour since Sound+Vision (1990).[79] The lineup for the Outside Tour included Gabrels, Garson and Alomar, with new additions including vocalist George Simms from the 1983 Serious Moonlight Tour, musical director Peter Schwartz, drummer Zachary Alford and bassist Gail Ann Dorsey,[80] both of whom would continue to work with Bowie frequently in subsequent years. The tour commenced on 14 September.[79]

The opening act for the tour's American leg were Nine Inch Nails. Frontman Trent Reznor was initially hesitant about the idea, finding it intimidating, but graciously accepted.[23][80] For the setlist, Bowie mostly played tracks from Outside and more unknown tracks from his career, along with reworkings of older tracks to fit the new album's styles; he refused to play any older hits. Towards the end of the opening sets, Bowie joined Nine Inch Nails on stage, where the two artists played songs from their own catalogues such as "Subterraneans" (1977) and "Hurt" (1994), respectively.[23][79] The fusion of the two artists was initially met with resistance from both artists' fanbases. Mojo's Chris Jones reported that during one performance, Bowie was pelted with debris from the confused crowd.[81] The American leg concluded at the end of October.[79] The tour's partnership between Bowie and Reznor facilitated the latter's undertaking of numerous Outside and Earthling remixes, as well as his appearance in the music video for "I'm Afraid of Americans" (1997).[44]

The European leg commenced in November with shows at the Wembley Arena in London. The opening act was Morrissey, who was promoting his newest album Southpaw Grammar (1995).[79][82] Tensions between the Bowie and Morrissey rose, leading the latter to depart shortly into the tour's leg; the remaining dates were opened by various local bands.[23] The tour concluded on 20 February 1996.[79] The UK shows, particularly Morrissey's appearances, were generally panned by concert reviewers.[82] Throughout the tour, many criticised Bowie's decision not to sing well-known hits, to which he replied: "If they didn't know that I wasn't going to be [playing the hits], they must have been living under a rock."[79] Despite the tour's poor reception from contemporary reviewers, Pegg states that it showcased Bowie's musical progression and was his finest tour in 20 years.[79] Recordings from the tour were later released in 2020 on the live albums Ouvrez le Chien (Live Dallas 95) and No Trendy Réchauffé (Live Birmingham 95),[83][84] as part of the series Brilliant Live Adventures (2020–2021).[85]

According to the liner notes and biographer Nicholas Pegg:[5][36]

• Outside at Discogs (list of releases)