On this day 48 ago, on 23 January 1976, David Bowie released his 10th studio album, Station to Station. The album is regarded as one of his most significant works and introduced one of Bowie's best known alter egos, ‘The Thin White Duke’, which was based on character David played in ‘The Man Who Fell to Earth’, a movie by Thomas Jerome Newton. The album cover art features a still from the film. During the sessions, Bowie was mostly drugs, especially cocaine, and stated in later interviews that he recalled barely anything of the recording and production sessions. Due to the success of his previous album, Young Americans, released the year before, Bowie gained more financial and thus artistic freedom. While the previous album featured mainly Funk and Soul elements, Station To Station introduced Bowie’s German electronic and Krautrock influences from the likes as for instance Kraftwerk and Neu!. Also lyrically he wandered off from the mainstream ‘pop’ path and was inspired by mythology, religion and figures like Friedrich Nietzsche & Aleister Crowley. Preceded by the single `Golden Years`, Station to Station was a commercial success, reaching the top five on the UK and US charts.

During the Isolar Tour, supporting the release of this album, he attracted controversy with statements suggesting support for fascism. Things became even worst when 'The Victoria Station Incident' happened. When NME photographer Chalkie Davies, shot a picture of David Bowie standing upright in a convertible Mercedes, seemingly bringing a nazi salute while waving to his fans. But in fact it just was, what we would call it these days, a hasty, improvident and bad photoshop job by an NME employee. Because of the fact the photographer used a flash light and bright sky backlight, David’s waving hand was not visible due to the light over exposure. So the editors decided to quickly fix it by drawing a fake hand on top of the picture … Of course the badly chosen headline “Heil and farewell” didn’t help either. No need to say the press picked up on this and put it together with some quotes on fascism he had made in Europe and behold David was vilified as a Nazi.

“That didn’t happen. THAT DID NOT HAPPEN. I waved. I just WAVED. Believe me. On the life of my child, I waved. And the bastard caught me. In MID-WAVE, man. And, God, did that photo get some coverage… As if I’d be foolish enough to pull a stunt like that. I died when I saw the photo. And even the people who were with me said, ‘David! How could you?’ The bastards. I didn’t… GOD, I just don’t believe in all that. (David Bowie, Melody Maker, 29 October 1977)

At the end of the tour, he moved to Europe, mainly to escape from the L.A. drug culture. Bowie lived in West Berlin for almost two years, during which time he moved on both musically and personally with his "Berlin Trilogy" albums; Low, Heroes and Lodger.

Positively received by music critics on its release, Station to Station has appeared on several lists of the greatest albums of all time.

David Bowie - Station To Station (LP)

DISCOGS

Industrial Complex is the sixth and latest up to date studio album from British Industrial-electro-EBM band Nitzer Ebb. It was initially intended and released as a limited tour edition (2009) only but was soon after picked up by the German Major Records who released the album in Europe on 22 January 2010, fifteen years after the band's last studio album Big Hit. This is the band's first release after leaving Mute Records following its 2006 retrospective, Body of Work. The Major Records version also came with a bonus CD containing remixes by Terence Fixmer and Depeche Mode's Alan Wilder amongst others.

Martin Gore of Depeche Mode—himself a fellow Essex boy—has contributed backing vocals on both 'Once You Say' and 'Payroll'. While the track 'Never Known' was featured on the soundtrack of Saw IV. The album was produced by the renown English producer Flood.

Although this comeback album could not please all their old school fans it generally received positive critics by the music press. NME gave the album a 4/5 star rating stating Nitzer Ebb "proves to be far from obsolete". Other magazines wrote critics like "Industrial Complex is a real stormer" or "Industrial Complex sounded like nothing I've ever expected, it's sure one great album."

Industrial Complex

Basic/tour edition (Red background cover, single disc, Artists' Addiction Records)

1 "Promises" 3:48
2 "Once You Say" 3:41
3 "Never Known" 3:58
4 "Going Away" 4:10
5 "Hit You Back" 4:19
6 "Payroll" 2:57
7 "Down On Your Knees" 3:52
8 "I Don´t Know You" 3:12
9 "My Door Is Open" 3:15
10 "I Am Undone" 3:51
11 "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" 2:57
12 "Traveling" 3:13 (bonus track)

Belgian edition bonus tracks (White cover background with $ sign, Alfa Matrix)

13. "Once You Say" (Komor Kommando Mix)
14. "Once You Say" (Leæther Strip Mix)
15. "Once You Say" (Essence Of Mind Mix)
16. "Once You Say" (Implant Mix)
17. "Once You Say" (Pouppée Fabrikk Mix)

Limited edition (Double CD - Tracks CD2, Major Records)
1 "I Am Undone" (Alan Wilder Remix) 5:29
2 "I Am Undone" (Christopher Kah Remix) 5:17
3 "My Door Is Open" (Terence Fixmer Remix) 5:48
4 "Once You Say" (Tom Furse Remix) 6:07
5 "Once You Say" (Celluloide Mix) 4:46
6 "Once You Say" (Orphee-Eeproh Remix) 4:29
7 "Once You Say" (People Theatre Remix) 4:24
8 "Once You Say" (Collapsed System Mix) 4:44
9 "Once You Say" (Suessenborn Sinessence Remix) 4:10

USA edition tracks (White cover background with $ sign, single disc, Artists' Addiction Records, AAR 001)
Same as Basic/tour edition, then additional tracks:
13 "On The Road"
14 "I Am Undone" (Alan Wilder Remix) 5:29
15 "I Am Undone" (Christopher Kah Remix) 5:17
16 "My Door Is Open" (Terence Fixmer Remix) 5:48
17 "Once You Say" (Tom Furse Remix) 6:07

DISCOGS

On January 21st, 1993 American Industrial/Metal band Ministry released its third single Just One Fix, taken from the album Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs (1992)

The song features samples from the movies Sid and Nancy, "Never trust a junkie" and The Man with the Golden Arm with Frank Sinatra reciting the words "Just One Fix” and “Gimme the thorazine. You don't need the thorazine” from the movie The Trip staring Peter Fonda and Bruce Dern.

The accompanying video was directed by Peter Christopherson (Coil) and features video footage and audio samples of author William S. Burroughs saying “Bring it all down”. Burroughs, who is known to be one of Al Jourgensen’s inspirations, also provided the single's cover art.

It was released as 3-track jewel case CD-Single, Digipack and 12” vinyl by Sire/Warner Bros. Records

Just One Fix (12" tracklist)

A1. Just One Fix (12 Inch edit) 8'13"
B1. Just One Fix (Video edit) 4'24"
B2. Quick Fix 4'11"

Just One Fix (Lyrics)

Never trust a junkie

Blood keeps drifting your way
Certain of its destination
Driving through New Orleans at night
Gotta find a destination

Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix

Life keeps slipping away
Fighting in a war with damnation
Poised, keep cutting away
I'm looking in through to salvation

Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix

Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix
Just one fix

Like if I boarded a train
Trying to take in another station
Join us and the choice will be made
Unless we kill the lie as a nation

Just one fix (just one fix)
Just one fix (just one fix)
Just one fix (just one fix)
Just one fix (just one fix)

Just one fix (one fix, one fix)
Just one fix (one fix, one fix)
Just one fix (one fix, one fix)
Just one fix (one fix, one fix)
Just one fix (one fix, one fix)
Just one fix (one fix, one fix)
Just one fix (one fix, one fix)

Songwriters: Barker Paul / Jourgenson Allen / Michael Bruce Balch / Rieflin William

The first single by The Sisterhood, “Giving Ground,” was released on 20 January 1986, on Andrew Eldritch’s Merciful Release label, which was distributed by WEA. The details of this release are dramatic in the extreme, producing enough lasting angst and antagonism to fuel every goth club on the continent for a decade.

The success of the first album, First and Last and Always, released 11 March 1985, had catapulted The Sisters of Mercy out of Leeds to stardom. Success demanded its pound of flesh, however, resulting in increased strain on the band. Over the summer, founding guitarist Gary Marx left mid-tour, citing “personal reasons.” The band finished the tour and took a short break, then reconvened to write and rehearse for the next album that fall. Bassist Craig Adams walked out, ostensibly over the bassline for “Torch.” Guitarist Wayne Hussey left the next day. Accounts differ regarding the details and reasons for these departures, but Hussey and Adams quickly formed a band, with Red Lorry Yellow Lorry drummer Mick Brown, that would eventually become The Mission. WEA dangled a £25,000 advance, originally promised to the Sisters, to whichever group made an album first.

The Sisters had been disintegrating for some time before these departures, and the new uncertainty about the contractual advance raised the stakes yet again with regard to the future of both bands. Before the final London show of the original lineup, later released as Wake, Eldritch had given interviews about plans to form a supergroup with Patricia Morrison, ex-Gun Club, and Allen Vega from Suicide. In their frustration with Eldritch, Hussey and Adams decided to call their new group The Sisterhood, which was not coincidentally the name of the Sisters’ fan club. They booked a London debut for 20 January 1986. Eldritch threatened legal action over the name, but these threats came to nothing. He decided to beat his former bandmates to the punch. A single, “Giving Ground,” was released by a different Sisterhood on the same day that the Adams-Hussey band had scheduled their first gig.

This Sisterhood was eventually composed of Eldritch, Morrison, Vega, James Ray, and Lucas Fox. Fox, who played drums for the original Motörhead lineup (when the band was named Bastards), helped with production, and Morrison played bass, as she later would on the Sisters’ Floodland (1987). Vega did vocal tracks on the later Sisterhood Gift album. But for the initial single, recorded primarily to block former bandmates from using the name, time was of the essence. Due to contractual obligations, Eldritch could not sing on the new single, so he enlisted James Ray to do the vocals. The single was recorded in five days. It included two mixes of “Giving Ground,” the “RSV” on Side A and the “AV” on Side AA. The cryptic mix names alluded to translations of the Bible in English, the Revised Standard Version and Eldritch’s beloved Authorized (or King James) Version. The RSV was a twentieth century “update” of the 1611 AV translation for readers ill-equipped to comprehend its Elizabethan English. Given Eldritch’s professed admiration of the older version, it may not be a stretch to speculate that he considered the instrumental track the “original” and any version with vocals added a necessary evil.

Musically, the single seemed hastily put together, which in fact it was. Lyrically, however, the song articulates a refusal to compromise with others, and an anticipation of moving onward that, given the circumstances of its composition is difficult not to read as autobiographical. The AV track was instrumental, notable for featuring the drum machine Doktor Avalanche. The insentience of the machine allowed “him” to circumvent the contract with WEA that prevented Eldritch from appearing by name on his own track. The RSV version, which featured Ray’s vocals, shot quickly up the charts on strength of association with the Sisters, but sank quickly as well.

But the release of the single had nevertheless done the business. Hussey and Adams were forced to come up with a new name, and in March 1986 they became The Mission. Eldritch meanwhile recorded the remainder of the Sisterhood album, Gift, which appeared later that year with yet another version of “Giving Ground.” The later full album became noteworthy for its influence on later electronic music. At the time of the single, however, its crucial achievement was ironically enough gaining ground. That £25,000 check won The Sisters of Mercy time to regroup, time to experiment in the studio with early versions of “This Corrosion,” and ultimately time to begin recording their next album, Floodland, a breakthrough in songwriting, production, and global ambition for the band.


Giving Ground 7"(SIS 010)

Giving Ground (Lyrics)

In the place to which we wander
Reason turned around
And every fool
Will see his madness crowned
And every truth is swallowed up
By gently giving ground

What you have lost can never be found
Words are just dust in deserts of sound
Everything is lost and your trust lies broken
And the truth is drowned

I watch
Surrender
Because I know
...
Now I know you will not see
The madness we have seen
And now I know you cannot be
All that your (fright/flight) has been

What you have lost can never be found
Words are just dust in deserts of sound
Everything is lost and your trust lies broken
And the truth is drowned

Words are just dust

I stood but you just could not wait
Behind
Because I know you cannot be
All that your (fright/flight) has been

What you have lost can never be found
Words are just dust in deserts of sound
Everything is lost and the truth is drowned
Everything is lost in the giving ground

Everything is lost
Everything is lost in the giving ground

Turned around
Reason turned around
In the giving ground
In the giving ground
Everything is lost
In the giving ground

DISCOGS

[Christopher Vilmar]

On this day, 33 years ago (19 January 1991), The Cure performed at The Great British Music Awards in London Wembley arena (UK) with a.o. Ride, The La's, Jesus Jones, New Model Army and The Wedding Present.

For this special occasion The Cure played a very rare selection of songs and lots of fans agree some of the performed versions are considered to be pre-eminent.

The entire show was broadcast by British tv & radio

Setlist

Pictures Of You, Fascination Street, Just Like Heaven, Lullaby, The Walk, Let's Go To Bed, Why Can't I Be You?, In Between Days, A Forest, Never Enough

Encores:
Three Imaginary Boys, Boys Don't Cry, Disintegration

Line-up

Robert Smith, Simon Gallup, Porl Thompson, Boris Williams, Perry Bamonte