Amy is a new mother who sees the world as a beautiful place. Her head space won't allow her to see the darkness of reality. That's why she struggles to take things seriously enough to see that they're not meant to be funny.
The humour is there, It's not subjective, It's the tone of some lines. It's sarcastic, though, like a dark joke. Bowie was never straight in his intentions, It's usually very nuanced. Getting the humour in this song in its first listening is quite remarkable
@@JulioLeonFandinho Sure, there's humour there. But it's masking a very serious theme. Bowie was exceptionally good at mixing and matching different emotions and styles to produce a different result. He understood that it's a lot more interesting to suggest what you mean than flat out say it. The audience will appreciate your work more if you respect their intelligence and curiosity enough to let them work it out for themselves.
This was an incredibly odd reaction. I think everyone should keep in mind a reaction isn't "wrong" or "right", but she certainly interpreted this song in ways I have not once in 30+ years ever heard anyone else interpret it. This felt like watching someone laugh at a funeral lol
Over analysed without listening but maybe it was a song that did similar to my child ears first time. I didn't have to record my thoughts then, but I wasn't getting paid for my view either. Maybe as an officianado she should revisit this after several listens imho
Her musical analysis is strong and she picks up on the dark humor, but she has definitely missed something fundamental about the song, I think. It was a bizarre experience to watch her listen to a piece that has repeatedly brought me to tears and have her declare it “funny.”
For me, this song was all about Major Tom dying in space. Maybe I'm stupid, but "funny," and "not serious" are words that would never come to mind when I listened to this song.
Why does everyone say he died in space? After "your circuit's dead" he's still "here, floating in my tin can". The song does not end with any clear indication that Major Tom died. Then in Ashes to Ashes "major tom's a junkie". He probably never even went to space in the first place. The overconfidence in these comments is mind-boggling.
@@Trendyflute You may be right. I didn't know about Ashes to Ashes until I began to read the comments. Space Oddity is one of the few David Bowie songs I've heard, and I have only ever heard it on the radio. I'm not about to try to understand the lyrics of that song that says "We all know Major Tom's a junkie," but if that tells you he was on LSD or something and never went into space, I also won't argue.
@@henrymach You may well be right. I think most people who listen to a lot music would agree with you. My reasoning goes like this. The movie 2001: A Space Odyssey came out in 1968, and the song came out in 1969. In the movie, none of the astronauts get home alive. All of them die, some soon, one much later. The song is called Space Oddity - and if it is a play on the title of the 1968 movie in which none of the astronauts get home, it is at least reasonable to think that Major Tom does not make it home either. I never bought records, and I didn't know anything about David Bowie or his LSD use, so all I had to go on was the song lyrics and the Stanley Kubrick movie.
Not often disappointed by the reactions of Amy, but I think this one floated in the space over her head. Context is important it was at the height of the space eace obsession of the West and Russia, David was barely twenty, and space filtered through every aspect of society at that time. Yes, it's kinda kitch and hokey on reflection but the real meaning for me is the counterpoint between the quest for exploration into new worlds set against the loneliness and fragility of the human spirit.
When you put yourself out there like Amy does each reaction vid/song you let the world see you without pretense. There will be agreement, celebration, disappointment, questioning, joy even envy and bitterness. I love and appreciate this channel, doing these it's much more difficult than it looks. Thank you Amy. It definitely hurts to hear some of this about this song, it's like sacrilegious and it's painful-- but if you care about someone and you love them, you accept and respect their opinion. If she didn't let her first reaction to a song fly, all of this would be pointless and insincere. Also I guarantee if Amy listened to this song 5 more times, she would have a totally different analysis. Keep going Amy. We love you. Still can't wait for your Radiohead deep dive. ❤
To me it's very clear what's happening. Ground control loses contact with Major Tom and that's the end as far as we know. Then, some time later, Ground Control gains contact with our lost spaceman. There are machines that are keeping him alive and he's living a constant trauma. "The Little green wheels are following me . . . Oh no! Not again." Sad indeed. But absolutely brilliant. I first hear this song on the radio in Nov 1971 when I got my first Stereo with headphones. The sonic magic predated Dark Side Of The Moon.
Wow… I totally disagree with you this time. This is a deeply emotional song of how someone must have felt being one of the first people going to space, facing the unknown, danger, loneliness, fear.
Right? I've always felt sad listening to the lyrics. A man lost to the void of space and the emptiness of life hardly seems funny or lighthearted. Or maybe I've just watched too many space horror movies. At any rate, this one seems to have eluded her completely.
Yes, and I never thought the ending was inconclusive. She's right though, about the beginning being light-hearted and comic like. I think that's part of why the ending is so sad. "Tell my wife I love her very much - she knows" always leaves me fighting to hold back the tears.
She is thinking of it from what we know about space travel in 2024. In 1969, Bowie is writing the song from a point of view that is new and exciting. She missed the point.
I've watched a lot of VR reviews, and this one i found an interesting take but also maybe a bit frustrating. Yes, there's a tiny element of humour and cynicism from Bowie here, maybe a vestige from his earlier carreer. But maybe like a few people here, I always regarded this song as a clever, creative, beautiful work of art, and in its own way one of the best of the 20th century. So without being too precious, it felt like it was maybe being treated a tad dismissively. I usually agree with VR reviews, but in this case I think a few more listens would reveal there's a lot more to it. I know you are reacting on first impressions though and you are always walking a fine line. 🙂
The deliberate speech patterns in Davids vocals was reflecting the distinct way astronauts spoke to mission control with as much clarity as possible to maximize understanding. I am in my mid sixties and I have never heard anyone describe this song as amusing or funny in the slightest way. Astronauts sometimes trained for years before going into space or even orbit but often that training could never actually prepare them for what was actually in store for them. And they all knew there was a good chance they would not come back. In every flight there was an astronaut that was doing something that no man had done before. Thats why the ' papers want to know whose shirt you wear'. When Ed White performed the first spacewalk in 1965, his spacesuit was not properly pressurised and it slightly inflated to the point that there was a fear he would not be able to fit back into the space capsule. He was ' floating in a most peculiar way'. Not a funny situation. A lot of news media used " The Sounds Of Silence" as their background music of their coverage right back to Apollo 7 and 8. This is a man achieving something big but realising how insignificant he is in relation to the world and everyone upon it.
I found her immediate 💩eating Bugs Bunny grin very unsettling. Makes me wonder if she’d find the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band to be the most serious music ever ?.
You're really listening to some true classics of late. Glad you enjoyed it! There is humor in the song, a wry humor, but it is ultimately a tragic ending. It's a twist of emotion from light and silly to dark and alone.
Your analysis of this song is a huge miss. It's quite a dark song about existential anguish. It presents existence, in a seemingly empty universe, and Tom is uniquely situated to experience that emptiness as a physical reality, a man adrift in a void. He has several inner anchors to hold on to, such as the love of his wife, but he's still engulfed in the vast emptiness of space. Bowie, known for creating characters, does draw Tom as caught up in the outward foibles of life, and he may have fallen into traps like celebrity, fame (or drug addiction, as a followup Bowie song intimated) etc. But the stark reality of being alone in an empty universe is the point of the song. Any humor in Bowie's characterization of Tom is done in irony- to contrast an astronaut's reliance on technology, actually his loss of autonomy to technology. Tom is trapped in his techno tin can, without recourse. The earth is blue, the universe is a vast emptiness, technology fails, Tom is adrift without hope. He can only bid his wife adieu and float into oblivion.
I've read at least five different interpretations of this song in the comments section. I hope yours is the correct interpretation.. I've listened to this song my whole life since release, and I'm with Amy on her interpretation.
Hadfield, being a can-do astronaut, altered the downer "and there's nothing I can do" to the more mission-oriented and optimistic "and there's nothing left to do" (among other changes).
I think you may have missed the fact that Major Tom died up there. This song is a tragedy. He knew he was going to die and there was nothing he could do about it. He was floating helplessly.
I normally enjoy your reactions, but in this case I think the 50+ years context eludes you. (Yes I am an old fart who remembers the '69 moon landing very clearly.) Nobody thought "cartoonish" when this song was a hit. The things which made you laugh were REAL worries at the time. (Weightlessness, travel into the unknown of space, etc.) Even the tongue in cheek references (the papers want to know which shirts you wear)... were based on the real celebrity status of the astronauts. Major Tom dying was a REAL possibility in everyone's mind. Space Oddity today is not only famous for being Bowie's first hit, but for being a snapshot of the public mindset before the moon landing.
Yes, she had to imagine space travel when there had not been space travel. Rather than how a person born after a series of successful missions would view it. I found myself recently telling a high school student that during the Cold War, we were all scared and believed that a nuclear war could occur during our lifetimes or even.... soon! They don't "get it" from a one-hour lesson in school.
I'm 35, I've still never heard this as funny or light hearted. This always felt a sad and worried song to me even when I first heard it, I'm perplexed by her reaction
I'm 69. Remember this song well from release date. I always thought it had a sardonic humour. Bowie grew up just south of where I now live and just north of where I lived then. At the same time, my wife spent her teens in West London close to members of The Who. Shortly after getting married, we lived in the southern end of Southall close to Hanwell and Hanwell Baptist Church where Rick Wakeman lived and went to church (Rick played keyboard on this and other Bowie songs). Maybe I share some ways of thinking with Bowie. Remember, we'd already had men in space and there had been one trip round the moon and back and it would not take long for Apollo 13 to be rescued. Around that time, we also had songs using space as a metaphor for rock stardom: Elton John's Rocket Man; Rice and Lloyd-Weber's Jesus Christ Superstar; slightly differently, The Who with Tommy; Rolling Stones had mused over the papers wondering what shirts you wear in Satisfaction; Mott the Hoople would produce several songs and a book, Diary of a Rock & Roll Star. It's an obvious metaphor to me
Great analysis (Carnival Of The Animals analogy was brilliant) but you misread the ending. He's become enraptured by the experience & no longer cares about corporeal existence. It's transcendental. That's why he says goodbye to his wife & drifts off, outside his tin can, now way above the moon ... Worth remembering that 2001: A Space Odyssey had been released in 1968 - in fact I've just read that ne was inspired by that film, in which the main protagonist most certainly had a transcendental experience!
I always think of that movie when I hear this song. I too find the song sad. It came out when I was a kid and it frightened me that he was out there all alone and no one could get him to respond.
Exactly. And the line "Planet Earth is blue, and there's nothing I can do" illustrates his disconnection from the world and desire to escape it permanently.
"Planet earth is blue and there's nothing I can do" is definitely not a humerous conclusion. It tells of a world in trouble, but we as individuals can can do nothing to change it.
There's nothing _he_ can do because he's stuck in space and presumably going to die there. But I think the message is for everyone left on the planet, that there are things that can be done.
I find a lot of humor in that line, it's a sort of extra-glib summation of an incredibly dire situation. He's boiling down a genuinely terrible story into rather silly lines. "sitting on a tin can", "take your protein pills and put your helmet on", "all the papers want to know whose shirts you wear"...even the earth is blue line is a double entendre, because it's 70% ocean it looks blue, the earth as a planetary body can't have an emotion, we project our emotions on it...but he could also just literally be talking about the color. I really disagree with all these comments that this song can only be read as sad and serious. The brilliance of it is that it is sad and serious and funny and silly all at once. Good art is more than one thing at a time, and Amy did not disrespect this piece.
@@Trendyflute Yeah, I think it's funny how people react so strongly at the notion that a song called "Space Oddity" might have some surreal and even humorous elements
I think many in these comments are too hyperfocused on the content of the lyrics, and not paying enough attention to the music and the voice itself as instruments and what they are conveying in all their multiple aspects. Yes this song has a melancholy poignancy that can be quite moving, but much of the music (and even quite a few of the lyrics) also has a light, whimsical tone. I have listened to this song countless times through my years being a Bowie fan and I do not think Amy "missed the point" by being focused on the lighthearted elements in the song. Bowie knows how to be musically heavy, serious and devastating in tone when he wants to be (Rock and Roll Suicide, The Bewlay Brothers, You Feel So Lonely You Could Die, and so on and on and on). Space Oddity in comparison has many "comic" elements to it, and I think that was very intentional of Bowie. It's an example of his incredible artistry that he can so deftly weave both the touching and the comic, both humour with melancholic sadness in the one song. For one person the song may be heartbreaking, for another, like Amy (on a first listen btw. And thank you to Amy for always giving her honest reaction and never trying to please the fans for views!) quirky and lighthearted. Neither is clearly right or wrong, but both responses are valid and evidence for each can be found in the music and lyrics. And that's part of what made Bowie such a great artist.
Exactly! The appeal of this channel is that she has her own particular perspective that's really thoughtful and unique. It's one thing to disagree with her, but all these commenters trying to mansplain music to her is a big 🙄 This song obviously has an element of wryness and camp, both in vocal delivery and instrumentation choices, and she was picking up on that, and was articulating it very well!
I am so glad somebody else already said it. Sonically the song might as well be a circus act, it's goofy. I love that AND the lyrical ideas presented. Damn, y'all, calm down. Blackstar would be hard to read as funny, not this. Ffs, Adam Sandler used it for a joke in one of his movies!
@@serenefish I'm a woman and am not "mansplaining". For that matter, neither are the men here. Usually her reactions are more thoughtful, but not this time. And we all have every right to let her know that.
@@jessithanks8082How is it not thoughtful? Like any video, she shared her thoughts and impressions as they came, and talked about how specific musical choices made her feel that way. Again, I get disagreeing, but I just found it frustrating to see people acting like she's being stupid or somehow disrespectful for experiencing it differently of course people have the right to comment that way, just like I have the right to express my frustration with it
one person said something like "maybe I had the same impression when I was a child. she should listen a few more times", another saying "any 8th grader would get an F for this analysis", another saying an "incredibly odd reaction", "like laughing at a funeral" etc etc.. and the kicker is that *they're* the ones who seem to have a pretty shallow, one dimensional take on the song.
I find the whole piece highly dramatic, not lighthearted in any way. But first and foremost, it´s a great classical melody with fantastic harmonies and a completely organic flow. Bohemian Rhapsody is a conglomerate of totally different sections and rhythms while Space Oddity works perfectly well as a campfire song with just one voice and guitar. In my opinion, this is one of the strongest songs in pop not written by the Beatles (other examples being She´s Not There by the Zombies and Bowie´s own Starman and Life On Mars).
So, Space Oddity is now a funny, light hearted song about a silly astronaut and all the unlikely ways Ground Control would or would not speak to him. Got it, cool. And to think all this time I thought it was an intensely sad piece about someone knowing they were going to soon be dying alone, thousands of miles from any other human, with no hope. My bad.
He did come back in Ashes to Ashes, but that was about a decade later. I think Bowie left the ending deliberately open ended so the listener can decide Major Tom's fate for themselves. He does not explicitly provide clues that he perishes or survives in the song.
This is one of the oddest song reactions on YT. Some comments note the English humor, theatrical aspects of Bowie. That's all true, and Bowie is using humor, satire and irony as he sets up the scene of this song. Everything is fair game, such as, Tom's celebrity, the tin can that represents advanced technology, who's shirt you wear- celebrity culture etc. Ground control speaks in the voice of authoritative technology, runs through a mundane checklist, which is interspersed with side comments of making the grade and perceptions of success in the media. If you had any knowledge of early space flight, this was the actual atmosphere of a launch. There was this imperious techno step by step routine, which was often broken by offhand comments of the participants. In fact, there is a realist aspect to this strange banter, it goes from instruction manual to ribbing and kidding. That's what actually happened at the time. However, the reactor absurdly takes the entire meaning of the song as frivolous and funny. That is pathetic. The song is mixing all these elements to set the scene. This is masterful use of irony to set the stage for a denoument. The ultimate purpose is to see that Tom is headed for his demise in an empty universe.
Lots of people take the lyrics literally... I happen to think of it as a metaphor for some guy with a bright future ahead of him that gets into drugs and "blasts off" into space... only to destroy himself and end up losing the connection he used to have with the rest of us
For me the bass is key in this song. It bounces and rises and falls like a man in a spaceship... Herbie Flowers was the bass player, and has passed away recently. He also played tuba. He also played for Marc Bolan, Paul Mccartney, Bryan Ferry, Elton John. Also famous for the bass line on Walk on The Wild Side - Lou Reed. RIP Herbie - one epic dude.
I am baffled by your response to this song. Sure, people have different reactions to and interpretations of music, but your takeaway seems very odd. You describe this song as funny, cartoonish, contrived, light-hearted, non-serious….Yikes. I agree there is a quirkiness and playfulness, but this song is also lush, moving, psychedelic, haunting and sad. This song is a successful blend of all those elements.
I have a feeling Amy didn't realise Major Tom ends up lost in Space!? 😳 Then again, she's not entirely wrong either with saying this song ends inconclusive; Food for thought! 🤔 To _me_ , it's not a funny song at all, though. A _great_ one, yes!
Ending not conclusive?? Does anyone really expect any ‘Houston we have a problem’ followed by a spectacular NASA rescue there? And didn’t anyone get that clue in the title (that nod to the not very funny Kubrick film) give it away (quite the spoiler that you will have to take into account when considering that open ending “food for thought”)? Even from the junkie angle, on has to admit that things are about to get far worse rather before they get any better for the foreseeable time at this point in Bowies life (we’d have to wait until his move from LA to Berlin to get to an actual turning point in that respect I suppose: trying to extrapolate that to this song then we are probably several alter ego’s and a couple of decades/changes later, no? So not a lot of arguments in favour of a happy, funny, not at all tragic ending in the context of song analysis for this one. But, as usual, nothing is ever conclusive in Bowie land, so I myself have come to interpret Ashes to Ashes as a form of sequel. Less funny, mind you, but at least clearly less final for the individual human and far less dystopian for humanity as a whole (tho still quite pessimistic post-modern undertones even there)…
@@elemar5 In a some weird way tho, I must confess that this song (in spite of the tragic story) does actually tend to bring more smiles to my face rather than bringing me in a state of anxiety or fear (which would be the expected response). If I speak from just my own personal experience being fully honest, yes, I kind of like those over the top futurist soundscapes that are created here: the radical choices in dynamics of the stereo, the in-your-face symbolism in that lift of an those pseudo-strange vocal overdubs that give that track that entire outlandish, mysterious, unknowable futuristic feel: those things just bring me joy. Excuse the naïve nerd in me here. Similarly I get far more joy than fear when watching Kubricks 2001 or even Clockwork Orange: I just love 60s and 70s over the top futuristic designs about our century I suppose, 😅
I usually love Amy's analysis of the songs she has covered, but on this occasion she has unfortunately completely missed the point of the song. Its not a funny song about an astronaut, its a tragic song about a spaced out junkie, which Bowie covered in later songs.
To be fair, unless you've read about this song, it is very difficult to figure this out on your own. I've been listening to mostly classic rock for many years and Bowie is one of my favorites, but I did not realize this until a few years ago, when I looked it up.
The first piece you listened was the exception. This is much more the norm for Bowie"s music although he changed styles ftequently. Theatricality and artifice was at the core of Bowie's art. He adopted several different performance personas (personae?) throughout his career. This early ''Major Tom' space exploration character and theme also works as a metaphor for growing up and launching yourself on life, expanding horizons, awareness of the state of the world together feelings of alienation, loneliness and being at the mercy of cosmic forces and the very small arena over which you can exercise any control. As always I enjoy the way you make connections to the deeper history of music.
This may be one of the most melancholy songs Bowie ever sang (and that's saying something). On top of the tragedy of losing an astronaut in space, the song also contains oblique references to drug addiction and compulsive behavior, which Bowie would return to several times in future songs. I love your reactions and analyses, but you really went off course on this one.
Same here. I've been getting that sense a while back, as if she hasn't grasped that the rock-related genres aren't only about feeling good, but that they're often as serious as any other artistic expression. Even in her praise sometimes there are subtle indications that she also looks down on it. I've learnt a lot about music in general from her (and other experts on RUclips) but there comes a time when I'll return to my own instincts and evaluation of music.
I don't expect too much from a reactor, who after 50+ Beatles songs, still can't distinguish Paul McCartney's voice from Lennon's. But to find this a lighthearted song is absurd. There is humor here, dark humor, gallows humor, deep irony.....but chuckles humor? That's ridiculous.
Space Oddity - Ashes to Ashes - Hallo Space boy - Black Star- make up the Major Tom Quartet that encompasses Bowies career. These 4 songs heard in sequence are an enlightening journey through one mans life works.
I am so glad to see Amy reviewing Bowie! I think accurately picked up on quirky musical aspect, which describes his earlier fantastic first work. But, then I think it kept her from noting the sadness of his detaching, (especially after his heartfelt goodbye to his wife). I was worried when she only gave Space Oddity 20 minutes. I hope she spends more time on musical elements in future videos.
I've always felt Tom lost it in space, overwhelmed by how miniscule he felt and committed suicide, that HE willingly shuts off the controls. I cry every time I hear this, particularly when he tells his wife that he loves her. It's not enough for him to overcome his feeling of helplessness and lack of meaning. I think your interpretation of the musical elements is spot on during the countdown sequence, but not so much lyrically or thematically at the end.
@@paulonius42 I guess it's comprehensible...we must understand...it's not her fault. Listening to "Space Oddity" when it came out in 1969 and listening to it in the year 2024 are two things absolutely not comparable...you can't have the same feelings...it's impossible...more than half a century has gone by !. Just think about listening to "My Generation" in 1965 at 17 y/o, and in 2024 at...say 35 y/o (but even at 17 y/o...times are different).....then tell me.
@@giuliogrifi7739 I agree that our age and the era in which we hear a song matter, but I don't think that really applies so much here. Ever since the song came out, pretty much all of us have understood it to be a tragic song. She's way out on her own on this interpretation. I've watched people doing reactions who are in their twenties and thirties, and they get the song just fine.
@@paulonius42 I was born in 1955. Anyway, I don't know if I can agree with you. In my first comment I've been critical, but, in the end, what we saw is her sincere (I'm sure) reaction...after all, she's coming from a completely dissimilar music world. About other reactions, I'm afraid not all of them can be considered genuine, heartfelt: many are "acting"...have you ever seen someone openly disliking any song or movie ?...I can count them on one hand. Let's be frank, the thing started as a hobby, but by now it's...business, much more than fun. Nonetheless, even being aware of this, I like to watch them the same.
@@giuliogrifi7739 I have seen plenty with negative opinions, but that's because I try to find people I believe are authentic. You're right, there are a lot of very fake reactions being done, and I'm not saying she needs to be ostracized for getting this one wrong or anything like that. I think her immense musical knowledge and her urge to analyze got in the way of her actually understanding the song. It used to happen with my college composition students when they started doing literary analysis and lost sight of the literature they were supposed to analyze. She had preconceived notions coming into this song that ruined her understanding of it.
I'm very happy that you choose to explore more Bowie, you need to continue! ♥️ I think that here you've missed something important about the meaning of the song and lyrics. That BLUE about the planet heart is so meaningful about things and about life and Major Tom himself. He will return in 4 Bowie's song, it's an important character in his career and art. Please try to capture more about Major Tom, maybe listenting again at Space Oddity. It will be sad if you loss who is and who was Major Tom. If you want to understand him in the others song you have to return on Space Oddity. Thanks, I love your work, you are great, if you make a mistake it's just because you're human ❤
I think Amy is tired. As she herself said, her little one is keeping her up at night. For me, this analysis was done on autopilot. It's a shame that this happened on one of Bowie's great classics. I insist again that a little more context is needed. And please take some time for yourself, Vlad and the little one. Love you guys!
This was one weird reaction! I don't see how you see this song as humorous in the sense of unserious. It does use humor, satirically, in the way the title is in contrast with 2001-A Space Odyssey. The humor is used ironically as well. But humor as an absence of seriousness, not at all. It's a deadly serious song.
No she did not, she reacted to original song that was recorded ‘69, and released as single, you remember the album version; that was re-recorded later in 1971 in much better studio, that is much better version, cause this first one sound almost like demo recording when you compare this two. One on what you think is the one most people think about, when “Space Oddity” is in question.
Oooo ... don't think you got this one right. It's definitely about alienation and abandonment and decidedly more poignant than funny. Maybe you've spent too much time with Queen and missed the lyric references Bowie used.
Pleased to see I don't stand alone this time being contrarian to Amy's reaction. I never found the song as humorous either. Always took it as commentary on the human condition. Interesting how differently others can look at things.
This was his first hit. Amy, apparently it's about a drug addict on a high. Keyboards by Rick Wakeman. RW came back to do Life On Mars - great pianist.
Good question. Well, there are operas, operettas, lieder, choral works and such, and those lyrics (or librettos) veer from the very light to the very dark as well. They cover all aspects from the brutal & savage to the divine, not to mention sexual elements. But yes, you do have a point. Getting to grips with the lyrical substance in contemporary music is a completely different challenge, and unfortunately, those who had been steeped in classical music exclusively will easily misjudge the mood of songs like these.
@@EddieReischl True, and although the original librettos are often poetic in style, they usually reflect real feelings & narrative elements and very little in terms of metaphors or allegories. A man lost in space would represent a man lost in space and not a spaced-out man, for example! It also means we shouldn't judge Amy harshly for misreading the lyrical mood of a song - how many of us realise what lyrics really mean with a first listen? Not many. But have I ever seen someone react to Space Oddity with giggles? Never thought I'd see it!
@@dogsmusicbookstravelscience Yeah, I know. The one line "...papers want to know whose shirts you wear..." is sort of a funny poke at how superficial our civilization is sometimes, which Bowie may have included as evidence of what he feels disconnected from, but other than that, it's more neutral until the part where the circuits crap out.
I'm glad you now have a better grounding in what David Bowie sounds like in his more typical pop rock style. While "Warszawa" was a great piece, it just wasn't David Bowie's typical style. Although, like Queen, he has a lot of variation in both his voice and music. You should now go back and listen to "Under Pressure" again so you can better contrast his voice from Freddie's. I think it will be obvious to you now that the other voice is Bowie. I was 9 when we first landed on the moon and have lots of memories of watching these space missions live. The astronauts were household names at that time and considered heros because they were putting their lives on the line. It could be very tense watching these mission (particularly Apollo 13) since there was a risk they would end in tragedy.
I think you (understandably) missed the fact that this was a song completely out of the style of it's moment. Look at other big hits from the charts at that time. It was musically revolutionary!! The number one songs of the moment was 'Sugar Sugar' by The Archies, and Johnny Cash 'A Boy Named Sue' and Elvis singing 'Suspicious Minds'. This was an important foundation for the music of the 70's.
I don't think you are wrong about the musical jokes that were made. Bowie was a consummate humorist in his own way, but he was something of a dark humorist. When he sounds flippant or light hearted, it is usually steeped in irony, and intended to highlight the tragedy using a flippant delivery. I do think you sort of missed the idea that Major Tom didn't come back. As others have said, this song is also an allegory for a lot of other situations where people boldly explore "places" that are fraught with peril, and are frequently misunderstood by people who do not share their journey. The song certainly has meant something different to almost every person who has heard it, but it almost never fails to be meaningful. The beauty of it is that it CAN mean so many things to so many people, and highlights the emotions of risk, discovery, and loss so eloquently. Life is funny and tragic, and so is this song.
For me the most important lines in the song are "you've really made the grade, and the papers want to know whose shirts you wear." For "ground control," it was never about the science but rather the creation of celebrity, and Major Tom is now going to pay the price. Might be a metaphor for the music industry at the time.
There are some competing emotions as well as unemotional passages in this song. The whole affair was, in context, the most significant undertaking in history. It had to be handled in a simultaneously emotionless and wildly emotional way with scientific, engineering, historical and commercial interests vying for expression.
Lots of great comments today. I’ll just point out that line about what shirt Major Tom was wearing is not entirely frivolous. At the time, much was made of the fact that Neil Armstrong wore an Omega Speedmaster chronograph on the mission.
All the NASA astronaut's wore Omega watches - after a lot of testing by NASA of Rolex, Breitling, etc, Omega's were the only ones that didn't break under flight simulations (vibration, etc), so NASA issued them to crew to wear in space. ...and Neil Armstrong's Omega wasn't the first on the Moon - he left his watch with Michael Collins in the Command Module that orbited the moon to cover for a malfunctioning electronic timer, while he and Buzz Aldrin landed in the Eagle lander - so Buzz Aldrin's Omega was the first on the moon. Aldrin lost his watch in the 1970's when it was sent to the Smithsonian Museum for an exhibition and went missing on the way.
Funny...okay. You should listen to this again, without the "funny glasses" on 😉 Perhaps you'll find something very sad in this piece. I wish you'll find it 😀
David Bowie, restless innovator, rock musician extraordinaire and cultural icon. We won't hear his like again. His famous claim 1999 in which he predicted, to a highly educated interviewer, that the Internet was going to shape all of our lives...I think the ending is less of boringly having 'nothing to do' but rather his realisation that he was adrift from the spacecraft and there was nothing he could do to prevent his perishing in space ("where no-one can hear you scream"). This is referenced on his last album Blackstar where the video shows the corpse of Major Tom.
I think about a billion other people thought the same thing about the internet in the 90's. The rest didn't know what the internet was. Bowie did make very good music, though
A bizarre reaction to a song that is essentially quite harrowing on many levels. I always thought the end was very conclusive, Major Tom's space capsule spirals out of control and dissappears into space as the orchestration spirals out of control and fades away. I would repestfully ask you do a second listen perhaps paired with Ashes to Ashes. On a wider point I would again respectfully suggest that taking a more 'serious' approach to the music of David Bowie may help (I can't believe I just wrote that - but it needs to be said I feel). I don't believe in polls and who is the best at this and that. Those things are quite pointless but if I was forced into expressing a view, I would say David Bowie is probably the most important, unique, creative artist in the history of popular music 🙃
I see this song as representing a slightly melancholy allegory about separating oneself (major Tom) from authority/social norms (ground control), and being ok floating into the unknown despite ground control’s concern (“can you hear me major Tom?”). I don’t find it primarily humorous, although there is a little tongue-in cheek tone about it (but more in a “this is hard but it’s ok” attitude).
In mind it paints the picture of overoptimistic faith in technology, sending out an explorer knowing full well how risky it would be, but convinced it will be fine as long as everyone believes in it. And then it all goes wrong... and his dead body floats forever
You're funny - it's "there's nothing I can do" as in a feeling of existential impotence, not "I've got nothing to do" as in bored stiff, twiddling on my guitar.😂
"Something entirely non serious", says Amy. An entirely inappropriate remark, Id say. Not for the first time, Amy makes a hash of it. The meaning behind 'Aqualung' was the first time I'd heard her "entirely" misrepresent a lyric sheet, that I became aware of, and Amy proves it was not just a false beginning. I didn't hear much on the music, nothing about melody or production again, (she probably thinks the mellotron is a symphony orchestra), but I switched off at 15.52 in despair. Amy, there were teenager's in the 70s who got the essence of this song in their youth, something which you have failed to do in your 30s or whatever. And the comment section explains what that is, very well. Further, her obsession with comparing everything to classical music, is a big mistake. Rock ripped up the musical rule book a life time ago, including that of Stockhausen. Im suprised her husband, who appears a little more au fait, allowed her to put this one out............
Oh dear. Got this one wrong, Amy. This is a song about how the world in 1969 is f***ed up - at least Major Tom's is. After a significant event (the flight into space) the only thing the papers want to know is what shirt this new celebrity wears. When he steps into space he sees that the Earth is blue (i.e. sad) but he's feeling liberated. In the end he knows there's nothing he can do to resolve Earth's problems so he turns off his comms and allows himself to drift into space. That's how I interpreted the lyrics in 1969 and I still read it that way. In "Ashes To Ashes" we find Major Tom is a junkie. My interpretation still fits. I have always wondered why the BBC chose such a depressing song for its Apollo 11 coverage. Still it gave Bowie a #5 UK hit. His next release "The Prettiest Star" bombed.
It didn't. That's a myth that Bowie himself promoted. The BBC refused to allow it on the radio until the astronauts returned to Earth. Pink Floyd did the music for the landing.
Thanks - as always - for bringing such a fresh perspective. Most who will have watched this, like me, will have lived with this song most, if not all of their lives. I think you may be right - we have come to treat it too seriously. For someone who sees the funny side you must look up and watch “Flight of the Conchords Bowie”. They get it too.
I call BS on that. At the time, Bowie was nobody, best known for the 1967 release The Laughing Gnome (which *was* a comedy song). It wasn't his disconnect that he was writing about, it was the other stars who had risen and flamed out due to drugs. I think he'd witnessed too many friends drift away to overdose.
Amy has shown before in many other reviews that she tends to take a very literal interpretation of the lyrics and messages in rock, pop and folk and completely misses the entire point of the piece she was listening to. This is another one and the message and moral of the song has all gone completely over her head.
@@Ck-zk3we I made a comment about it in the comment section. You're being what you're accusing the lady reactor of being: literal The song is ambiguous in tone, there's many ways of expressing one idea. Bowie was being consciously ambiguous and sarcastic
Fully agreed. I'll never criticise others for not getting it at a first listen since we all start at the bottom of learning curves. However, on several occasions, Amy's given me the idea that she approaches none of the songs with the seriousness they deserve. She'd mention the things she likes and explain some interesting passages that many fans would miss in the music itself, but she does seem to be under the impression that nothing in rock (the "lesser art form") can be truly serious. This is not the first time I've wondered what the hell she's giggling about...
Bowie was very theatrical right from the start and influenced by musicals/mime, the whole kit and caboodle, combined with a wonderful pop/rock sensibility.
I think it helps to understand the context at the time in history when Apollo 11 launched. The public was very engaged with everything that led up to this event and the astronauts were very much celebrities. They appeared in all sorts of magazines and people probably did want to know what sorts of shirts they wore. There was an interest on mundane topics such as what type of food they would be eating, hence the "protein pills" . Also happening at the same time the movie 2001 was released which provided additional imagery that people were absorbing at the very same time. Finally, there was a very real sense that' something could go wrong and the astronauts might get stranded out in space. The song actually ends in this tragedy. Some of these things probably make more sense to someone who was around when all this was happening. There are many things worked into the song that ring true to reality. There was a great unity and collective hope that they would be safe and they would make it.
I’ve listened to the song since my early childhood as my father played it before I even knew who David Bowie was. And I’ve never would consider it funny or cartoony, but rather extremely sad and anxious because of fear and inconceivability of void and space (also death) that the astronaut experiences. in the context of human life it could also be a metaphor of solitude or alienation… e. g. for me the guitar outro is extremely unsettling. that’s why I was rather surprised by your reaction. also drawing the context, the title is a reference to the S. Kubrick’s great movie the „2001: Space Odyssey”, which in my opinion nicely puts the song in a cultural context and concept of understanding the cosmos.
On a couple of occasions you seen to miss the point completely. I'm thinking of here and the bee gees, I started to cry. Don't get me wrong, I love your analyses. I guess you can't hit a home run every time. Maybe just be a bit more open to the possibility that the lyrics have a deeper meaning would be my only note for you.
The music does tell us what happens in the end. As you yourself say, the violin and flute are moving apart. The symbals are crashing at accidental times, everything is slowing down, the violin gets out of tune . . . (Strung out on heaven's high hitting an all-time low)
I hear this song and imagine what it must be like to realize that you are floating off to your death, knowing there is nothing you can do but wait out the very last moments of life until the point when the oxygen runs out. Thinking of your loved ones and how they know you're off to your end and how they too must be fearful and suffering. I will admit that the first several times listening to this song as a child that never occurred to me but it also never occurred to me that the song was humorous in any way. Whether taking the lyrics literally or figuratively there's only the sense of doom, tranquil maybe, but doom nonetheless.
I saw an interview with David Bowie years ago where he talked about wanting to write stage musicals when he was a teenager, and that made so much sense to me. Many of his songs do come across like songs you'd hear in a musical, and his various personae are like characters in a play.
He actually started to write a stage musical about "1984". But he didn't get the rights from George Orwell's heirs, so he scratched it and used the song material for the "Diamond Dogs" album.
Exatly! Thanks for saying so. I really think this song stops being fun when you add the theatrical, the dramatic aspect to it. Amy missed precisely this. It is a profound song written by a young Bowie, a nihilistic Bowie, I dare to say. The kind of Bowie would later write Diamond Dogs
My reading of Space Oddity has always been that it's Major Tom who decides that he's not going back to earth. When Ground Control says 'Your circuit's dead', it's because Major Tom has switched it off and no longer wants to communicate with them. He's decided to just let himself drift through space until he dies (or at least until he decides to come back in Ashes to Ashes). The theme of isolation has been there throughout Bowie's work and career and this is an early example of it. All in my opinion, of course.
"Someone at the BBC had a sense of humor" - or _irony_. "I think my spaceship knows which way to go/tell my wife I love her very much..." He is not coming home. He is choosing to float off into the void. It's a kind of a tragedy...
I think the “funny” introduction is meant to depict our fledgling steps into the unknown. Major Tom had been hyped up. He really made the grade. He was the man…. And just like Icarus, he flew too close to the sun… As humans, we like to run before we really know how to walk, and thus we constantly lead ourselves into tragedy. 17:50. The instrumental separation is Major Tom floating away, lost in space.
The song is poignant, not humorous. Major Tom lets his weltschmerz overcome him and he lets himself float out into space with no desire to want to be on the Earth any more.
I really love your channel and appreciate your work and analysis Amy. Thank you very much. I hope that you are not offended by negative comments. I like it that you are giving an honest opinion about your feelings. The essence of art is allowing to be interpreted individually. There is no right or wrong. Greetings from germany
The "ground control to Major Tom" part is the call out from Ground Control to contact the spacecraft. They would sound out messages like that until they got a response.
The idea that this song is funny is so weird. I think you took the idea that it was treated as a "novelty song" in the wrong way. This is lyrically a ballad, and trying to analyze it halfway through the story is really not the best thing to do. This is a tragic song.
Always a fan of Amy's reactions, as they are different to any others, and always honest. I'd really like to see more David Bowie reactions as I've always been a fan of his. He made so many great songs, and with such variety. Hunky Dory is my favourite album and Queen Bitch and Oh! You Pretty Things are both brilliant songs, but the track I'd most like to see Amy review would be Golden Years from the Station to Station album. This is because initially I wasn't that keen on this track, but it is now my absolute favourite Bowie song, and so it would be interesting to see what Amy thinks of it and whether she likes it.
Interesting take. I’ve always found this song to be incredibly isolating, detached/lonely and, quite frankly, very sad.
Have always thought it was a jokey take in the early part, which increases the pathos of the ending
Tell my wife I love her very much...
She knows...
😭
@@greatbigbadger Exactly this. Both takes are correct and key tonal choices in the song. At least that is to say that I agree... lol
Then years later there's Ashes to Ashes where its revealed "We know Major Tom's a junkie"
Strange perspective. The song is deeply melancholic. Maybe dark whimsical, but definitely not funny.
A genius piece of music.
I’ve never found it humorous or light hearted but rather quite
sad
I guess it’s all subjective.
His voice, the lyrics, many times, brings me to tears
That's the problem with formulating comments only part way through.
Amy is a new mother who sees the world as a beautiful place. Her head space won't allow her to see the darkness of reality.
That's why she struggles to take things seriously enough to see that they're not meant to be funny.
The humour is there, It's not subjective, It's the tone of some lines.
It's sarcastic, though, like a dark joke.
Bowie was never straight in his intentions, It's usually very nuanced.
Getting the humour in this song in its first listening is quite remarkable
@@JulioLeonFandinho Sure, there's humour there. But it's masking a very serious theme. Bowie was exceptionally good at mixing and matching different emotions and styles to produce a different result.
He understood that it's a lot more interesting to suggest what you mean than flat out say it. The audience will appreciate your work more if you respect their intelligence and curiosity enough to let them work it out for themselves.
This was an incredibly odd reaction. I think everyone should keep in mind a reaction isn't "wrong" or "right", but she certainly interpreted this song in ways I have not once in 30+ years ever heard anyone else interpret it.
This felt like watching someone laugh at a funeral lol
Kind of like "Chop Suey" that way...
are you offended? 😂
@BR81-iv6lt shut up bozo don't be a dipshit! Just say you don't have a brain cell to understand the song either
Over analysed without listening but maybe it was a song that did similar to my child ears first time. I didn't have to record my thoughts then, but I wasn't getting paid for my view either. Maybe as an officianado she should revisit this after several listens imho
Her musical analysis is strong and she picks up on the dark humor, but she has definitely missed something fundamental about the song, I think. It was a bizarre experience to watch her listen to a piece that has repeatedly brought me to tears and have her declare it “funny.”
For me, this song was all about Major Tom dying in space. Maybe I'm stupid, but "funny," and "not serious" are words that would never come to mind when I listened to this song.
Why does everyone say he died in space? After "your circuit's dead" he's still "here, floating in my tin can". The song does not end with any clear indication that Major Tom died. Then in Ashes to Ashes "major tom's a junkie". He probably never even went to space in the first place. The overconfidence in these comments is mind-boggling.
@@Trendyflute You may be right. I didn't know about Ashes to Ashes until I began to read the comments. Space Oddity is one of the few David Bowie songs I've heard, and I have only ever heard it on the radio. I'm not about to try to understand the lyrics of that song that says "We all know Major Tom's a junkie," but if that tells you he was on LSD or something and never went into space, I also won't argue.
It's about Bowie's addiction to heroin.
Both songs Space Oddity and Ashes to Ashes
I've always thought it was about an acid trip
@@henrymach You may well be right. I think most people who listen to a lot music would agree with you. My reasoning goes like this. The movie 2001: A Space Odyssey came out in 1968, and the song came out in 1969. In the movie, none of the astronauts get home alive. All of them die, some soon, one much later. The song is called Space Oddity - and if it is a play on the title of the 1968 movie in which none of the astronauts get home, it is at least reasonable to think that Major Tom does not make it home either.
I never bought records, and I didn't know anything about David Bowie or his LSD use, so all I had to go on was the song lyrics and the Stanley Kubrick movie.
Not often disappointed by the reactions of Amy, but I think this one floated in the space over her head. Context is important it was at the height of the space eace obsession of the West and Russia, David was barely twenty, and space filtered through every aspect of society at that time. Yes, it's kinda kitch and hokey on reflection but the real meaning for me is the counterpoint between the quest for exploration into new worlds set against the loneliness and fragility of the human spirit.
When you put yourself out there like Amy does each reaction vid/song you let the world see you without pretense. There will be agreement, celebration, disappointment, questioning, joy even envy and bitterness. I love and appreciate this channel, doing these it's much more difficult than it looks. Thank you Amy. It definitely hurts to hear some of this about this song, it's like sacrilegious and it's painful-- but if you care about someone and you love them, you accept and respect their opinion. If she didn't let her first reaction to a song fly, all of this would be pointless and insincere. Also I guarantee if Amy listened to this song 5 more times, she would have a totally different analysis. Keep going Amy. We love you. Still can't wait for your Radiohead deep dive. ❤
We can respect her without respecting all of her opinions. This one just wasn't very well thought out.
Counterpoint: Ashes to ashes, funk to funky. We know Major Tom's a junkie. Strung out in heaven's high hitting an all-time low.
He's addicted to oxygen and he's jonesing real bad.
I was going to say that!
@@angelmontgomery6168 Or, he's equating being in space to just being high... maybe this is not a literal space journey but a metaphorical one
@@MidwestFarmToys Definitely a metaphorical one.
To me it's very clear what's happening. Ground control loses contact with Major Tom and that's the end as far as we know. Then, some time later, Ground Control gains contact with our lost spaceman. There are machines that are keeping him alive and he's living a constant trauma. "The Little green wheels are following me . . . Oh no! Not again." Sad indeed. But absolutely brilliant. I first hear this song on the radio in Nov 1971 when I got my first Stereo with headphones. The sonic magic predated Dark Side Of The Moon.
Glad to see I’m not alone in thinking she wasn’t able to comprehend this song!
Wow… I totally disagree with you this time. This is a deeply emotional song of how someone must have felt being one of the first people going to space, facing the unknown, danger, loneliness, fear.
@tobepps I totally agree, she totally missed the point!
@@petersutton2182agreed
I don't think so. I don't believe anyone ever left the earth. Come at me
Agreed, it's a song about addiction. If you're a normie, it's about space though, so just accept it and move on
@@Andriig75 While I agree with you, the song is brilliant.
In well over 50 years of listening to this song, I have never once thought it was "funny".
Right? I've always felt sad listening to the lyrics. A man lost to the void of space and the emptiness of life hardly seems funny or lighthearted. Or maybe I've just watched too many space horror movies. At any rate, this one seems to have eluded her completely.
Yes, and I never thought the ending was inconclusive. She's right though, about the beginning being light-hearted and comic like. I think that's part of why the ending is so sad. "Tell my wife I love her very much - she knows" always leaves me fighting to hold back the tears.
She is thinking of it from what we know about space travel in 2024. In 1969, Bowie is writing the song from a point of view that is new and exciting. She missed the point.
I think absurd would be a more fitting sentiment.
She thought "I Started A Joke" was hilarious too. Strange.
I've watched a lot of VR reviews, and this one i found an interesting take but also maybe a bit frustrating. Yes, there's a tiny element of humour and cynicism from Bowie here, maybe a vestige from his earlier carreer. But maybe like a few people here, I always regarded this song as a clever, creative, beautiful work of art, and in its own way one of the best of the 20th century. So without being too precious, it felt like it was maybe being treated a tad dismissively. I usually agree with VR reviews, but in this case I think a few more listens would reveal there's a lot more to it. I know you are reacting on first impressions though and you are always walking a fine line. 🙂
The deliberate speech patterns in Davids vocals was reflecting the distinct way astronauts spoke to mission control with as much clarity as possible to maximize understanding. I am in my mid sixties and I have never heard anyone describe this song as amusing or funny in the slightest way. Astronauts sometimes trained for years before going into space or even orbit but often that training could never actually prepare them for what was actually in store for them. And they all knew there was a good chance they would not come back. In every flight there was an astronaut that was doing something that no man had done before. Thats why the ' papers want to know whose shirt you wear'. When Ed White performed the first spacewalk in 1965, his spacesuit was not properly pressurised and it slightly inflated to the point that there was a fear he would not be able to fit back into the space capsule. He was ' floating in a most peculiar way'. Not a funny situation. A lot of news media used " The Sounds Of Silence" as their background music of their coverage right back to Apollo 7 and 8. This is a man achieving something big but realising how insignificant he is in relation to the world and everyone upon it.
are you offended? 😂😂
I found her immediate 💩eating Bugs Bunny grin very unsettling. Makes me wonder if she’d find the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band to be the most serious music ever ?.
You're really listening to some true classics of late. Glad you enjoyed it! There is humor in the song, a wry humor, but it is ultimately a tragic ending. It's a twist of emotion from light and silly to dark and alone.
Your analysis of this song is a huge miss. It's quite a dark song about existential anguish. It presents existence, in a seemingly empty universe, and Tom is uniquely situated to experience that emptiness as a physical reality, a man adrift in a void. He has several inner anchors to hold on to, such as the love of his wife, but he's still engulfed in the vast emptiness of space.
Bowie, known for creating characters, does draw Tom as caught up in the outward foibles of life, and he may have fallen into traps like celebrity, fame (or drug addiction, as a followup Bowie song intimated) etc. But the stark reality of being alone in an empty universe is the point of the song.
Any humor in Bowie's characterization of Tom is done in irony- to contrast an astronaut's reliance on technology, actually his loss of autonomy to technology. Tom is trapped in his techno tin can, without recourse. The earth is blue, the universe is a vast emptiness, technology fails, Tom is adrift without hope. He can only bid his wife adieu and float into oblivion.
Well said. Thank you for putting into words what I could not.
Well said
I've read at least five different interpretations of this song in the comments section. I hope yours is the correct interpretation.. I've listened to this song my whole life since release, and I'm with Amy on her interpretation.
It's possible for a song to be funny and sad. The lyrics at the beginning are quite whimsical.
This is one valid interpretation but it’s certainly not the definitive one lol
Chris Hadfield did a cover of this song while floating in microgravity in the International Space Station, which has to be the coolest cover ever.
It'd be cool if Amy reacted to that video!
Hadfield, being a can-do astronaut, altered the downer "and there's nothing I can do" to the more mission-oriented and optimistic "and there's nothing left to do" (among other changes).
🇨🇦 A proud moment
I came into the comments to say this and you beat me to it lmao the guitar he played was the first musical instrument sent to the ISS in 2001 too.
This is a great cover
I think you may have missed the fact that Major Tom died up there. This song is a tragedy. He knew he was going to die and there was nothing he could do about it. He was floating helplessly.
The song is a metaphor for our existence
Spoiler alert, Major Tom returns in another song. My mother said, to get things done, you better not mess with Major Tom.
Noooo, he's still up there!
He'll come back when there's no more war...
🌼
Yep. The last things he says to them is "tell my wife I love her very much". I think Bowie's whimsical style of composing threw her off a little.
@@Escapee5931 "Want an axe to break the ice / Wanna come down right now."
I normally enjoy your reactions, but in this case I think the 50+ years context eludes you. (Yes I am an old fart who remembers the '69 moon landing very clearly.) Nobody thought "cartoonish" when this song was a hit. The things which made you laugh were REAL worries at the time. (Weightlessness, travel into the unknown of space, etc.) Even the tongue in cheek references (the papers want to know which shirts you wear)... were based on the real celebrity status of the astronauts. Major Tom dying was a REAL possibility in everyone's mind. Space Oddity today is not only famous for being Bowie's first hit, but for being a snapshot of the public mindset before the moon landing.
totaly agree!!
Yes, she had to imagine space travel when there had not been space travel. Rather than how a person born after a series of successful missions would view it. I found myself recently telling a high school student that during the Cold War, we were all scared and believed that a nuclear war could occur during our lifetimes or even.... soon! They don't "get it" from a one-hour lesson in school.
I'm 35, I've still never heard this as funny or light hearted. This always felt a sad and worried song to me even when I first heard it, I'm perplexed by her reaction
Also, Beatlemania and the whole fame experience.
I'm 69. Remember this song well from release date. I always thought it had a sardonic humour. Bowie grew up just south of where I now live and just north of where I lived then. At the same time, my wife spent her teens in West London close to members of The Who. Shortly after getting married, we lived in the southern end of Southall close to Hanwell and Hanwell Baptist Church where Rick Wakeman lived and went to church (Rick played keyboard on this and other Bowie songs). Maybe I share some ways of thinking with Bowie.
Remember, we'd already had men in space and there had been one trip round the moon and back and it would not take long for Apollo 13 to be rescued. Around that time, we also had songs using space as a metaphor for rock stardom: Elton John's Rocket Man; Rice and Lloyd-Weber's Jesus Christ Superstar; slightly differently, The Who with Tommy; Rolling Stones had mused over the papers wondering what shirts you wear in Satisfaction; Mott the Hoople would produce several songs and a book, Diary of a Rock & Roll Star. It's an obvious metaphor to me
I was just becoming emotional and then you stopped it and laughed! 😂It's amazing how a piece of music affects people in different ways...
Yeah, that was somewhat disturbing.
Great analysis (Carnival Of The Animals analogy was brilliant) but you misread the ending. He's become enraptured by the experience & no longer cares about corporeal existence. It's transcendental. That's why he says goodbye to his wife & drifts off, outside his tin can, now way above the moon ...
Worth remembering that 2001: A Space Odyssey had been released in 1968 - in fact I've just read that ne was inspired by that film, in which the main protagonist most certainly had a transcendental experience!
I always think of that movie when I hear this song. I too find the song sad. It came out when I was a kid and it frightened me that he was out there all alone and no one could get him to respond.
stop smoking whatever you smoke
Exactly. And the line "Planet Earth is blue, and there's nothing I can do" illustrates his disconnection from the world and desire to escape it permanently.
"Planet earth is blue and there's nothing I can do" is definitely not a humerous conclusion. It tells of a world in trouble, but we as individuals can can do nothing to change it.
Humerous is indeed humorous. ; )
It says he can see the planet as he drifts off into space because his ship is malfunctioning.
There's nothing _he_ can do because he's stuck in space and presumably going to die there. But I think the message is for everyone left on the planet, that there are things that can be done.
I find a lot of humor in that line, it's a sort of extra-glib summation of an incredibly dire situation. He's boiling down a genuinely terrible story into rather silly lines. "sitting on a tin can", "take your protein pills and put your helmet on", "all the papers want to know whose shirts you wear"...even the earth is blue line is a double entendre, because it's 70% ocean it looks blue, the earth as a planetary body can't have an emotion, we project our emotions on it...but he could also just literally be talking about the color. I really disagree with all these comments that this song can only be read as sad and serious. The brilliance of it is that it is sad and serious and funny and silly all at once. Good art is more than one thing at a time, and Amy did not disrespect this piece.
@@Trendyflute Yeah, I think it's funny how people react so strongly at the notion that a song called "Space Oddity" might have some surreal and even humorous elements
I think many in these comments are too hyperfocused on the content of the lyrics, and not paying enough attention to the music and the voice itself as instruments and what they are conveying in all their multiple aspects.
Yes this song has a melancholy poignancy that can be quite moving, but much of the music (and even quite a few of the lyrics) also has a light, whimsical tone. I have listened to this song countless times through my years being a Bowie fan and I do not think Amy "missed the point" by being focused on the lighthearted elements in the song.
Bowie knows how to be musically heavy, serious and devastating in tone when he wants to be (Rock and Roll Suicide, The Bewlay Brothers, You Feel So Lonely You Could Die, and so on and on and on). Space Oddity in comparison has many "comic" elements to it, and I think that was very intentional of Bowie. It's an example of his incredible artistry that he can so deftly weave both the touching and the comic, both humour with melancholic sadness in the one song.
For one person the song may be heartbreaking, for another, like Amy (on a first listen btw. And thank you to Amy for always giving her honest reaction and never trying to please the fans for views!) quirky and lighthearted. Neither is clearly right or wrong, but both responses are valid and evidence for each can be found in the music and lyrics. And that's part of what made Bowie such a great artist.
Exactly! The appeal of this channel is that she has her own particular perspective that's really thoughtful and unique. It's one thing to disagree with her, but all these commenters trying to mansplain music to her is a big 🙄
This song obviously has an element of wryness and camp, both in vocal delivery and instrumentation choices, and she was picking up on that, and was articulating it very well!
I am so glad somebody else already said it. Sonically the song might as well be a circus act, it's goofy.
I love that AND the lyrical ideas presented. Damn, y'all, calm down. Blackstar would be hard to read as funny, not this. Ffs, Adam Sandler used it for a joke in one of his movies!
@@serenefish I'm a woman and am not "mansplaining". For that matter, neither are the men here. Usually her reactions are more thoughtful, but not this time. And we all have every right to let her know that.
@@jessithanks8082How is it not thoughtful? Like any video, she shared her thoughts and impressions as they came, and talked about how specific musical choices made her feel that way.
Again, I get disagreeing, but I just found it frustrating to see people acting like she's being stupid or somehow disrespectful for experiencing it differently
of course people have the right to comment that way, just like I have the right to express my frustration with it
one person said something like "maybe I had the same impression when I was a child. she should listen a few more times", another saying "any 8th grader would get an F for this analysis", another saying an "incredibly odd reaction", "like laughing at a funeral"
etc etc.. and the kicker is that *they're* the ones who seem to have a pretty shallow, one dimensional take on the song.
Those "flutes" and "strings" were played by the brilliant Rick Wakeman on the Mellotron.
What recording was he not on?!
You should see astronaut, Cmdr. Chris Hadfield's performance on the ISS of this song. Amazing and Inspiring !!!
I find the whole piece highly dramatic, not lighthearted in any way. But first and foremost, it´s a great classical melody with fantastic harmonies and a completely organic flow. Bohemian Rhapsody is a conglomerate of totally different sections and rhythms while Space Oddity works perfectly well as a campfire song with just one voice and guitar. In my opinion, this is one of the strongest songs in pop not written by the Beatles (other examples being She´s Not There by the Zombies and Bowie´s own Starman and Life On Mars).
So, Space Oddity is now a funny, light hearted song about a silly astronaut and all the unlikely ways Ground Control would or would not speak to him. Got it, cool. And to think all this time I thought it was an intensely sad piece about someone knowing they were going to soon be dying alone, thousands of miles from any other human, with no hope. My bad.
Tell my wife I love her very much...
She knows...
😭
I always understood that he is stranded at the end with no way back. "Your circuits dead, there's something wrong. Can you hear me Major Tom?"
Yeah I'm not sure this was the appropriate soundtrack for the moon landing coverage 😂
@@vanyadolly Especially since, before the fact, nobody knew if it was going to succeed (as in, end with 3 astronauts returning to Earth alive).
@@moi01887 Which is why I can't believe they played this during coverage 😂
He did come back in Ashes to Ashes, but that was about a decade later. I think Bowie left the ending deliberately open ended so the listener can decide Major Tom's fate for themselves. He does not explicitly provide clues that he perishes or survives in the song.
@@vanyadollyIt's a cautionary tale so maybe it was the perfect choice.🤔
This is one of the oddest song reactions on YT. Some comments note the English humor, theatrical aspects of Bowie. That's all true, and Bowie is using humor, satire and irony as he sets up the scene of this song.
Everything is fair game, such as, Tom's celebrity, the tin can that represents advanced technology, who's shirt you wear- celebrity culture etc. Ground control speaks in the voice of authoritative technology, runs through a mundane checklist, which is interspersed with side comments of making the grade and perceptions of success in the media. If you had any knowledge of early space flight, this was the actual atmosphere of a launch. There was this imperious techno step by step routine, which was often broken by offhand comments of the participants. In fact, there is a realist aspect to this strange banter, it goes from instruction manual to ribbing and kidding. That's what actually happened at the time. However, the reactor absurdly takes the entire meaning of the song as frivolous and funny. That is pathetic. The song is mixing all these elements to set the scene. This is masterful use of irony to set the stage for a denoument.
The ultimate purpose is to see that Tom is headed for his demise in an empty universe.
Lots of people take the lyrics literally... I happen to think of it as a metaphor for some guy with a bright future ahead of him that gets into drugs and "blasts off" into space... only to destroy himself and end up losing the connection he used to have with the rest of us
Well, that's a take that I haven't heard before, and I can see it. Thanks.
still not humorous
@@Araye it's not a lot of things
For me the bass is key in this song. It bounces and rises and falls like a man in a spaceship... Herbie Flowers was the bass player, and has passed away recently. He also played tuba. He also played for Marc Bolan, Paul Mccartney, Bryan Ferry, Elton John. Also famous for the bass line on Walk on The Wild Side - Lou Reed. RIP Herbie - one epic dude.
I am baffled by your response to this song. Sure, people have different reactions to and interpretations of music, but your takeaway seems very odd. You describe this song as funny, cartoonish, contrived, light-hearted, non-serious….Yikes. I agree there is a quirkiness and playfulness, but this song is also lush, moving, psychedelic, haunting and sad. This song is a successful blend of all those elements.
How you found this funny is beyond me.
Sometimes reactors completely miss the point.
it definitely is intended to be funny. British dark humour mate,
@@yinoveryang4246 no it isn't, don't be stupid.
She explained why.
It’s a little like a monthy python sketch…
I have a feeling Amy didn't realise Major Tom ends up lost in Space!? 😳 Then again, she's not entirely wrong either with saying this song ends inconclusive; Food for thought!
🤔
To _me_ , it's not a funny song at all, though.
A _great_ one, yes!
I never found it funny either. It's not a funny story.
COME ON.... "Major Tom's a junkie" ( Ashes to ashes )
Ending not conclusive?? Does anyone really expect any ‘Houston we have a problem’ followed by a spectacular NASA rescue there? And didn’t anyone get that clue in the title (that nod to the not very funny Kubrick film) give it away (quite the spoiler that you will have to take into account when considering that open ending “food for thought”)?
Even from the junkie angle, on has to admit that things are about to get far worse rather before they get any better for the foreseeable time at this point in Bowies life (we’d have to wait until his move from LA to Berlin to get to an actual turning point in that respect I suppose: trying to extrapolate that to this song then we are probably several alter ego’s and a couple of decades/changes later, no?
So not a lot of arguments in favour of a happy, funny, not at all tragic ending in the context of song analysis for this one. But, as usual, nothing is ever conclusive in Bowie land, so I myself have come to interpret Ashes to Ashes as a form of sequel. Less funny, mind you, but at least clearly less final for the individual human and far less dystopian for humanity as a whole (tho still quite pessimistic post-modern undertones even there)…
@@elemar5 In a some weird way tho, I must confess that this song (in spite of the tragic story) does actually tend to bring more smiles to my face rather than bringing me in a state of anxiety or fear (which would be the expected response). If I speak from just my own personal experience being fully honest, yes, I kind of like those over the top futurist soundscapes that are created here: the radical choices in dynamics of the stereo, the in-your-face symbolism in that lift of an those pseudo-strange vocal overdubs that give that track that entire outlandish, mysterious, unknowable futuristic feel: those things just bring me joy. Excuse the naïve nerd in me here. Similarly I get far more joy than fear when watching Kubricks 2001 or even Clockwork Orange: I just love 60s and 70s over the top futuristic designs about our century I suppose, 😅
Mental masturbation
I usually love Amy's analysis of the songs she has covered, but on this occasion she has unfortunately completely missed the point of the song. Its not a funny song about an astronaut, its a tragic song about a spaced out junkie, which Bowie covered in later songs.
But someone not in-the-know would not be aware of that reference. Bowie of course made this clear for everyone in his later piece "Ashes to Ashes".
To be fair, unless you've read about this song, it is very difficult to figure this out on your own. I've been listening to mostly classic rock for many years and Bowie is one of my favorites, but I did not realize this until a few years ago, when I looked it up.
The first piece you listened was the exception. This is much more the norm for Bowie"s music although he changed styles ftequently. Theatricality and artifice was at the core of Bowie's art. He adopted several different performance personas (personae?) throughout his career. This early ''Major Tom' space exploration character and theme also works as a metaphor for growing up and launching yourself on life, expanding horizons, awareness of the state of the world together feelings of alienation, loneliness and being at the mercy of cosmic forces and the very small arena over which you can exercise any control. As always I enjoy the way you make connections to the deeper history of music.
Strange outlook . A master piece.
This may be one of the most melancholy songs Bowie ever sang (and that's saying something). On top of the tragedy of losing an astronaut in space, the song also contains oblique references to drug addiction and compulsive behavior, which Bowie would return to several times in future songs. I love your reactions and analyses, but you really went off course on this one.
I’m getting a sense of condescension from Amy concerning a time period that she doesn’t understand
Same here. I've been getting that sense a while back, as if she hasn't grasped that the rock-related genres aren't only about feeling good, but that they're often as serious as any other artistic expression. Even in her praise sometimes there are subtle indications that she also looks down on it. I've learnt a lot about music in general from her (and other experts on RUclips) but there comes a time when I'll return to my own instincts and evaluation of music.
Yes Sir.
I don't expect too much from a reactor, who after 50+ Beatles songs, still can't distinguish Paul McCartney's voice from Lennon's. But to find this a lighthearted song is absurd. There is humor here, dark humor, gallows humor, deep irony.....but chuckles humor? That's ridiculous.
Space Oddity - Ashes to Ashes - Hallo Space boy - Black Star- make up the Major Tom Quartet that encompasses Bowies career. These 4 songs heard in sequence are an enlightening journey through one mans life works.
It's a quadrilogy. Space Oddity - Ashes to Ashes - Hallo Spaceboy - Blackstar.
@@ferdinandofallica5869I stand corrected. Hallo Spaceboy is indeed part of a Quartet of songs. Thanks.
What has Hallo Spaceboy got to do with Major Tom? Its a serial killers song about night clubbing
I am so glad to see Amy reviewing Bowie! I think accurately picked up on quirky musical aspect, which describes his earlier fantastic first work. But, then I think it kept her from noting the sadness of his detaching, (especially after his heartfelt goodbye to his wife). I was worried when she only gave Space Oddity 20 minutes. I hope she spends more time on musical elements in future videos.
"I was worried when she only gave Space Oddity 20 minutes". Same here.
@@arimakiaho2960 She was wrong on so many levels here. Sad. She usually gets it. Not this time.
I've always felt Tom lost it in space, overwhelmed by how miniscule he felt and committed suicide, that HE willingly shuts off the controls. I cry every time I hear this, particularly when he tells his wife that he loves her. It's not enough for him to overcome his feeling of helplessness and lack of meaning.
I think your interpretation of the musical elements is spot on during the countdown sequence, but not so much lyrically or thematically at the end.
Wow !!!.....I've always thought this was a tragic, dire, desperate song !.
It is. She doesn't get it at all. She started with the wrong attitude and never corrected.
@@paulonius42 I guess it's comprehensible...we must understand...it's not her fault. Listening to "Space Oddity" when it came out in 1969 and listening to it in the year 2024 are two things absolutely not comparable...you can't have the same feelings...it's impossible...more than half a century has gone by !. Just think about listening to "My Generation" in 1965 at 17 y/o, and in 2024 at...say 35 y/o (but even at 17 y/o...times are different).....then tell me.
@@giuliogrifi7739 I agree that our age and the era in which we hear a song matter, but I don't think that really applies so much here. Ever since the song came out, pretty much all of us have understood it to be a tragic song. She's way out on her own on this interpretation. I've watched people doing reactions who are in their twenties and thirties, and they get the song just fine.
@@paulonius42 I was born in 1955. Anyway, I don't know if I can agree with you. In my first comment I've been critical, but, in the end, what we saw is her sincere (I'm sure) reaction...after all, she's coming from a completely dissimilar music world. About other reactions, I'm afraid not all of them can be considered genuine, heartfelt: many are "acting"...have you ever seen someone openly disliking any song or movie ?...I can count them on one hand. Let's be frank, the thing started as a hobby, but by now it's...business, much more than fun. Nonetheless, even being aware of this, I like to watch them the same.
@@giuliogrifi7739 I have seen plenty with negative opinions, but that's because I try to find people I believe are authentic. You're right, there are a lot of very fake reactions being done, and I'm not saying she needs to be ostracized for getting this one wrong or anything like that. I think her immense musical knowledge and her urge to analyze got in the way of her actually understanding the song. It used to happen with my college composition students when they started doing literary analysis and lost sight of the literature they were supposed to analyze. She had preconceived notions coming into this song that ruined her understanding of it.
I'm very happy that you choose to explore more Bowie, you need to continue! ♥️ I think that here you've missed something important about the meaning of the song and lyrics. That BLUE about the planet heart is so meaningful about things and about life and Major Tom himself. He will return in 4 Bowie's song, it's an important character in his career and art. Please try to capture more about Major Tom, maybe listenting again at Space Oddity. It will be sad if you loss who is and who was Major Tom. If you want to understand him in the others song you have to return on Space Oddity. Thanks, I love your work, you are great, if you make a mistake it's just because you're human ❤
I think Amy is tired. As she herself said, her little one is keeping her up at night. For me, this analysis was done on autopilot. It's a shame that this happened on one of Bowie's great classics. I insist again that a little more context is needed. And please take some time for yourself, Vlad and the little one. Love you guys!
I never heard anyone call it funny, quirky or cartoonish since the first time hearing it sometime in the early 70s.
This was one weird reaction! I don't see how you see this song as humorous in the sense of unserious. It does use humor, satirically, in the way the title is in contrast with 2001-A Space Odyssey. The humor is used ironically as well. But humor as an absence of seriousness, not at all. It's a deadly serious song.
Nah, missed the whole point of the lyrics. It's about being isolated and alone even surrounded by people you're alone
Amy seemed to have missed the countdown happening. I do remember back then that this music did sound original. It still stands alone in its way.
No she did not, she reacted to original song that was recorded ‘69, and released as single, you remember the album version; that was re-recorded later in 1971 in much better studio, that is much better version, cause this first one sound almost like demo recording when you compare this two.
One on what you think is the one most people think about, when “Space Oddity” is in question.
@@buca505 ? The countdown most certainly was there.
You definitely need a second listen to this one....
Oooo ... don't think you got this one right. It's definitely about alienation and abandonment and decidedly more poignant than funny. Maybe you've spent too much time with Queen and missed the lyric references Bowie used.
Pleased to see I don't stand alone this time being contrarian to Amy's reaction. I never found the song as humorous either. Always took it as commentary on the human condition. Interesting how differently others can look at things.
This was his first hit. Amy, apparently it's about a drug addict on a high. Keyboards by Rick Wakeman. RW came back to do Life On Mars - great pianist.
I guess Classical Musicians are not really used to hearing lyrics that much?
Good question. Well, there are operas, operettas, lieder, choral works and such, and those lyrics (or librettos) veer from the very light to the very dark as well. They cover all aspects from the brutal & savage to the divine, not to mention sexual elements. But yes, you do have a point. Getting to grips with the lyrical substance in contemporary music is a completely different challenge, and unfortunately, those who had been steeped in classical music exclusively will easily misjudge the mood of songs like these.
I think that's a fair point, and that even with most lyrics in opera, they are usually grounded in a real situation and not metaphorical.
@@EddieReischl True, and although the original librettos are often poetic in style, they usually reflect real feelings & narrative elements and very little in terms of metaphors or allegories. A man lost in space would represent a man lost in space and not a spaced-out man, for example!
It also means we shouldn't judge Amy harshly for misreading the lyrical mood of a song - how many of us realise what lyrics really mean with a first listen? Not many. But have I ever seen someone react to Space Oddity with giggles? Never thought I'd see it!
@@dogsmusicbookstravelscience Yeah, I know. The one line "...papers want to know whose shirts you wear..." is sort of a funny poke at how superficial our civilization is sometimes, which Bowie may have included as evidence of what he feels disconnected from, but other than that, it's more neutral until the part where the circuits crap out.
There are plenty of reactors online that only talk about the lyrics
Ahhh.....so nice to hear this......appropriate again for this moment in time !
I'm glad you now have a better grounding in what David Bowie sounds like in his more typical pop rock style. While "Warszawa" was a great piece, it just wasn't David Bowie's typical style. Although, like Queen, he has a lot of variation in both his voice and music. You should now go back and listen to "Under Pressure" again so you can better contrast his voice from Freddie's. I think it will be obvious to you now that the other voice is Bowie. I was 9 when we first landed on the moon and have lots of memories of watching these space missions live. The astronauts were household names at that time and considered heros because they were putting their lives on the line. It could be very tense watching these mission (particularly Apollo 13) since there was a risk they would end in tragedy.
Bowie was a total chameleon, reinventing himself many times right up until the end.
I think you (understandably) missed the fact that this was a song completely out of the style of it's moment. Look at other big hits from the charts at that time. It was musically revolutionary!! The number one songs of the moment was 'Sugar Sugar' by The Archies, and Johnny Cash 'A Boy Named Sue' and Elvis singing 'Suspicious Minds'. This was an important foundation for the music of the 70's.
I don't think you are wrong about the musical jokes that were made. Bowie was a consummate humorist in his own way, but he was something of a dark humorist. When he sounds flippant or light hearted, it is usually steeped in irony, and intended to highlight the tragedy using a flippant delivery. I do think you sort of missed the idea that Major Tom didn't come back. As others have said, this song is also an allegory for a lot of other situations where people boldly explore "places" that are fraught with peril, and are frequently misunderstood by people who do not share their journey. The song certainly has meant something different to almost every person who has heard it, but it almost never fails to be meaningful. The beauty of it is that it CAN mean so many things to so many people, and highlights the emotions of risk, discovery, and loss so eloquently. Life is funny and tragic, and so is this song.
For me the most important lines in the song are "you've really made the grade, and the papers want to know whose shirts you wear." For "ground control," it was never about the science but rather the creation of celebrity, and Major Tom is now going to pay the price. Might be a metaphor for the music industry at the time.
Yep. And also important is saying goodbye before anyone else knows something's wrong; meaning, Major Tom deliberately disconnected.
Beatlemania was still dying in '69.
There are some competing emotions as well as unemotional passages in this song. The whole affair was, in context, the most significant undertaking in history. It had to be handled in a simultaneously emotionless and wildly emotional way with scientific, engineering, historical and commercial interests vying for expression.
Lots of great comments today. I’ll just point out that line about what shirt Major Tom was wearing is not entirely frivolous. At the time, much was made of the fact that Neil Armstrong wore an Omega Speedmaster chronograph on the mission.
Hell, Omega has been milking that ever since.
All the NASA astronaut's wore Omega watches - after a lot of testing by NASA of Rolex, Breitling, etc, Omega's were the only ones that didn't break under flight simulations (vibration, etc), so NASA issued them to crew to wear in space.
...and Neil Armstrong's Omega wasn't the first on the Moon - he left his watch with Michael Collins in the Command Module that orbited the moon to cover for a malfunctioning electronic timer, while he and Buzz Aldrin landed in the Eagle lander - so Buzz Aldrin's Omega was the first on the moon.
Aldrin lost his watch in the 1970's when it was sent to the Smithsonian Museum for an exhibition and went missing on the way.
Funny...okay. You should listen to this again, without the "funny glasses" on 😉 Perhaps you'll find something very sad in this piece. I wish you'll find it 😀
David Bowie, restless innovator, rock musician extraordinaire and cultural icon. We won't hear his like again. His famous claim 1999 in which he predicted, to a highly educated interviewer, that the Internet was going to shape all of our lives...I think the ending is less of boringly having 'nothing to do' but rather his realisation that he was adrift from the spacecraft and there was nothing he could do to prevent his perishing in space ("where no-one can hear you scream"). This is referenced on his last album Blackstar where the video shows the corpse of Major Tom.
I think about a billion other people thought the same thing about the internet in the 90's. The rest didn't know what the internet was. Bowie did make very good music, though
A bizarre reaction to a song that is essentially quite harrowing on many levels. I always thought the end was very conclusive, Major Tom's space capsule spirals out of control and dissappears into space as the orchestration spirals out of control and fades away. I would repestfully ask you do a second listen perhaps paired with Ashes to Ashes. On a wider point I would again respectfully suggest that taking a more 'serious' approach to the music of David Bowie may help (I can't believe I just wrote that - but it needs to be said I feel). I don't believe in polls and who is the best at this and that. Those things are quite pointless but if I was forced into expressing a view, I would say David Bowie is probably the most important, unique, creative artist in the history of popular music 🙃
I see this song as representing a slightly melancholy allegory about separating oneself (major Tom) from authority/social norms (ground control), and being ok floating into the unknown despite ground control’s concern (“can you hear me major Tom?”). I don’t find it primarily humorous, although there is a little tongue-in cheek tone about it (but more in a “this is hard but it’s ok” attitude).
In mind it paints the picture of overoptimistic faith in technology, sending out an explorer knowing full well how risky it would be, but convinced it will be fine as long as everyone believes in it. And then it all goes wrong... and his dead body floats forever
Until Ashes to Ashes, of course. /s
Why the laughter. I’m confused.
You're funny - it's "there's nothing I can do" as in a feeling of existential impotence, not "I've got nothing to do" as in bored stiff, twiddling on my guitar.😂
"Something entirely non serious", says Amy. An entirely inappropriate remark, Id say. Not for the first time, Amy makes a hash of it. The meaning behind 'Aqualung' was the first time I'd heard her "entirely" misrepresent a lyric sheet, that I became aware of, and Amy proves it was not just a false beginning.
I didn't hear much on the music, nothing about melody or production again, (she probably thinks the mellotron is a symphony orchestra), but I switched off at 15.52 in despair. Amy, there were teenager's in the 70s who got the essence of this song in their youth, something which you have failed to do in your 30s or whatever. And the comment section explains what that is, very well. Further, her obsession with comparing everything to classical music, is a big mistake. Rock ripped up the musical rule book a life time ago, including that of Stockhausen. Im suprised her husband, who appears a little more au fait, allowed her to put this one out............
It's not inconclusive. You have to connect the dots. Things did not end well.
True. He wound up a junkie.
@@TillyOrificehe didn’t end up as a junkie, like everything else in his life, his drug addiction was just a phase
@@biseinerheult78 Fair point
@TillyOrifice ha ha. Indeed he did.
Oh dear. Got this one wrong, Amy. This is a song about how the world in 1969 is f***ed up - at least Major Tom's is. After a significant event (the flight into space) the only thing the papers want to know is what shirt this new celebrity wears. When he steps into space he sees that the Earth is blue (i.e. sad) but he's feeling liberated. In the end he knows there's nothing he can do to resolve Earth's problems so he turns off his comms and allows himself to drift into space. That's how I interpreted the lyrics in 1969 and I still read it that way.
In "Ashes To Ashes" we find Major Tom is a junkie. My interpretation still fits.
I have always wondered why the BBC chose such a depressing song for its Apollo 11 coverage. Still it gave Bowie a #5 UK hit. His next release "The Prettiest Star" bombed.
Yes, your interpretation fits. Becoming junkie is just one way of turning off comms and drifting into space.
It didn't. That's a myth that Bowie himself promoted. The BBC refused to allow it on the radio until the astronauts returned to Earth. Pink Floyd did the music for the landing.
You might find this short-lived song very interesting: ruclips.net/video/wO0A0XcWy88/видео.html
Thanks - as always - for bringing such a fresh perspective. Most who will have watched this, like me, will have lived with this song most, if not all of their lives.
I think you may be right - we have come to treat it too seriously.
For someone who sees the funny side you must look up and watch “Flight of the Conchords Bowie”. They get it too.
Your reading of the song is entirely literal; it's actually about alienation and Bowie's disconnect from the world and society around him.
I call BS on that. At the time, Bowie was nobody, best known for the 1967 release The Laughing Gnome (which *was* a comedy song). It wasn't his disconnect that he was writing about, it was the other stars who had risen and flamed out due to drugs. I think he'd witnessed too many friends drift away to overdose.
@@nzlemming I call BS on your BS.
Maybe Amy had "The Laughing Gnome" in her earphones?
good one
never gotten funnness from it altho it has 60s kitsch element in a way but its combined with so much emotion and melancholy
Amy has shown before in many other reviews that she tends to take a very literal interpretation of the lyrics and messages in rock, pop and folk and completely misses the entire point of the piece she was listening to.
This is another one and the message and moral of the song has all gone completely over her head.
I think that, on the contrary, It's you and many others here, who didn't get what the song is about
@@JulioLeonFandinho that’s all-you got?
@@Ck-zk3we I made a comment about it in the comment section.
You're being what you're accusing the lady reactor of being: literal
The song is ambiguous in tone, there's many ways of expressing one idea. Bowie was being consciously ambiguous and sarcastic
Fully agreed. I'll never criticise others for not getting it at a first listen since we all start at the bottom of learning curves. However, on several occasions, Amy's given me the idea that she approaches none of the songs with the seriousness they deserve. She'd mention the things she likes and explain some interesting passages that many fans would miss in the music itself, but she does seem to be under the impression that nothing in rock (the "lesser art form") can be truly serious. This is not the first time I've wondered what the hell she's giggling about...
Bowie was very theatrical right from the start and influenced by musicals/mime, the whole kit and caboodle, combined with a wonderful pop/rock sensibility.
I think it helps to understand the context at the time in history when Apollo 11 launched. The public was very engaged with everything that led up to this event and the astronauts were very much celebrities. They appeared in all sorts of magazines and people probably did want to know what sorts of shirts they wore. There was an interest on mundane topics such as what type of food they would be eating, hence the "protein pills" . Also happening at the same time the movie 2001 was released which provided additional imagery that people were absorbing at the very same time. Finally, there was a very real sense that' something could go wrong and the astronauts might get stranded out in space. The song actually ends in this tragedy. Some of these things probably make more sense to someone who was around when all this was happening. There are many things worked into the song that ring true to reality. There was a great unity and collective hope that they would be safe and they would make it.
I’ve listened to the song since my early childhood as my father played it before I even knew who David Bowie was. And I’ve never would consider it funny or cartoony, but rather extremely sad and anxious because of fear and inconceivability of void and space (also death) that the astronaut experiences. in the context of human life it could also be a metaphor of solitude or alienation… e. g. for me the guitar outro is extremely unsettling. that’s why I was rather surprised by your reaction. also drawing the context, the title is a reference to the S. Kubrick’s great movie the „2001: Space Odyssey”, which in my opinion nicely puts the song in a cultural context and concept of understanding the cosmos.
I saw that at 11 as part of my local Astronomical Society. I had no clue what it was about, but I loved the visuals.
YOu've made the grade - you have ACHIEVED THE EXPERT ABILITIES OF AN ASTRONAUT - QUITE DIFFICULT wouldn't you say????????
On a couple of occasions you seen to miss the point completely. I'm thinking of here and the bee gees, I started to cry. Don't get me wrong, I love your analyses. I guess you can't hit a home run every time. Maybe just be a bit more open to the possibility that the lyrics have a deeper meaning would be my only note for you.
The music does tell us what happens in the end. As you yourself say, the violin and flute are moving apart. The symbals are crashing at accidental times, everything is slowing down, the violin gets out of tune . . . (Strung out on heaven's high hitting an all-time low)
I hear this song and imagine what it must be like to realize that you are floating off to your death, knowing there is nothing you can do but wait out the very last moments of life until the point when the oxygen runs out. Thinking of your loved ones and how they know you're off to your end and how they too must be fearful and suffering. I will admit that the first several times listening to this song as a child that never occurred to me but it also never occurred to me that the song was humorous in any way. Whether taking the lyrics literally or figuratively there's only the sense of doom, tranquil maybe, but doom nonetheless.
Major Tom is a recurring theme in Bowie's work, it appears in 3 other songs Ashes to Ashes (1980), Hallo Spaceboy (1995) and Blackstar (2016).
I've never ever considered this song as humorous. Wow. It is extremely sad and painful for me.
Its not nothing to do... But nothing he CAN do.
I saw an interview with David Bowie years ago where he talked about wanting to write stage musicals when he was a teenager, and that made so much sense to me. Many of his songs do come across like songs you'd hear in a musical, and his various personae are like characters in a play.
He actually started to write a stage musical about "1984".
But he didn't get the rights from George Orwell's heirs, so he scratched it and used the song material for the "Diamond Dogs" album.
@@mori1bund that would have been amazing
Exatly! Thanks for saying so. I really think this song stops being fun when you add the theatrical, the dramatic aspect to it. Amy missed precisely this. It is a profound song written by a young Bowie, a nihilistic Bowie, I dare to say. The kind of Bowie would later write Diamond Dogs
My reading of Space Oddity has always been that it's Major Tom who decides that he's not going back to earth. When Ground Control says 'Your circuit's dead', it's because Major Tom has switched it off and no longer wants to communicate with them. He's decided to just let himself drift through space until he dies (or at least until he decides to come back in Ashes to Ashes). The theme of isolation has been there throughout Bowie's work and career and this is an early example of it. All in my opinion, of course.
"Someone at the BBC had a sense of humor" - or _irony_. "I think my spaceship knows which way to go/tell my wife I love her very much..." He is not coming home. He is choosing to float off into the void. It's a kind of a tragedy...
Bowie was well ahead of the game. One artist crossing such a span of genres, and doing it so competently.
Space Oddity, to me, was using music to tell a story, like in a musical. I think that was the intention.
Swing and a miss Amy, that's okay! You're still awesome!
I think the “funny” introduction is meant to depict our fledgling steps into the unknown. Major Tom had been hyped up. He really made the grade. He was the man…. And just like Icarus, he flew too close to the sun…
As humans, we like to run before we really know how to walk, and thus we constantly lead ourselves into tragedy.
17:50. The instrumental separation is Major Tom floating away, lost in space.
Grinning all the way through this existential masterpiece. How upsetting.
The song is poignant, not humorous. Major Tom lets his weltschmerz overcome him and he lets himself float out into space with no desire to want to be on the Earth any more.
I really love your channel and appreciate your work and analysis Amy. Thank you very much. I hope that you are not offended by negative comments. I like it that you are giving an honest opinion about your feelings. The essence of art is allowing to be interpreted individually. There is no right or wrong. Greetings from germany
The "ground control to Major Tom" part is the call out from Ground Control to contact the spacecraft.
They would sound out messages like that until they got a response.
Wow. I heard a completely different story than that. 😮
The idea that this song is funny is so weird. I think you took the idea that it was treated as a "novelty song" in the wrong way. This is lyrically a ballad, and trying to analyze it halfway through the story is really not the best thing to do. This is a tragic song.
Always a fan of Amy's reactions, as they are different to any others, and always honest. I'd really like to see more David Bowie reactions as I've always been a fan of his. He made so many great songs, and with such variety. Hunky Dory is my favourite album and Queen Bitch and Oh! You Pretty Things are both brilliant songs, but the track I'd most like to see Amy review would be Golden Years from the Station to Station album. This is because initially I wasn't that keen on this track, but it is now my absolute favourite Bowie song, and so it would be interesting to see what Amy thinks of it and whether she likes it.