David Bowie's The Buddha of Suburbia Remastered for CD and Digital Album Reissue by Capitol/EMI

David Bowie's The Buddha of Suburbia Remastered for CD and Digital Album Reissue by Capitol/EMI

Release Date: October 2, 2007

HOLLYWOOD, Calif., July 26 /PRNewswire/ -- Released in 1993, The Buddha of Suburbia was David Bowie's 19th full studio album. Created to complement the debut of a BBC-produced mini-series based on Hanif Kureishi's bestselling novel of the same title, Bowie's The Buddha of Suburbia was classified as a soundtrack upon its release, although only the album's title track was featured in the program. An extremely rare and highly sought-after collector title, The Buddha of Suburbia will be reissued by Capitol/EMI on CD and digitally on October 2.

(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20070726/LATH079)

"This album may well have been one of the most enjoyable projects that I've been involved with," explains David Bowie. "My personal memory stock for this album was made up from an almighty plethora of influences and reminiscences from the 1970s."

The Buddha of Suburbia is a semi-autobiographical tale featuring Karim, a South London teenager desperate to escape the suburbs which confine him. When the novel was published, author Kureishi was already well-known for his screenplay for My Beautiful Launderette, the 1985 film which centered on issues of sexuality, race and class in volatile 1980s Britain.

   DAVID BOWIE: THE BUDDHA OF SUBURBIA   1. Buddha Of Suburbia (4:28)   2. Sex And The Church (6:25)   3. South Horizon (5:26)   4. The Mysteries (7:12)   5. Bleed Like A Craze, Dad (5:22)   6. Strangers When We Meet (4:58)   7. Dead Against It (5:48)   8. Untitled No. 1 (5:01)   9. Ian Fish, U.K. Heir (6:27)   10. Buddha Of Suburbia (4:19) (featuring Lenny Kravitz on guitar)    All songs written by David Bowie     DAVID BOWIE ON THE BUDDHA OF SUBURBIA:  

"This album may well have been one of the most enjoyable projects that I've been involved with. Although this collection of music bears little resemblance to the motif driven small pieces that became the actual transmitted soundtrack for the BBC play of "Buddha," director Roger Mitchell's request that I supply some stuff for Hanif Kureishi's fabulous play got me on a real roll. Weeks later however, left to my own devices, these same pieces just took on a life of their own in the studio, with lots of narrative provocation from Hanif's play and dozens of personal 70's memories providing a textural backdrop in my imagination that laid the groundwork for a truly exciting work situation. I took the TV play motifs and discarded them completely except that is for the theme song. The pace of work was unbelievably frenetic taking only 6 days to write and record though a full fifteen days to mix, owing in part to some technical breakdowns -- nothing too serious but enough to put our team out by five or six days. My personal memory stock for this album was made up from an almighty plethora of influences and reminiscences from the 1970's. Here, below, is just a tiny selection of what went through my mind while writing:

   Free association lyrics   Kraftwerk   Pink Floyd   Bromley   Harry Partch   Croydon   CostumeEno   Blues clubs Soho   Prostitutes & Soho   Unter de Linden   Ronnie Scott's club   Brucke Museum in Berlin   Travels thru Russia   Pet Sounds   Loneliness   Friends of the Krays I had known   O'Jays   Neu   Mark Bolan   Philip Glass in New York clubs   Richard Strauss   Philip Glass playing in London 1970/1   Drag   T.Rex   Die Mauer, Berlin   The Casserole   Drugs   Roxy Music   Mum   

The list is actually endless but the above initially springs to mind. Fifty percent of the lyrical content is used just because I like the sound of the word. Some of it is reasonably narrative driven. Many of my working forms are taken in whole or in part from my collaborations with Brian Eno (who in my humble opinion occupies a parallel position in late 20th century popular music that Clement Greenberg in the 40's or Richard Hamilton in the 60`s had to visual art). The cut-up style that is obviously used on such tracks as Bleed Like A Craze, Dad (yes, it is a play on Krays) and Dead Against it springs from the Brion Gyson/William Burroughs school of F*cking with the Fabric of Time. The very magical multi-instrumentalist Erdal Kizilcay was so pivotal in interpreting my musical desires, foibles and arrangements that it's just not funny."

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Source: Capitol/EMI

CONTACT: Jennifer Ballantyne of EMI Music Marketing, +1-323-871-5494,
jennifer.ballantyne@emicap.com

Web site: http://www.capitolrecords.com/

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Profile: International Entertainment