"Heroes" (David Bowie song)
"'Heroes'"[a] is a song by the English musician David Bowie from his 12th studio album of the same name. Co-written by Bowie and Brian Eno and co-produced by Bowie and Tony Visconti, the song was recorded in mid-1977 at Hansa Studio 2 in West Berlin. The backing track was recorded fully before lyrics were written; Bowie and Eno added synthesiser overdubs while Robert Fripp contributed guitar. To record the vocal, Visconti devised a "multi-latch" system, wherein three microphones were placed at different distances from Bowie and would open when he sang loud enough. Like other album tracks, he improvised lyrics while standing at the microphone.
""Heroes" (song)" redirects here. For other songs of the same name, see Heroes."'Heroes'"
23 September 1977
July–August 1977
- 6:07 (album version)
- 3:32 (single version)
- David Bowie
- Brian Eno
- David Bowie
- Tony Visconti
An art rock song that builds throughout its run time, "'Heroes'" concerns two lovers, one from East Berlin and the other from the West. Under constant fear of death, they dream they are free, swimming with dolphins. Bowie placed the title in quotation marks as an expression of irony on the otherwise romantic or triumphant words and music. Directly inspired by Bowie witnessing a kiss between Visconti and singer Antonia Maass next to the Berlin Wall, other inspirations included a painting by Otto Mueller and a short story by Alberto Denti di Pirajno.
Released in edited form by RCA Records on 23 September 1977 as the album's lead single, initial reviews for the song were mostly positive, with some welcoming it as a classic addition to the artist's catalogue. Bowie heavily promoted the song with a music video and sang it on numerous television programmes, including Marc Bolan's Marc and Bing Crosby's Christmas special. Bowie also released German and French-language versions of "'Heroes'", titled "'Helden'" and "'Héros'", respectively. Despite its large promotion, the song only peaked at number 24 on the UK Singles Chart and failed to chart at all on the US Billboard Hot 100, but reached the top 20 in multiple European countries and Australia.
Over time, the song has grown substantially in reputation and been seen as one of Bowie's best songs, with some considering it one of the greatest songs of all time. His biographers pan the single edit for diminishing the song's power. Following Bowie's death in 2016, the song reached a new peak of number 12 in the UK. The song remained a staple throughout his concert tours and live performances and is Bowie's second-most covered song after "Rebel Rebel" (1974). A version of "'Heroes'" by the Wallflowers was positively received and charted in the US and Canada in 1998. Another version by the finalists of The X Factor was a UK number one in 2010. The song has also been used predominantly in advertising over the years and has appeared in several television series and films.
Critical reception[edit]
Initial reviews for "'Heroes'" were mostly positive. Like Low's "Sound and Vision", some viewed it as the album's most commercial track.[52][53] Several welcomed the song as a classic addition to Bowie's catalogue.[52][54] Record Mirror's Tim Lott deemed it "regal" and a "shocking dream[ingly] powerful" song that stands out as the album's best. He found the lyrics are "in a sense throwaway" but display "simple heroism": "Brick by synthesised brick it builds into a leviathan, a monster track that sucks you in and spews you out grinning ..."[52] Kris Needs of ZigZag magazine also considered the song a "monster" track with its end result being "magic".[53] Ira Robbins went further in Crawdaddy magazine, hailing the song as Bowie's best commitment to plastic in three years, praising the instrumentation and vocal performance, and highlighted Eno's contributions among the track's best features.[54]
In the Los Angeles Times, Robert Hilburn wrote that despite the dreariness of "Heroes" as a whole, the title track contains "compassion and some fleeting hope".[55] A reviewer for Billboard deemed the song one of the album's best tracks.[56] Writing in Hit Parader, American musician and author Patti Smith praised "'Heroes'" as a "pure" and "wonderful" track that "exposes us to our most precious and private dilemma". She predicted that it would become the "theme song for every great movie" and would be "made remade or yet to come".[57] Charlie Gillett gave the single a mixed review in the NME, saying: "Well he had a pretty good run for our money, for a guy who was no singer. But I think his time has been and gone, and this just sounds weary. Then again, maybe the ponderous heavy riff will be absorbed on the radio, and the monotonous feel may just be hypnotic enough to drag people into buying it. I hope not."[58] The magazine placed it at number six in their list of the year's best singles.[59]
Live performances[edit]
"'Heroes'" remained a staple throughout Bowie's concert tours.[5] He later acknowledged the song's impact on live audiences: "In Europe, it is one of the ones that seemed to have special resonance."[2] During the 1978 Isolar II and 1983 Serious Moonlight tours, the song was usually the second number performed rather than among the shows' encores.[5] Performances from the former have seen release on Stage (1978) and Welcome to the Blackout (2018),[112][113] while some from the latter appeared on its 1984 concert video and later on Serious Moonlight (Live '83), released as part of the 2018 box set Loving the Alien (1983–1988),[114] and separately the following year.[115] Following Live Aid, Bowie revived "'Heroes'" for the 1987 Glass Spider Tour, as seen in its accompanying concert video (1988).[116] The performance on 6 June 1987 at the German Reichstag in West Berlin has been considered a catalyst to the later fall of the Berlin Wall.[117][118] The song made subsequent appearances during the 1990 Sound+Vision, 1996–97 Earthling, 2000, 2002 Heathen and 2003–04 A Reality tours.[5] A performance from the A Reality Tour saw release on the accompanying DVD and live album, released in 2004 and 2010, respectively.[119]
Outside his tours, "'Heroes'" was performed at The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert in 1992 by Bowie, his former guitarist Mick Ronson and the surviving members of Queen: Brian May, Roger Taylor, and John Deacon. Bowie played a semi-acoustic version at the 1996 Bridge School benefit concerts; the 20 October rendition later saw release on The Bridge School Concerts Vol. 1 album and The Bridge School Concerts 25th Anniversary Edition DVD.[5] The song was also sung at his 50th birthday concert in January 1997, at the Glastonbury Festival in June 2000, which was released in 2018 on Glastonbury 2000,[120] and a performance 2 days later at the BBC Radio Theatre which went unreleased until 2021's Brilliant Adventure (1992–2001). The song was again performed in 2001 at the Tibet House Benefit concert and the Concert for New York City.[5]
Usage in media[edit]
Bowie allowed "'Heroes'" to be used in advertising campaigns throughout his lifetime,[5] from ads for cell phones, cars and softwares, to HBO Latin American programming, musical video games and sporting events.[4] One such event was the opening ceremony of the 2012 Summer Olympics, where it was played as the British team entered the Olympic Stadium.[135] In 2001, the song appeared in three prominent feature films: Antitrust, Moulin Rouge! and The Parole Officer.[5]
On television, the song has made appearances in Glee (2012), the US version of The Tomorrow People (2014) and Regular Show (2017),[136] and on soundtrack albums for Heroes and Ninja Assassin (2009).[5] Meanwhile, Gabriel's version was used in two episodes of the Netflix series Stranger Things in 2016 and 2019.[137] Bowie's original was also featured in the film The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012),[138][139] and in the premiere trailer for the Brazilian film Praia do Futuro (2014).[140] Five years later, "'Helden'" was played at the end of Jojo Rabbit.[141]
According to biographer Chris O'Leary:[4]
Technical