Adventures in blogging: Was my “Hidden Song within ‘Rebel Rebel’ post misleading?

It isn’t like I hadn’t heard the lyrics near the end of “Rebel Rebel” about a million times. They are not really new or mysterious. But I’ve been thinking about them of late, how good they are and how… it almost seems like they are hidden within the song. The more I thought about it, the more hidden they seemed to me, especially since I realized that Bowie sometimes — maybe even usually— dropped them from his live performances (such as the one in this video from the A Reality Tour).

So I posted about it. And I got some negative feedback, accusing my headline of being click-bait. Was it? I don’t think so, but I understood the point. So I added a paragraph, then rewrote the whole thing. Meanwhile, the next couple of days showed that the post was the second-most-visited since I’ve begun keeping track of my blog’s stats. But instead of feeling like I wrote a really good, compelling post, days later I’m wondering if I was unintentionally misleading.

Before I go any further, the lyrics in question are these:

“So what you wanna know
Calamity’s child, chi-chi, chi-chi
Where’d you wanna go?
What can I do for you? Looks like you’ve been there too.”

And the post, in its current form, can be found HERE.

To confuse matters further, Bowie actually does have at least one song with a hidden song within it— “Ashes to Ashes.” There’s part of “Ashes to Ashes” where the background words differ considerably from what Bowie is singing up front. They are not barely discernible— they simply are not discernible. That’s another song I have heard over and over again but didn’t know about the hidden lyrics until I read Adam Steiner’s excellent book about the Scary Monsters album (click HERE for my interview with Adam).

The secret lyrics of “Ashes to Ashes” in question are apparently these:

“No-one ever asked, he was thirteen
songs that please the ear can leave the mind blown
and I was ready to go in ’74.”

Actually, these lyrics are so well hidden that I’m not entirely sure I have them right. I wasn’t even able to find a reliable answer online. But the larger point is this— did you ever hear anything like these in “Ashes to Ashes?” Well, they, or something very close to them, are there.

Less mysteriously, there are a bunch of other phrases in Bowie songs that are intentionally difficult to understand. There are too many examples to list. Just to give a few examples— Bowie’s seemingly random calling out of dates in “Leon Takes Us Outside.” That he’s saying something is not a mystery, but it’s tough to understand what, exactly, he’s saying. Or another example— does he say something about hamburgers in “Sweet Thing?” Is he saying, “King Volcano” in “Velvet Goldmine?” Like I said, there are too many examples to count.

But none of these constitute hidden songs within songs.

OK— there’s still more that might count. Surely Bowie repurposed old songs, so “It’s No Game” contains elements of his never-released, “Tired of My Life.” “Red Money” uses the music of “Sister Midnight.” “Life on Mars?” has musical connections to “My Way” (made famous by Frank Sinatra). “Move On,” at least in part, is based on “All the Young Dudes” played backward. Now there’s a hidden song within a song (I can never think of how it sounds backward).

As for the hidden lyrics in “Rebel Rebel?” Did I use the term in a misleading way? I don’t think so. My failure, if I failed, was in explaining what I meant. There’s a thought in my head that I’m trying to get out. Maybe that’s what’s really hidden— my own meaning.