Deep reading. Probably not of interest for anyone not a David Bowie diehard, but will be loved by fans of his.

I was really excited to get an advanced copy of this book. I am a huge Bowie fan. I was expecting a behind the scenes, deep insight into every moment that went into making this album. I was a bit disappointed. There are bits of behind the scenes of how songs were recorded, but there are more tangents going on here that take away from the “making of an album.” The author does a good job of painting a picture of the times and mindset of Bowie, but spends little time in the actual making of the album. If you’re a David Bowie fan, you should read it. I do wish the galley had a better formatting instead of just one long chapter, no page breaks, chapters, or any formatting around quotes, poems(?), etc. Reading the actual printed book might have been more enjoyable. Thanks to @netgalley and Backbeat for the advanced copy.

Extremely complex and enlightening. Definitely not for lightweight Bowie fans. I consider myself a slightly higher than mainstream fan (jumped my child the morning Bowie died because she sent the news to me in a text message), but even I had a difficult time with all of the actual deep recording studio song development. I don’t recommend that any of that should be edited; Bowie’s lifeblood is his songwriting. God I’m still taking about him in the present tense. David will never really die. He’s in our stars; he lives on in his legacy. And I firmly believe a book like this could probably be written about most of his album. The thin white Duke is dead. Long live the thin white Duke.

My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Globe Pequot, Backbeat Books for an advanced copy of this book on the making and influence of one of David Bowie's best albums, considered by many to be one of the best recordings in rock history.

An album is never created in a vacuum. There are engineers, and producers, and record executives, sometimes with ideas that can be ignored, or have the deep pockets that allow the record to exist at all. Friends weigh in, that sounds great, ughh, why. Band members can come up with a riff, a comment could be turned into a lyrics, an accident made art. The outside world weighs in, politics, the music scene, the push by management to stop with art and make some money. Love, or lack of can add ambience, a city bursting with new sounds, new ideas can fill a tape. And of course the artist, David Bowie and his ability to absorb everything and release it with his own flair. Out of Berlin, dealing with the fallout of punk, the advent of post-punk and new age,with a need to make a commercial album, Bowie did what Bowie did best. Create a new album for a new decade. Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) was the result. Silhouettes and Shadows: The Secret History of David Bowie’s Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) by music writer Adam Steiner is both a personal look by the author of the meaning of the album to Steiner, and a look at its creation, and the influence it had on Bowie and the music that was to come.

David Bowie was at a crossroads. Finishing his Berlin trilogy of albums with Brian Eno, albums that have grown in stature and fame, but at the time were received kind of flatly, Bowie wanted something different. New wave was coming in, punk was out, and Bowie found himself competing with bands and people who were new on the scene with new sounds and even more new attitudes. Bowie decided the next album was going to be more commercial. Bowie started in New York working at the Power Station without Brian Eno but with Tony Visconti and some of the same musicians. Bowie created music that was different for him, not as improvisational, but infused with what was going on in the New York music scene, with a few old friends. Bowie returned to England to work on lyrics, drawing from older works, bringing back Major Tom, in an album that was to end the seventies in many ways, and set up a new sound that would bring Bowie back to the mainstream, if not bigger.

Scary Monsters is considered not only very good Bowie album but a classic album in many ways. An album that ends the Ziggy/ Great White Duke/ past personas, and brings in more modern music, more of a new wave, post disco feeling. Adam Steiner starts the book with how much he loved the album, buying it for one pound to play on his car radio and how transformative the album was to him. This continues as he unfolds more about the making of the album, the political times of Thatcher, the music that was being played, and even the way Bowie was looking at his career. Steiner looks at the songs, telling stories about their creation, being in the studio with Bowie and the other musicians, even a bit from what the producer was thinking about the project. Steiner has talked to many people involved and around the album, parses gossip and other tales in attempt to get to the truth, which as in any behind the music story can be hard to get.

Steiner is a very good writer, and this book is a must for fans of both Bowie and the era this music was created in. Recommended for music historians, Bowie readers and people who like books about the creative process and how art is created.