Hours

David Bowie | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (December 16, 2009)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Columbia
• ASIN: B0001LYH98
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (197 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #106,335 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com's Best of 1999

Hours... is a lush, largely serene self-portrait through which David Bowie atones for mistakes and reflects on regrets. Not that this is the chameleon's swan song, but it's a fitting time for him to speak out honestly about his life--a life that's been lionized, criticized, and mythologized by the masses for three decades. Bowie's Hunky Dory muses were once "driving their mamas and papas insane," but here they are aged and faded ("The Pretty Things Are Going to Hell"); yet the man himself could not be more graceful or vibrant. --Beth Massa

Product Description

Hours - David Bowie

This product is manufactured on demand using CD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A mature album by a mature man, November 18, 1999

By 

Greg Benson (Athens, GA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hours (Audio CD)

Bowie seems to still be getting a lot of flak for his eighties slump; most rockers his age can rehash and regurgitate and get rewarded by most critics just for showing up. Bowie, on the other hand, has started to really take some chances again with his music, and only a few critics seem to have noticed. While "Hours..." is (consciously or unconsciously)reminiscient of "Hunky Dory" and then "The Man who Sold the World," he has inserted the lyrics of a fifty-something musician who admittedly feels a bit left behind. Well, this is stuff we (adults) can sink our teeth into! I especially love how the album starts out slow and builds up steam; with each listen this approach seems to make more sense. Those who have listened to him for a long time don't always want the sustained energy of "Earthling." (We can't always take it! Sometimes we just want a nice ride!) And we know this is the real thing; Bowie's been giving us the real thing since "Outside" or even before. I think he knows it; too bad it's taken rock critics a while to be convinced.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Do Not Sell This Short!!, November 4, 2005

By 

Thomas D. Ryan "American Hit Network" (New York) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hours (Audio CD)

Hours? It's more like years since David Bowie finished an album that was something other than conceptual in its nature. Almost all of his recent album projects have been defined by the styles incorporated, or by a storyline concept (the convoluted but clever Outside, the techno-influenced Earthling, et. al.), but unless I'm missing something, Hours is Bowie's most unencumbered work in quite a while. It's almost like old times, actually, containing a batch of songs that could be heard either together or separately, with no repercussions. As such, it is also some of Bowie's best work in a long time, since the songs coexist snugly without leaning on one another.

Whether it's due to the impending millennium and all of the implications that it brings with it, or personal experiences that have altered his perspective is unclear, but the songs on Hours are anything but opaque. Throughout this album, Bowie is emotionally direct, confronting love and loss with a vulnerability that might surprise those who have him pigeonholed as an artistic poseur. On "Survive", he sings with emotional candor to an estranged (or possibly deceased) lover or friend, "You're the great mistake I never made. I never lied to you, I hated when you lied, and I'll survive your naked eyes...I love you". That in itself is a revelation, since I cannot recall previously hearing Bowie sing the words "I love you". This direct vulnerability expands as the disk continues, with self-searching, emotionally wrought lines like "If I'm dreaming my life, was she ever here" (from "If I'm Dreaming My Life") and "Hold my face before you. Still my trembling heart. Seven days to live my life or seven ways to die (from "Seven").

This liberation of self-expression has opened new vistas for Bowie, who seems resigned to accept the nature of a fickle music business that looks to artists less than half his age to provide new revelations for a new generation. He is no longer making a play for commerciality. He is satisfied to communicate with those who are genuinely interested, and his fan base remains adequate to provide him this luxury. Very, very few artists on the top of the charts have more to say than Bowie, and almost none are as eloquent. As Bowie sings in "The Pretty Things Are Going to Hell," "I'm reaching the very edge y'know. I'm going to the other side this time." I for one would rather follow him over the edge than wait around for a younger bard to fight his way through the morass, only to possibly end up a loser. Bowie was there first, and he survived, with class, style and grace. Will any of the new breed be able to say the same? A- Tom Ryan

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Simply Spectacular, February 28, 2002

By 

Mud Pyramid "rilaly" (Omaha, Nebraska USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hours (Audio CD)

Some of the times an album gets drowned out by an artist's former successes. If an album, from such a performer, does not break new ground it somehow gains less attention than the upstart's albums. This, my fellow legion of Bowie fans, is simply a spectacular album. This is David Bowie easing on the cutting edge for a moment to settle into sound song craftsmanship. How many artists out there can lay claim to so many incredible and unique albums. In my opinion, Bowie has had ten albums I would call incredible, and this fits into that groove. Subtlety rules on this album. A deft hand by both Bowie and Reeves Gabrels has been used on this album to at times fill the empty spaces, and at other times let it flow. To say that I am impressed by this album would be a grand understatement. This is a probably not a great starting point for those not initiated into the Bowie craftsmanship, but to those who love him as much as I do...it's great punctuation to the progressive brilliance.