Let's Dance by David Bowie

About

“Let’s Dance” is the first single and titular track from David Bowie’s 1983 album Let’s Dance, and first for EMI Records. Produced by Nile Rodgers of Chic, It was a direct shift from the post-punk and art rock sound Bowie experimented with on his 1980 album Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) to a funk, post-disco, and dance pop sound. This stylistic change aligned Bowie with the popular music of the ‘80s and led to “Let’s Dance” becoming one of Bowie’s biggest-selling tracks. It topped the charts in the UK, the US, Ireland and New Zealand, and reached #2 in Austria, Australia and Germany. The song’s closing guitar solo is played by American musician Stevie Ray Vaughan. Bowie has said that the original demo of the song was “totally different” from Nile Rodgers' arrangement. The music video for “Let’s Dance” was directed by David Mallet in March 1983 in Australia at a bar in New South Wales and at the Warrumbungle National Park. Bowie chose to include residents of the town of the bar, most of whom had no knowledge of who David Bowie was or why they were shooting a video. The video features an Aboriginal couple and also features the red shoes Bowie sings of in the song, which serve as a motif in the video. The video includes multiple references to the Stolen Generations, which were the Aboriginal children who were forcefully removed from their families by Australian government agencies of the British settlers. These references constitute part of the several statements by Bowie featured on the album concerning the integration of one culture with another. The pop appeal of “Let’s Dance” garnered Bowie an entirely new base of fans who were young and unaware of Bowie’s prior works and successes. Bowie’s subsequent releases Tonight and Never Let Me Down were a continuation of this shift, which Bowie has described as an effort to cater to the new audience. However, the move garnered Bowie negative criticism. He went on to form the rock band Tin Machine in order to redevelop his style.