The David Bowie song that blew St. Vincent away

With her otherworldly soundscapes and the facades and fairytales she creates to accompany them, Clark has managed to emulate the element of Bowie’s work that she most admired: his ability to transport you to another place while still maintaining relevance and poignancy in the real world. Her stories, and the sounds that accompany them, open a window into someone else’s mind or world without losing touch with her listeners.

There is one song in Bowie’s repertoire that embodies this transformative ability particularly well: “Always Crashing In The Same Car.” The song appeared on Bowie’s eleventh album in 1977. Lowwhich also resulted in the cult hit “Sound and Vision”. During a conversation with RedBullClark shared her love for the record and its infectious quality.

“I love music that takes me to another place,” she revealed, “like the second half of Low; stuff that reminds me of things that are important rather than pure escapism. It just blows me away.” She noted that she was particularly blown away by ‘Always Crashing In The Same Car,’ a song in which Bowie’s protagonist seems doomed to make the same bad decisions over and over again.

Even when he claims he’s looked left and right, he can’t help but crash the same car over and over again. According to Clark, the song is about him “crashing his car into the car of a drug dealer who was cheating him,” but his words go beyond that. It’s not just about a car crash of passion, but about the inability to break a habit, the inevitability of certain toxic cycles.

‘Always Crashing In The Same Car’ certainly has the ability to transport listeners to another world, into the mind of Bowie in the midst of addiction, but it’s not a purely escapist track. In fact, it’s universally relatable – we all make mistakes we can’t stop ourselves from repeating, flaws we can’t seem to get rid of, cars we can’t stop from crashing.

“Always Crashing In The Same Car” is deeply rooted in reality and his own personal experiences, but also has a much more universal appeal. It is a prime example of what made Bowie such a beloved songwriter to Clark and millions of others. His work was both otherworldly and completely rooted in the human experience, much like Clark’s own works.

It’s easy to see how Clark’s love of “Always Crashing In The Same Car” and her admiration for Bowie in general have found their way into her own songwriting. While she vacillates between the extraterrestrial and the earthly, the spirit of Bowie lives on.

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