As a philosophy grad the first thing this song makes me think of is Chomsky's linguistic theories. Chomsky argued that the human mind has an inborn faculty of language comprehension that recognizes the underlying structure of language, without requiring the content of a given sentence to be, itself, comprehensible. Chomsky's famous example is the sentence "Colourless green ideas sleep furiously." which, syntactically speaking, is a perfectly acceptable sentence, and is recognized by the mind as such - despite it's being nonsense. I've always wondered if Bowie was aware of this theory and cleverly making art out of science.
@terrykb - I believe you are on the right track as he seems to do the same in Warszawa. Chili venco raro, muthafuckahhhs! God I miss him. Never got to see him live. Never got to pick him up hitchhiking along a desolate stretch of desert highway and sing all of Lodger with him: "No, no, David... you sing 'wait-ing so long' and I'll do the 'look back in ay-ay-anger' part... just, just try it. What? What do you mean, pull over? Seriously?? Fine, you sing whatever you want. Whatever. Or silence is good... I have to pee? Do you...
@terrykb - I believe you are on the right track as he seems to do the same in Warszawa. Chili venco raro, muthafuckahhhs! God I miss him. Never got to see him live. Never got to pick him up hitchhiking along a desolate stretch of desert highway and sing all of Lodger with him: "No, no, David... you sing 'wait-ing so long' and I'll do the 'look back in ay-ay-anger' part... just, just try it. What? What do you mean, pull over? Seriously?? Fine, you sing whatever you want. Whatever. Or silence is good... I have to pee? Do you have to pee? It's these damn Gatorades.".
As a philosophy grad the first thing this song makes me think of is Chomsky's linguistic theories. Chomsky argued that the human mind has an inborn faculty of language comprehension that recognizes the underlying structure of language, without requiring the content of a given sentence to be, itself, comprehensible. Chomsky's famous example is the sentence "Colourless green ideas sleep furiously." which, syntactically speaking, is a perfectly acceptable sentence, and is recognized by the mind as such - despite it's being nonsense. I've always wondered if Bowie was aware of this theory and cleverly making art out of science.
@terrykb - I believe you are on the right track as he seems to do the same in Warszawa. Chili venco raro, muthafuckahhhs! God I miss him. Never got to see him live. Never got to pick him up hitchhiking along a desolate stretch of desert highway and sing all of Lodger with him: "No, no, David... you sing 'wait-ing so long' and I'll do the 'look back in ay-ay-anger' part... just, just try it. What? What do you mean, pull over? Seriously?? Fine, you sing whatever you want. Whatever. Or silence is good... I have to pee? Do you...
@terrykb - I believe you are on the right track as he seems to do the same in Warszawa. Chili venco raro, muthafuckahhhs! God I miss him. Never got to see him live. Never got to pick him up hitchhiking along a desolate stretch of desert highway and sing all of Lodger with him: "No, no, David... you sing 'wait-ing so long' and I'll do the 'look back in ay-ay-anger' part... just, just try it. What? What do you mean, pull over? Seriously?? Fine, you sing whatever you want. Whatever. Or silence is good... I have to pee? Do you have to pee? It's these damn Gatorades.".