History Music / NeverLetMeDown

''Never Let Me Down'' is the 17th studio album by Music/DavidBowie, released in 1987.

In 2018, two years after his death, a GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion of the album using the original vocals and a new backing track was released. Titled ''Never Let Me Down 2018'', the album was released exclusively as part of the BoxedSet ''Loving the Alien (1983-1988)''. The re-do was a project Bowie had been trying to get off the ground as early as late 1987, first being talked out of it by Reeves Gabrels due to its close proximity to the original version's release before later revisiting the idea in 1996 just prior to starting work on ''Music/{{Earthling}}''. However, in both cases the idea never went far enough for anything to actually be recorded. The closest Bowie got to redoing ''Never Let Me Down'' in his lifetime was in 2008, when he appointed Mario J. [=McNulty=] to produce a new backing track for "Time Will Crawl" for the compilation album ''[=iSelect=]''. Bowie did, however, manage to have some degree of influence on the final 2018 product, having hand-picked at least some of the musicians included on the remix.

* ReCut: Most songs on the original LP release of the album were cut down to allow everything to fit on one disc without compressing any of the grooves; these edits were also present on the cassette release. The full songs, however, would be included on all CD releases, and would eventually come to vinyl with the ''Loving the Alien [1983-1988]'' BoxedSet and the standalone 2019 reissue of ''Never Let Me Down'' in its original form (with the LP edits being relegated to the set's ''Re:Call 4'' compilation).

Bowie, having grown disconnected from his ''Music/LetsDance''/''Music/{{Tonight}}'' fans, wanted to [[RevisitingTheRoots return to making a more rock-and-roll based album]], marking the first time since ''Music/ScaryMonstersAndSuperCreeps'' that he played instruments in addition to singing. He collaborated with Music/IggyPop and Erdal Kızılçay with the view of putting the songs into a theatrical tour.

* RecordProducer: David Bowie and David Richards, with the addition of Mario J. [=McNulty=] on the 2018 version. Based on Bowie's comments about the making of the 1987 version, he himself seemed to be an example of the invisible variety, retrospectively describing himself in an interview as having been "indifferent" towards the album's production when it was first recorded.

* RegionalBonus: The Japanese release of the version include a Japanese-language version of "Girls" as a bonus track, slotted between "Zeroes" and "Glass Spider".

* CoverSong: "Bang Bang", Bowie's final Music/IggyPop cover.

* LyricalDissonance: A good amount of songs are about as dark from a lyrical standpoint as you'd expect from David Bowie, but they're all written to be quite danceable. "Day-In Day-Out" is a particularly noticeable example, being an upbeat, horn-heavy track that brings up subjects such as child abandonment, misguided patriotism, crushing poverty, and (implied) police brutality.

* RealLifeWritesThePlot: The album, in spite of its seemingly cheery melodies, focuses a great deal on themes of loss and abandonment in its lyrics, likely influenced by the lingering grief from the suicide of Bowie's half-brother Terry two years prior.

The album was commercially successful, selling more copies than ''Tonight'' and spawned three UK Top 40 singles in the title track, "Day-In Day-Out" and "Time Will Crawl". The album additionally peaked at No. 6 on the UK Albums chart and at No. 34 on the Billboard 200, going on to be certified platinum in Canada and gold in the UK, the US, and France. The tour the album spawned, the Glass Spider Tour, ended up being the longest and most expensive tour Bowie had embarked upon at the time, with its elaborate set being called "the largest touring set ever." Despite its unprecedented expense, it too was a huge commercial success, making $86 million USD at the box office across its three legs and 86 shows.

[[caption-width-right:350:[[labelnote:Click to see cover for ''Never Let Me Down 2018'']]\\

[[caption-width-right:350:''"We only smelled the gas as we lay down to sleep."'']]
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/never_let_me_down_2018_small.jpg]]

However both the album and the tour were poorly received at the time, which took a toll on the singer. In the album's case, it was received even more negatively than ''Tonight'', and nowadays ranks among most listeners as Bowie's worst album. In this case, however, it's owed less to the songwriting and more to the production, which is grounded quite heavily in late 80's production values and consequently does little to separate itself from the multitude of other samey-sounding 80's pop records. Bowie was in fact so shaken by the poor outcome of the album and tour that he almost quit the music industry entirely; with the encouragement of Reeves Gabrels, he would go on to form Tin Machine in 1988 as a means of artistically reinvigorating himself.

In 2018, [[Main/AuthorExistenceFailure two years after his death,]] a GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion of the album using the original vocals and a new backing track was released. Titled ''Never Let Me Down 2018'', the album was released exclusively as part of the BoxedSet ''Loving the Alien (1983-1988)''. The re-do was a project Bowie had been trying to get off the ground as early as late 1987, first being talked out of it by Reeves Gabrels due to its close proximity to the original version's release before later revisiting the idea in 1996 just prior to starting work on ''Music/{{Earthling}}''. However, in both cases the idea never went far enough for anything to actually be recorded. The closest Bowie got to redoing ''Never Let Me Down'' in his lifetime was in 2008, when he appointed Mario J. [=McNulty=] to produce a new backing track for "Time Will Crawl" for the compilation album ''[=iSelect=]''. Bowie did, however, manage to have some degree of influence on the final 2018 product, having hand-picked at least some of the musicians included on the remix. While it still isn't considered a masterpiece on the level of his 70's works, the remix was praised by reviewers as a major improvement over the 1987 version, allowing the songwriting to finally breathe and bringing it up to at least the middle tier of his discography.

In 2018, [[Main/AuthorExistenceFailure two years after his death]] and 31 years after the album's original release, a GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion appeared in the form of ''Never Let Me Down 2018''. Featuring newly recorded backing tracks while preserving the most distinctive elements of the original songs (including all of Bowie's vocals), the album was released exclusively as part of the BoxedSet ''Loving the Alien (1983-1988)''.

The re-do was a project Bowie had been trying to get off the ground as early as late 1987, first being talked out of it by Reeves Gabrels due to its close proximity to the original version's release before later revisiting the idea in 1996 just prior to starting work on ''Music/{{Earthling}}''. However, in both cases the idea never went far enough for anything to actually be recorded. The closest Bowie got to redoing ''Never Let Me Down'' in his lifetime was in 2008, when he appointed Mario J. [=McNulty=] to produce a new backing track for "Time Will Crawl" for the compilation album ''[=iSelect=]''. Bowie did, however, manage to have some degree of influence on the final 2018 product, having hand-picked at least some of the musicians included on the remix.

* RevisitingTheRoots: The album was ''supposed'' to be this, but the synth-heavy final mix ended up shoehorning it more into the direction of his other post-''Music/LetsDance'' material. The 2018 remix consequently tries to bring the record back in line with this trope.

* PoliceBrutality: Implied in "Day-In Day-Out": the bridge ends with a mention of a "police shakedown," and the last verse mentions the protagonist being gunned down by ironically-described "angels everywhere;" the music video juxtaposes these lyrics with scenes of riot control tanks ramming into her house.

* {{Bowdlerize}}:
** The music video for "Day-In Day-Out" features the protagonist's baby arranging letter blocks to spell "MOM," "FOOD," and "FUCK," representing the cycle of dependency. TV airings edited it to say "MOM," "LOOK," and "LUCK" instead. Bowie reacted to the edit with disdain, calling it "ludicrous" and claiming that the censors made a knee-jerk reaction to the "FUCK" blocks instead of trying to grasp their meaning. The TV edit also removes a scene at the end of a man peeing on UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan's Walk of Fame star.

* {{Bowdlerize}}: The music video for "Day-In Day-Out" features the protagonist's baby arranging letter blocks to spell "MOM," "FOOD," and "FUCK," representing the cycle of dependency. TV airings edited it to say "MOM," "LOOK," and "LUCK" instead. Bowie reacted to the edit with disdain, calling it "ludicrous" and claiming that the censors made a knee-jerk reaction to the "FUCK" blocks instead of trying to grasp their meaning.

* TakeThat: "'87 and Cry" is one to the UsefulNotes/MargaretThatcher administration, featuring Bowie sarcastically prattling off a number of shallow, feel-good slogans characteristic of the Thatcher era.