I'm Afraid of Americans

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"I'm Afraid of Americans" is a song by the English musician David Bowie, released as a single from his album Earthling on 14 October 1997 through Virgin Records. The song was co-written by Bowie and Brian Eno and originally recorded during the sessions for Bowie's 1995 album Outside; this version was released on the soundtrack of Showgirls (1995). The song was then remade during the sessions for Earthling, featuring rewritten lyrics, overdubs and transposed verses. An industrial and techno track, it presents a critique of America through the eyes of a stereotypical "Johnny" and is characterised by drum patterns, synthesisers, various loops and vocal distortions.

The maxi-single release contained six different remixes mostly created by Trent Reznor and his Nine Inch Nails band members; the V3 mix featured Ice Cube while the V5 mix was created by Photek.<ref name="afraidof">Template:Cite AV media notes</ref> Reznor subsequently appeared in the music video, which reflected the song's theme of a frightened European in an American city. The single was Bowie's final single to chart on the Billboard Hot 100 until 2015, reaching number 66. Reznor's V1 mix has since appeared on several compilation albums.

The song has received positive responses from critics and biographers. Rolling Stone named it one of the 30 most essential songs of Bowie's catalogue in 2016. Some American commentators later acknowledged the significance of the lyrics in the late 2010s. Bowie performed "I'm Afraid of Americans" frequently on his concert tours, live performances from which have been released on live albums. Reznor has performed the song live with Nine Inch Nails as well.

Writing and recordingEdit

"I'm Afraid of Americans" was written by Bowie and Brian Eno and originally recorded during the sessions for Bowie's 1995 album Outside. According to biographer Chris O'Leary, recording took place in late 1994 at Mountain Studios in Montreux, Switzerland and the early weeks of 1995 at the Hit Factory in New York City.Template:Sfn Titled "Dummy", it featured different lyrics, such as "I'm afraid of the animals" instead of "Americans".Template:Sfn Eno recalled in 2016: "I remember [David] recording 'I'm Afraid of Americans' and saying, after one of the early takes, 'No, [the 'Dummy' character's] got to be more self-doubting than that.'"Template:Sfn This version was intended for release on the soundtrack for the 1995 film Johnny Mnemonic but was instead released on the soundtrack for the 1995 film Showgirls.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn

During the sessions for Bowie's next album Earthling (1997), he decided to remake the song with his current band—guitarist Reeves Gabrels, pianist Mike Garson, bassist Gail Ann Dorsey and drummer Zack Alford.Template:Sfn Bowie stated: "That was something that Eno and I put together, and I just didn't feel it fit Outside, so it didn't go on it. It just got left behind. So then we took just the embryo of it, and restructured it with this band."<ref name="Fi">Template:Cite magazine</ref> Recording for the remake took place between AugustTemplate:Sfn and October 1996Template:Sfn at Looking Glass Studios in New York City with engineer Mark Plati, who had extensive experience there.Template:Sfn Plati and Gabrels were credited as co-producers while Bowie himself mostly self-produced.<ref name="rollingstone review">Template:Cite magazine</ref> Regarding the remake, Plati explained: "We pulled things off several different reels to make this new composite. It was quite a clean-up job, not the most enjoyable."Template:Sfn Bowie revised the lyrics, changing "Dummy" to "Johnny", and transposed verses while the band provided additional overdubs. Gabrels stated that he added fuzz boxes "until I ran out".Template:Sfn

CompositionEdit

Template:Quote box In an interview with Mojo magazine in 1997, Bowie described the song as "one of those stereotypical 'Johnny' songs: Johnny does this, Johnny does that".<ref name="Mojo">Template:Cite magazine</ref> The absurdist lyrics present a critique of America, in line with Bowie's 1975 track "Young Americans".Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Commentators have seen similarities between the song's titular Johnny and the Johnny of the Lodger track "Repetition" (1979);Template:Sfn Template:Sfn while the Johnny of the former craves objects of status through self-entitlement, the Johnny of the latter emotionally abuses his wife due to his lower status.<ref name="Vice" /> The song concludes with the revelation that "God is an American",Template:Sfn which biographer Marc Spitz considers an "ironic jingoism".Template:Sfn

Musically, reviewers have categorised it as techno,<ref name="Mojo" /><ref name="Rapp">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> with author James Perone writing that it mixes various industrial and techno styles of the 1980s and 1990s.Template:Sfn The GuardianTemplate:'s Caroline Sullivan found the melody reminiscent of Bowie's "Ashes to Ashes" (1980), with a "perky jungle percussion loop", ultimately creating "a most singular fusion of rock and drum & bass".<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> Characterised by drum patterns, synthesisers, various loops and vocal distortions, O'Leary writes that the remake retained the original's "'laughing' hook" and "synth hook pinging around an [[E♭ (musical note)|ETemplate:Flat]] octave". Both the original and remake are also in the key of F major.Template:Sfn Biographer Nicholas Pegg calls the remake "darker" and "funkier" compared to the original,Template:Sfn while Spitz compares the track's "loud/quiet/loud anthem[ic]" quality to the Pixies.Template:Sfn Perone considers it "richer" than other Earthling tracks.Template:Sfn

ReleasesEdit

The original version of "I'm Afraid of Americans" was released on the Showgirls soundtrack on 26 September 1995.Template:Sfn Earthling was released on 3 February 1997Template:Sfn on CD and LP formats through RCA Records in the UK,Template:Sfn Virgin Records in the US,<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> and Arista Records and its parent distributor BMG elsewhere.Template:Sfn "I'm Afraid of Americans" was the eighth and penultimate track, between "The Last Thing You Should Do" and "Law (Earthlings on Fire)".Template:Sfn

File:Trent Reznor-FEB2008 (cropped, but higher quality) (2).jpg

The CD maxi-single featured various remixes by Trent Reznor (pictured in 2008), who appeared in the song's music video.

Virgin issued "I'm Afraid of Americans" as a maxi-single in North America only on 14 October 1997, where it was backed by six remixes;<ref name="AllMusic">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>Template:Sfn the V3 mix featured guest vocals from rapper Ice Cube while the V5 mix was created by producer Photek.Template:Sfn<ref name="CD single" /><ref name="LP single" /> The project was instigated by Nine Inch Nails frontman Trent Reznor, continuing his and Bowie's association following the Outside Tour. Reznor, who stated that he "tried to make it a bit darker",Template:Sfn stripped the production to its roots to create what biographer David Buckley calls "an eerie, psychotic track".Template:Sfn The ending result is an almost 40-minute project that, in Bowie's words, was "not just a remix [but] almost...an album piece in itself. I was absolutely knocked out when I heard what [Reznor] had done. It was great."Template:Sfn Commercially, the single reached number 66 on the Billboard Hot 100 and remained on the chart for 16 weeks, becoming Bowie's biggest hit in the country since "Day-In Day-Out" ten years earlier.Template:Sfn It was the final Bowie single to chart on the Hot 100 until the release of "Blackstar" in 2015.Template:Sfn<ref name="Vice" /> It also stayed in the Canadian top 50 for six months.Template:Sfn

Reznor also starred as the titular Johnny in the Dom and Nic-directed music video,Template:Sfn which was shot in New York City in October 1997 during the American leg of the Earthling Tour. Bowie explained that he chose the duo because they were "making very interesting, quite hard-edged British videos at the moment. I felt it was important that it retained that outsider's perspective of America".Template:Sfn The video depicts Bowie as a man who is chased around the streets of New York by a stalker portrayed by Reznor,<ref name="RS essentials" /> reflecting the song's theme of a frightened European in an American city.Template:Sfn Discussing his character, Reznor stated: "They wanted a kind of Taxi Driver feel to the whole thing. That's kind of what it's based on. That's why I'm in my Travis Bickle outfit!"Template:Sfn According to Spitz, the video received heavy rotation on MTV, a first for Bowie in over a decade.Template:Sfn It also earned Bowie a nomination for Best Male Video at the 1998 MTV Video Music Awards.Template:Sfn

O'Leary states that while the track has no "definitive" version, Reznor's V1 mix is the most recognisable,Template:Sfn which has appeared on the compilation albums Best of Bowie (2002),<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Nothing Has Changed (2014),<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and Bowie Legacy (2016).<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The Showgirls version, V1 mix and Plati's "Original Edit" were included on the bonus disc of the Earthling expanded edition in 2004.Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite AV media notes</ref>

Reception and legacyEdit

Reviewing Earthling on release, MojoTemplate:'s Andy Gill considered "I'm Afraid of Americans" the "most direct" track on the album.<ref name="Mojo" /> In another review for Rolling Stone, Mark Kemp considered the song "a stuttering rocker" that "seems detached from the other songs".<ref name="rollingstone review" /> Upon release of the single, Billboard writers Larry Flick and Shawnee Smith praised Reznor's remix as an improvement on the "already deeply moody and largely sharp" original. They further opined that the Ice Cube remix could provide a successful foray into a hardcore hip hop album.<ref name="Billboard">Template:Cite magazine</ref> Reviewing the maxi-single for AllMusic, Christian Huey criticised it as "too derivative of Downward Spiral-era Nine Inch Nails" to please Bowie's fans. He argued that it acts better when viewed as a Reznor project rather than a Bowie one. He nevertheless praised Reznor's work on the remixes as well as Photek's contribution.<ref name="AllMusic" />

In later decades, Pegg describes the track as "terrific" while Spitz considered it Bowie's finest single since 1984's "Loving the Alien".Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Following Bowie's death in 2016, Rolling Stone named "I'm Afraid of Americans" one of the 30 most essential songs of Bowie's catalogue.<ref name="RS essentials">Template:Cite magazine</ref> That same year, Ultimate Classic Rock placed "I'm Afraid of Americans" at number 23 in a list ranking every Bowie single from worst to best, calling it the best song on Earthling and Bowie's best song in over a decade, further commenting: "It would be another decade and a half before he was this good again."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> A year later, Consequence of Sound placed "I'm Afraid of Americans" at number 66 on their list of Bowie's 70 best songs, writing:<ref name="CoS">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Many aging rock stars may have been sunk by toying with industrial electronic or having a song feature in the Showgirls soundtrack, but David Bowie excels in even the most theoretically ill-fitting suits, looking sleek and charming. He’s telling tales of humans in ruin, of futility and idealism, and while the original version that appeared in the schlocky midnight movie was afraid of 'the animals,' the eventual final take changed it to 'Americans,' an electro-crunchy slab of sardonic delight.{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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In 2017, ViceTemplate:'s Jill Krajewski commented on the song's relevance during the presidency of Donald Trump, stating: "'I'm Afraid of Americans' has a darker resonance today not through its chorus, but in a context that gives it unnerving prescience: a snapshot of the [era we live in today]."<ref name="Vice" /> She argued that the "working-class everyman" (Johnny) were responsible in sharpening the political divide and widespread hate on the internet, presenting a sense of unease living in America as she concludes, "I am afraid of Americans".<ref name="Vice">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The same year, Lior Phillips of Consequence of Sound said "The title is a picture-perfect distillation of what it means to live in this world."<ref name="CoS" />

Live versionsEdit

Following its release, Bowie performed "I'm Afraid of Americans" frequently on concert tours and television appearances.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn He first performed the track ahead of EarthlingTemplate:'s release on 9 January 1997 at his fiftieth birthday concert in New York City with the band Sonic Youth.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn The song then made regular appearances throughout the Earthling Tour later that year.Template:Sfn Three separate live performances of the song were released on live albums included in the box set Brilliant Live Adventures (2020–2021): A July 1997 performance (released on Look at the Moon!),<ref name="BLA" /><ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> an October 1997 version recorded in New York (included on LiveAndWell.com (1999/2021)),Template:Sfn<ref name="BLA" /><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and a version from the Hours Tour in November 1999 on David Bowie At The Kit Kat Klub (Live New York 99).<ref name="BLA">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Bowie performed the song again at Howard Stern's forty-fourth birthday concert in 1998.Template:Sfn Bowie's 25 June 2000 performance of the song at the Glastonbury Festival was released in 2018 on Glastonbury 2000.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Another live version, recorded at the BBC Radio Theatre, London on 27 June 2000, was released on the bonus disc accompanying the first releases of Bowie at the Beeb in 2000.Template:Sfn<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> A performance from his 2003 A Reality Tour was included on the A Reality Tour DVD (2004), and later on the A Reality Tour album (2010).<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Reznor has performed the song live with Nine Inch Nails as well.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>

Track listingEdit

All tracks are written by David Bowie and Brian Eno. All tracks remixed by Nine Inch Nails, except V5 additionally produced and remixed by Photek.<ref name="CD single" />

12" and CD: Virgin / 7243 8 38618 1/2 (US)<ref name="CD single">Template:Cite AV media notes</ref><ref name="LP single">Template:Cite AV media notes</ref>

A-side: