Autobahn

Pavement in American motorways are typically made with low initial construction cost, but with ongoing and pricy maintenance. This differs severely from the European and namely German building philosophy. The plans for the Autobahn originated in the 1920'ies under the Weimar Republic. An increasing number of vehicles began to appear all around the country, as the wounds and damages after the devastating world war began to heal. The economy was beginning to flourish again, and despite a recent hyperinflation the country was entering what would later be known as the "golden years" of the republic.

Ideas for express carriageways only for motor vehicles were already present at the time, as in Italy where the first part of the "autostrada" was completed in 1924. In Weimar the vision for the first part of what would later become the Autobahn was the stretch from Hamburg over Frankfurt to Basel. On November 6, 1926 a association called HaFraBa (short name for the involved cities) was founded. A huge project at the time (with a span of over 800 kilometers), it would require intensive engineering and labour power. However, due to the loss of the 1st world war, Germany was unable to lend money anywhere, and secondly the railway industry lobbied against such a proposal. The solution was to collect road tolls, just like Italy did for their projects.

When the Third Reich swept away the slowly collapsing republic, the plans for the HaFraBa was initially rejected, but with the rise of Adolf Hitler things changed. He formed a vision; a plan for the Reichsautobahn. Just as the railways had played an important part in modernizing infrastructure, the time was ready for the motorways to do the same. Thus, in 1933 a law was passed, and the association Gesellschaft Reichsautobahnen created to surpass the construction of this immense project, and the first dig was done by Adolf Hitler himself on September 23 that same year.

This was the beginning of one of the world most well respected and sturdy road networks in the world: Autobahn.

Map of the the first Autobahn stretch, Hamburg over Frankfurt to Basel

Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited

Dylan’s music has always struck me with a feeling of both deep sorrow and deprivation yet it holds the beauty of Nature and Man. His ability to grasp sadness and laughter within the same breath of air has always impressed me. The feelings of Man expressed in one song. For me Dylan binds together the negative and positive sides of life, thus underlining that what makes human life worth living is that we experience both. He is as much a common man as a flamboyant artist, a man with a bleeding heart and a laughter resounding every album, song or text.

A woman whose beauty sooths or eyes yet our memory of her causes us pain. Or a memory many years ago which fills us with joy but whose impermanence is painful. His ability to describe and make us feel the world that we live in through his music and thoughts are for me brilliant. 

On Bob Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited released in 1965, Dylan successfully creates an album that contains a wide palette this wide palette of feelings and notions. He takes on a trip across America discussing, debating and commenting on himself, American History and everything in between. With 110 miles an hour Bob collides with the contemporary America as this is his first album where his songs are electrified – a choice not likened by Dylan’s fans and the folk movement. But luckily Dylan had the courage to rewrite and challenge a genre that, despite it not being conservative in any way, had its identity and self-image in a country that no longer existed. And if I may blatantly and tastelessly quote the man himself: “Then you better start swimmin’ Or you’ll sink like a stone, for the times they are a changin’.”

His eyes are fixed on the road ahead of him; sticking it to the man, the development of welfare America, the breaking up of traditional values: family, race, classes and politics. But while at the same time managing this mishmash – he has a third eye looking through the rearview mirror. The young folksinger is never stupid or naïve enough not to acknowledge that the ground he stands on and the breath he breaths was there long before his time. He is as well travelling down memory lane. He never forgets that he is rooted in the North Country, his past and the musical roots of folk. In the same way, the modern and progressive America that Dylan describes originates from a time long gone. A time of slaves and slave owners, wars and world wars, blacks and whites - deprivation and depression.  In order to understand our own time and foresee the future ones we must investigate and rationalize our past. Anything doesn’t originate from nothing, and we must break with our past in order to write our future.

The road on which we are travelling was paved by the Man of the past, a man of history and identity as well as a social identity. A man who domesticated the Wild, a man who “made” America with a pick axe, pencil and shovel. For me, this is Dylan’s way of saying that to change America  into something better, we must first deal and rationalize its past so that we may pave the road ahead ourselves and kick out the man in a suit. And that is for me what makes Highway 61 Revisited such a great album: This is an album whose, songs, themes, lyrics and persona are as multifaceted as the country it describes. It is a reflection of a society whose diversity and sheer scale is tearing it apart but at the same time adding a great deal of cohesion. Like the album America is one big melting pot.

It’s a Buick 66 travelling at a hundred different directions with the pedal to the metal. With endpoints miles apart with nowhere but everywhere to go. It is a car whose cabinet is long torn apart but whose engine is still running held together by an idea of equality, sense of community and a shared past.

Laika

40 years after the Bolshevik revolution, Russia had seen massive changes. Under the reign of many different leaders the country had been shaped to what it was known as in the sixties: a glorious and powerful soviet nation contrasting to the western, namely the US. Alongside the unrest of the cold war, another battle hastily took form: conquering space.

On October 4, 1957, over two thousand kilometers from Kreml, Sputnik 1 was launched from a remote location in Soviet-ruled Kazakhstan. It was the first unmanned satellite to orbit the earth, and a great success for the USSR. This ignited the space race, and the next step would be to have human beings in space. Both American and Russian scientists were intensively researching the possibilities of launching man into space. This would require many more technicalities than an unmanned vessel, and technology was primitive at the time.

Laika, a stray dog from the streets of Moscow was chosen to be the subject of the next flight. Together with two other dogs, she was trained extensively prior to the launch. The success of Sputnik 1 made the Soviet leaders very optimistic, so much that the only gave a months notice before the launch of Sputnik 2, which would contain a living dog. The launch would then take place on the exact day of the 40 year anniverseyr of the Bolshevik revolution. This extremely short notice gave the project an unforseen pressure, which resulted in tragic decision: Laika was deemed for a one-way trip.

November 3, 1957.
Sputnik 2 launches successfully, onboard is cosmonaut dog 'Laika'. The satellite reaches space, but some of the thermal insulation is torn in the flight. This made the cabin temperature rise considerably. After three hours of flight, Laika's biological functions settles to near normal after the stressful launch. Succeeding four orbits around the Earth, no further life signs are received from the satellite; Laika is dead, supposedly of overheating. Laika became the first animal to be successfully launched into space and orbit the earth.

After the fall of Soviet Union, scientists who participated in the project admitted that the project was a subject to extreme political pressure. The launch was far more important politically than scientifically, and sadly Laika was the casualty. As one of the participating scientists expressed it: "We did not learn enough from this mission to justify the death of the dog."

The Thin White Duke

In 1976 Bowie had gained praises from almost all of his albums spanning from the heavy rock and folk album "The Man Who Sold the World" to the "plastic" soul of "Young Americans". He had changed genres, personnel, and personas several times during the last 6-7 years, and had moved to LA in 1974 and was beginning to seek new musical ground once again.



Today it is clear, that 1976 was to become a breaking point in Bowie's music. A longer transition from glam over soul and disco to an evidently darker and more gloomy musical landscape had taken place over the last years. A more mature, coke-sniffing, and pepper-eating Bowie had isolated himself in his big LA mansion, and had shown a growing interest in the occult and mythic. His increasing consumption of mostly coke had meant that he lost his grip of reality and became paranoid and conspiring. It is possible that Bowie, in an attempt to face his personal problems, occult obsession and drug addiction, transformed himself into The Thin White Duke persona - a transformation that one could see as a therapeutic way for Bowie to face his problems as well as an artistic experiment in which he sought to dissolve the barrier between the creator and the created. The artist becomes a work of art, and the work of art becomes the artist, or?!

No matter what, the environment that surrounded Bowie at that time caused the birth, or return, of The Thin White Duke - a cool and cynical thin man portrayed in only black and white. When on stage, this cigarette smoking and impeccably dressed coke addict, becomes a behemoth whose musical expression underlines the seriousness and somewhat deep despair of the Duke. A man who has both fame and money but fails to enjoy both.

Once again Bowies interest in acting - a keyword that permeats the whole of Bowie's career from the glam days of Ziggy Stardust to the massive scene show of the Diamond Dogs tour and his many acting rolls in both theater and films - are visible:

Thus The Station to Station World Tour would see its beginning every night with the title track "Station to Station", an act in which Bowie enters the stage after having teased the audience for more than 3 minutes, casually walking almost strolling, yet with a determination, towards the middle of the stage accompanied by the roaring and heavy sound leading up to his "majestic" entrance. Bowie overlooking the enthusiastic crowd with an intentional distance and apparent carelessness while almost nonchalantly announcing his arrival to the wild crowd:

"The return of the thin white duke throwing darts in lover's eyes".

It is my belief that Bowie intentionally wish to show the glaring contrast between the enchanted crowd who hungers for their messiah and idol wishing to be him and Bowie himself, who ironically want's to be everyone but the Duke. The interaction between the performer and the audience is the real show.

To be continued.