Talk:Station to Station (song)

Untitled

Ian Mcdonald wrote a good essay about this song in his book 'The people's Music'. Perhaps a wiser wikipedia user than me can put a link or something to the essay, which I believe is called something like 'Black Magic, White Noise'. Pedantic perhaps but this is a key bowie track that deserves a longer article

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GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Station to Station (song)/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: BennyOnTheLoose (talk · contribs) 22:28, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

I'll be looking to claim points for the 2020 Wikipedia:WikiCup for this review. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 22:28, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

zmbro My comments are below. I'm happy to be challenged on, or discuss, any of this. Regards, BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 15:35, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Review Comments:

• Lead: "It dabbles in" - I suggest amending this to something like "The song has elements of" or "Bowie dabbles in" as I don't think a song can dabble.

• Definitely sounds better. Fixed.

• Lead: "often the embodiment of Bowie himself." I wasn't sure about this phrase at first, but seeing that a definition of embodiment is "someone or something that represents a quality or an idea exactly" I think is fine.

• Cool beans.

• Composition: ""Berlin" years" - there are links to Berlin Trilogy that include the album years in the previews, but it might be worth adding in the years here.

• Changed to "his "Berlin" years (1977–1979)"

• Lyrics: "the European canon (or cannon) is here" - not a direct quote? I suggest using a direct quote and adding a bit more to explain the canon/cannons interpretation.

• The actual quote from Doggett is "canon (or, at a stretch, "cannon")" so I put that.

• Release and reception: "Alexis Petridis of The Guardian ranked the song third in her list" - either use "his" or reword so the phrase is gender-neutral.

• Fixed

• Legacy: Add a link to the Motorik article?
• Picture caption: Should it be "Label of the French promotional single" rather than "LP label of the French promotional single"?

• Yes it should. Fixed.

• References: There are a couple of places where the references are not in numerical order, i.e. "across three bars in 4:4 and one in 2:4.[7][6]" and "throughout 1976, for Bowie himself.[16][4]" I think it will look better to re-order those.

• Definitely does. Fixed.

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose, spelling, and grammar): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (reference section): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR): d (copyvio and plagiarism):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free content have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions): Comment: Rationale for label picture use provided, and image size has been reduced. The Thin White Duke picture is free-to-use.

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

BennyOnTheLoose Thanks so much for reviewing! I believe I've taken care of everything. Thanks again. :-) – zmbro _(talk) 17:44, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Comments by Ian Rose -- Hi, I just wanted to jump in here as the guy who largely wrote the album article, some passages of which have found their way here. I would have claimed this review myself but had no time earlier. So forgive me BennyOnTheLoose, you're probably still getting to part 2 (d) of the reviewing criteria but I noticed this on a quick read of the first paragraph in Composition:

• Following the train noise, the band begins to awaken... -- Wording like the band "awakens" is a red flag, it doesn't sound like language you'd hear from an encyclopedia and, sure enough, checking the source one finds the words "Gradually, the band awoke...", which is way too close paraphrasing. I'd suggest something like "The band the begins to enter..." or something like that.
• Also in that sentence, ...before the entire band erupts -- "erupts" is purple prose, I would just drop those five words entirely.
• What follows is a "slow, hypnotic instrumental march"... -- if you're going to quote, I'd advise attributing it inline (which you do elsewhere). Be careful about "over-quoting" through.
• ...the band erupts into a prog-disco "celebratory groove"... -- Again, I'd attribute "celebratory groove" inline. Also you copy the word "erupts" from the source, which says " a celebratory groove suddenly erupts". If you want to keep the word "erupt", then use the quote as I've given it from the source or else drop it.

I'm going to stop there. It'd be nice to see this article at GA as a companion to the album article but it can't make it as is with issues such as those above. You need to be very careful about close paraphrasing and check the whole article against the sources as I've done with this paragraph, which is just a small sample. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 22:49, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Ian Rose Thanks for this. I usually do the plagiarism and copyvio check after other changes, as otherwise it need to be redone in case any new issues have been created. If you have the time to comment further, and particularly if you have access to some of the offline sources, I'd welcome that. I've tracked down a lot on Google Books when doing other reviews, but sometimes that's in a snippet view that cuts off at an inconvenient point. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 01:30, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Ian Rose BennyOnTheLoose Thanks for the input Ian. I realize that I got a little out of hand with not paraphrasing as well as I could have when expanding this. I've adjusted the ones you mentioned plus a few others. If I need to change anything else please let me know. :-) – zmbro _(talk) 17:16, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Second round of comments

• Composition: source has "He starved his body of all nutrients (besides milk, cocaine and red peppers)" and the article has "Bowie starved himself of all nutrients except milk, red peppers, and cocaine." It's difficult to avoid paraphrasing an extract like this, so consider changing it to a direct quote.

• Changed.

• Composition: source has "standing with Earl Slick in the studio and asking him to play a Chuck Berry riff in the same key throughout the opening of "Station to Station"" and the article has "standing with lead guitarist Earl Slick in the studio and asking him to play a Chuck Berry-style riff in the same key throughout the opening of "Station to Station"" Seems too close to the original source.

• I knew it was too. I added a quote from Bowie then attributed the above sentence to Buckley.

• Composition: "the band bursts into a prog-disco jubilant groove" - despite the change, this still looks paraphrased and not very encyclopediac. It may be best to use the quote from the source as per Ian's suggestion above.

• I knew it didn't. Changed to "a thud of drums signals a change of tempo and key and the band erupts into what Alan Light of Rolling Stone calls a prog-disco "celebratory groove" which lasts for the rest of the track." Is that better?

• Composition: "the entire song dabbles" - should have added this to my earlier comment about dabbling. (As an aside, britannica.com refers to Bowie as a "born dabbler.")

• Changed to be the same as the lead. I forgot I used the same wording here.

• Composition: parts are a bit too close to the Pegg source, e.g. "the sequence of 14 landmarks on Christ's path to the crucifixion, each a symbolic stopping-point for prayer" appears to be a direct quote. Could you have another look at this section and see if it can be reworked?

• Yep I'll see what I can do. – zmbro _(talk) 17:57, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

• Changed to "the series of 14 images depicting Christ's path to his crucifixion, each symbolising a stopping-point for prayer." That better? – zmbro _(talk) 00:04, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

• Lyrics: "became the mouthpiece for Station to Station and, often throughout 1976, for Bowie himself" - I didn't find the verification for this I was looking for in the cited references for this sentence but I could perhaps be persuaded.
  • Hi guys, I think this sentence is pretty much straight from the album article in which case I can take the credit/blame for it -- my source there was Carr/Murray. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 00:29, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
    • Thanks Ian Rose. In that case, I think that the citation just needs to be amended to Carr/Murray. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 00:46, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

• Added.

• Lyrics: "Kether to Malkuth" - consider linking to the Keter and Malkuth articles.

• Added. Was not aware those existed before

• Lyrics: "another duke was at the heart of the action" - maybe reword to something like "another duke was being referenced"?

• Changed.

• Lyrics: "Other references include the 13th century Jewish mystical system known as the Kabbalah" - probably better to move this before the earlier Kabbalah references in the article.

• Fixed.

• Lyrics: "Other themes present on the track are paranoia and odd fixations that were present in Bowie's mind at the time are also recurring themes" didn't quite read right to me - and it takes a bit too much directly from the Rolling Stone source (e.g. "paranoia and odd fixations")

• Reworded to attribute the themes to RS; I also realized I said the same thing at the beginning and end so thanks for pointing this out.

• Lyrics: "Bowie declares "the European canon (or, "at a stretch, 'cannon'") is here"" - my preference would be to quote Bowie directly then go to Doggett's commentary. Alternatively, show that this is a direct quote from Doggett rather than Bowie.

• Changed the sentence to "At different points Bowie declares "the European canon is here", which Doggett believes is a "pretentious way" of summarising Bowie's interest in Kraftwerk and Brechtian theatre; he also notes the word 'canon' could be interpreted "at a stretch" as the word 'cannon'." Is that better or should I still adjust?

zmbro - as noted earlier, happy to discuss this or be challenged. Thanks. Regards, BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 00:06, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

BennyOnTheLoose I believe I have taken care of everything now. Sorry I've been kinda slow, been a bit busy irl. – zmbro _(talk) 00:04, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

zmbro Thanks for this. I've looked at everything showing over 2% on Earwig's Copyvio Tool and mostly they are direct quotes used as such - no concerns. All of the paraphrasing issues I found earlier have been addressed. Article is suitably comprehensive, neutral and well-referenced for GA. I'm happy to promote this. Ian Rose thanks for your work on the album article and your contribution here - if you're aware of any issues I've missed then let's fix it. BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 11:53, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Tks guys, I'm sure the heavy lifting has been done now but if you can give me some time for a quick walk-though from top to bottom that'd be great. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 14:00, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

In "Composition"

I wanted to point this out since it's bugged me for ages now, the opening riff is neither atonal nor 3 bars of 4/4 and one of 2/4, it's a pretty straightforward repeating riff in Am across 5 bars of 2/2. 92.40.216.123 (talk) 16:03, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing this up here. According to Chris O'Leary: "The intro is the same structure as the opening section: a 6/4 A minor measure (“here am I, flashing no color”) followed by a 4/4 measure over F and G (“tall in this room overlooking the oh-”) and back to 6/4 (“-cean”)." (I wrote this article before I got his book). So you're right in saying it's A minor but it's not in 2/2. I'll make some adjustments. – zmbro _{(talk) (cont)} 20:37, 28 January 2024 (UTC)