Kaiser Chiefs have doubled down on their claim that they once turned down lyrics suggested to them by David Bowie.
The Leeds band first spoke about their interaction with the rock icon in an interview with News of the World back in 2011, when drummer Nick Hodgson noted that they were able to contact Bowie through a mutual colleague, the legendary producer Tony Visconti.
Visconti had co-produced their album ‘The Future is Medieval’, released in the same year, and was on close terms with Bowie, having collaborated on over ten of his albums, including classics such as ‘Low’, ‘Heroes’ and ‘Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps)’.
“Tony texted David asking for his suggestions to finish off a verse [on ‘Man On Mars’] and he came up with a couple of lines,” Hodgson recalled. “I’m such a big Bowie fan I can’t believe I’m saying this, but they just weren’t right, so I’ve missed out on a Hodgson/Bowie writing credit. Gutted!”
Shortly after Hodgson’s comments became public, Visconti denied the claims to NME, stating: “I have never asked David Bowie to write lyrics for the Kaiser Chiefs. I was hired for the production job because of Nick‘s obsession with Bowie and T. Rex, and I freely shared some of my production secrets with them, but that did not include getting Bowie to write lyrics for them. That is absurd.”
But now, in a segment on Virgin Radio UK, the band’s Ricky Wilson and Andrew White have restated that it did in fact happen.
Kaiser Chiefs once DIDN'T use a lyric given to them by the great David Bowie 😱
Our very own @rickontour and his @KaiserChiefs bandmate @WhiteyKaiser delve into their brand new "Easy Eighth Album" – out now!
Watch the full interview:https://t.co/6bPXBgGzmp#VirginRadioUK pic.twitter.com/gR7mLU5md8
— Virgin Radio UK (@VirginRadioUK) March 3, 2024
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“Remember when we didn’t put in a lyric by David Bowie?” Wilson asked his bandmate.
“I remember we texted him,” White replied.
“Yeah, well Tony Visconti, the producer, we were missing a lyric, this was an album a long time ago,” Wilson continued. “And we asked, ‘Can David Bowie think of one?’ And he sent one through, but it didn’t really go with the song.”
Wilson went on to say that the line Bowie offered was “Waters aren’t going to muddy themselves”, before joking that he might “save that for the next record”.
After White commented that the line was “terrible”, Wilson replied, “You can’t say that, it’s Bowie!”
Kaiser Chiefs’ new album, ‘Kaiser Chiefs’ Easy Eighth Album’, was released on Friday (March 1) via V2. It was preceded by the disco-laced single ‘Burning In Flames’.
Whether or not Bowie approved of Kaiser Chiefs, it appears that Mark E. Smith did not, with Wilson recently recalling that the former Fall frontman suggested that “the Kaiser Chiefs and Arctic Monkeys should open a chain of chip shops in North Yorkshire”.
Another high profile figure that has publicly taken against the band in the past is former prime minister Boris Johnson, who Wilson remembers once described him personally as an “epic softie”.
“I don’t know what an ‘epic softie’ is, but it’s probably something you’d call someone if you’d been to boarding school in the ‘80s and were trying to sound cool in the ’00s,” Wilson said. “If you were going to have a new pop star, Epic Softie is a perfectly acceptable name, so I don’t mind being called that.”