The Secret Life of Arabia

Somehow, for almost 40 years, it escaped me that this was a straight-up disco song. Then, suddenly, listening to it in the car on the way to work this morning - on the "extra bass" setting - it seems so obvious. I guess I couldn't handle that knowledge at 16 and in a full-blown "Disco Sucks" phase, and then I suppose denial set in for the long haul, or I just didn't pay attention. But Carlos Alomar and George Murray could easily be Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards on this track. Why this should be a surprise after Bowie had already been fooling around with funk on Young Americans makes me realize that I had no real sense of context for the man's work when I was younger.