David Bowie ‎Heroes 1977 AFL1-2522 (Vinyl) Near Mint

Recorded at Hansa Tonstudio in what was then West Berlin, "Heroes" reflected the zeitgeist of the Cold War, symbolised by the divided city. Co-producer Tony Visconti considered it "one of my last great adventures in making albums. The studio was about 500 yards from the wall. Red Guards would look into our control-room window with powerful binoculars."^[5] David Bowie again paid tribute to his Krautrock influences: the title is a nod to the track "Hero" on the album Neu! '75 by the German band Neu! – whose guitarist Michael Rother had originally been approached to play on the album^[6] – while "V-2 Schneider" is inspired by and named after Kraftwerk's Florian Schneider.^[7] Earlier in 1977, Kraftwerk had name-checked Bowie on the title track of Trans-Europe Express. The cover photo by Masayoshi Sukita was inspired by German artist Erich Heckel's Roquairol.^[8]

Brian Eno called up Robert Fripp and invited him to play guitar on the album. Fripp, who had considered himself retired from music, said "Well, I don’t know because I haven’t played for three years, but if you’re prepared to take a risk, then so am I."^[9] Upon arriving at the studio, jetlagged from his flight in, he played on the track "Beauty and the Beast" and his first take was used in the song's final mix.^[9]

Though "Heroes" included a number of dark and atmospheric instrumentals such as "Sense of Doubt" and "Neuköln", it was regarded as a highly passionate and positive artistic statement,^[5][7] particularly after the often melancholy Low.^[10] This relative optimism was evident not only through '"Heroes"' the song but in the rocking opener "Beauty and the Beast" (released as the second single in January 1978), the raucous "Joe the Lion" and the light-hearted closer "The Secret Life of Arabia". The lyrics for "Joe the Lion", written and recorded at the microphone "in less than an hour" according to Visconti, typified the improvisational nature of the recording.