Setting the tone with intricate guitars playing the iconic opening melody from David Bowie‘s The Man Who Sold The World, Venusia open their cover with intrigue and dimensionality.
We love the cello strings and the polished soundscape as Venusia deliver atmospheric vocals laced with charisma. It is hard to replicate a song like this without straying too far from the original, especially if you want to maintain the shared audience of the song. Venusia has just done that. They have found a perfect niche to modernise the opus, whilst also showcasing Venusia as a unique concept with its own enigmatic identity.
We learn that Venusia is not just any band. The confess, “We are part of a bigger vision that we call The Venusia Project, where we aim use the magic of music combined with art and writing to advocate for unity, celebration of life, healing, inclusion and peace.”
They expand, “We write original music and produce original art work using generative AI technique that reflects this vision, but we also just love great music and appreciate artists that go against the grain to carve their own path, such as David Bowie.”
When discussing why they chose to release a cover, Venusia, who are also known as Andrew Bayuk and Anisah Alyahya, tell us, “We don’t do many covers, but we had a special feeling for this one, so we streamlined its release. Our version is mostly a nod to David Bowie, with the original bass line punctuated with cello, which is unique from all previous versions to this song. We include a wink to Klaus Nomi with the harmonies; we loved that cool, weird version on Saturday Night Live.”
The pair elaborates further, “Our interpretation of the song is that it is about a young man in despair, dialoging with a future version of himself. For us, it is a song of hope because the future self tells him everything is going to be alright. We interpret ‘selling the world’ as a statement about going about on one’s path and not being coerced to be like everyone else in society. “
We appreciate the depth and sonic redesign that Venusia share with their cover of the popular song, and their unique perspective shines through and gives us a sense of futurism and dynamism. We have added Venusia‘s cover of David Bowie‘s The Man Who Sold The World to our New Music Spotlight playlist, whilst we continue to stream the wider discography of the project – Solstice Love and Waking Dream.