# David Bowie, Jacques Brel, and Americanisims **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 3, 2008, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/david-bowie-jacques-brel-and-americanisims/458721 "2008-08-03T18:31:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BlackNGold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/779978/32.png) [@BlackNGold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackNGold)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2008, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/david-bowie-jacques-brel-and-americanisims/458721/1 "2008-08-03T18:31:02Z")
Listening to _My Death_ from the Ziggy Stardust Soundtrack this morning reminded me of a question. In his version of Brel’s _My Death_ and _Amsterdam_ , David Bowie used two phrases that are, to me, uniquely American. Weird for an Englishman translating a French song. In _My Death_ the phrase is “Throw him a dime / For the passing time”. AFAIK, the “dime” has never been a unit of English (or French) currency. I guess the question here would be if that phrase sounds “foreign” to English ears? Would it identify the “voice” of the song to be an American? Or does it just make for a good rhyme? I know if an American act used “farthing” or “pence” in a song it would sound strange to me. In _Amsterdam_ the phrase is “By the dawn’s early light”. This is from the American national anthem. Is that phrase well known? I mean, I’m pretty sure I could identify parts of _God Save The Queen_ , although only the Eddie Izzard version comes to mind right now. Any thoughts? Or am I reading **way** too much into this? ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2008, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/david-bowie-jacques-brel-and-americanisims/458721/2 "2008-08-03T18:36:00Z")
[QUOTE=BlackNGold] Weird for an Englishman translating a French song. [/QUOTE] What makes you think Bowie translated them? The English lyrics are credited to Mort Schuman. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2008, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/david-bowie-jacques-brel-and-americanisims/458721/3 "2008-08-03T18:53:30Z")
Those songs were covered first by Bowie’s great inspiration and one of my favorite things about this planet, Scott Walker. He was an American working in Europe, but yes as BtES points out the outrageously campy lyrics were by Mort Schuman, the man who gave us “Viva Las Vegas.” Bowie did the songs as covers of Scott Walker songs, so he’d’ve likely kept the lyrics as they were, silly as they are. ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2008, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/david-bowie-jacques-brel-and-americanisims/458721/4 "2008-08-03T20:15:41Z")
Dime is of French origin (_Dix, disme_), although the phrase likely is not. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/david-bowie-jacques-brel-and-americanisims/458721/5 "2008-08-04T04:50:34Z")
[QUOTE=BlackNGold] Or does it just make for a good rhyme? I know if an American act used “farthing” or “pence” in a song it would sound strange to me. [/QUOTE] The band Sixpence None the Richer was formed in Texas. ---
**Author:** ![BlackNGold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/779978/32.png) [@BlackNGold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackNGold)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2008, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/david-bowie-jacques-brel-and-americanisims/458721/6 "2008-08-04T22:32:04Z")
[QUOTE=lissener] Those songs were covered first by Bowie’s great inspiration and one of my favorite things about this planet, Scott Walker. He was an American working in Europe, but yes as BtES points out the outrageously campy lyrics were by Mort Schuman [/QUOTE] OK, shame on me for not checking that. I seem to remember reading somewhere about one of the lines having been “mistranslated” by Bowie, and just assumed that he had done the translations. Thanks, all.