The Jean Genie
by David Bowie
- 129
- BPM
- A major
- Key
- 11B
- Camelot
- 58
- Danceability
- 38
- Acousticness
The Sweet released "Block Buster!" just after David Bowie put out "The Jean Genie", and its riff sounded very close. It made number one in the UK while Bowie's single was still in the Top 10, and Bowie's reached only number two, held off the top by Little Jimmy Osmond's "Long Haired Lover from Liverpool". Everyone involved called the likeness a coincidence. Nicky Chinn, who wrote the Sweet song, said Bowie looked at him deadpan, insulted him, hugged him and offered congratulations.
RCA had released Bowie's single on November 24, 1972 as the lead from Aladdin Sane. It began as a jam called "Bussin'" on the Ziggy Stardust tour bus between Cleveland and Memphis, when Mick Ronson played a Bo Diddley-style riff on his new Les Paul. Bowie finished it in New York, where he spent time with Cyrinda Foxe, and recorded it at RCA Studios on October 6, 1972. The bassist Trevor Bolder said they did it in an hour and a half.
Bowie called it a smorgasbord of imagined Americana, with a character in the style of Iggy Pop. The line about a mind that cannot drive his module later gave Simple Minds their name. Mick Rock shot the video with Foxe in San Francisco.
The Jean Genie runs at 129 BPM, the tempo of house, disco and most club dance music. In classical terms it sits in allegro territory. A bar of 4/4 lasts 1.86 seconds, and a quarter-note delay is 465 ms. It is in A major, Camelot 11B, which shares its notes with F# minor and mixes cleanly with D major and E major.
We use multiple sources as part of our online research for the song story including Wikipedia.