“Where Are We Now?” Music Video

Bowie had not performed live since 2006, and had not released a new album since Reality in 2003. Suddenly, on his 66th birthday (January 8, 2013), he released “Where Are We Now?” the first single for the then-unannounced new album The Next Day. The song’s accompanying music video was also released that day, and was directed by Tony Oursler. In the video, Bowie’s face appears on a small puppet alongside the face of Jacqueline Humphries, Oursler’s wife. According to Tony Visconti, Humphries was brought into the video because she bore some similarity in appearance to Corinne Schwab, Bowie’s personal assistant during his time in Berlin. Bowie, Schwab, and Iggy Pop were all great friends who were inseparable in Berlin. This friendship would seem to form the basis of the song’s dynamic between Bowie, and the subject the song is directed to.