| Don't Look Down | |
| Type: | single |
| Artist: | Lindsey Buckingham |
| Album: | Out of the Cradle |
| Released: | 1993 |
| Genre: | Rock |
| Length: | 2:47 3:12 (full version with "Instrumental Introduction To") |
| Label: | Reprise |
| Producer: | Lindsey Buckingham, Richard Dashut |
| Chronology: | Lindsey Buckingham |
| Prev Title: | Soul Drifter |
| Prev Year: | 1992 |
| Next Title: | Twisted |
| Next Year: | 1996 |
"Don't Look Down" is a song by Lindsey Buckingham, released in 1993 as the final single from his third solo album Out of the Cradle. It only charted in Canada, where it peaked at number 59.
On "Don't Look Down", Buckingham decided against using a standard drum kit, instead opting to record some rhythms on cardboard boxes.[1] The vocal cadence on "Don't Look Down" follows a 1:1 motion-to-rest ratio over the course of four measures, with the melodic activity occurring for two measures and ending on the downbeat of the third bar.[2] An instrumental guitar passage leads into the song's main riff.[3]
Buckingham originally wanted "Don't Look Down" to be the album's first single, although it was overlooked in favor of "Wrong" in North America and "Countdown" in Europe.[4] After the first few singles from Out of the Cradle failed to chart, Warner Bros opted to lift "Don't Look Down" as the album's next single to coincide with its accompanying tour.[5]
The music video for "Don't Look Down" was recorded with Buckingham's touring band and took around 15 hours to film. Janet Robin, who was one of the guitarists on the Out of the Cradle tour, recalled that Buckingham was involved in making creative decisions for certain shots in the video.[6] Buckingham commented that live performances of "Don't Look Down" varied in quality depending on the acoustics of the performance venue and the mixing levels. "It fits together like a jigsaw, and its impact hinges on the level of things in relationship to each other, [such as] the vocals coming in loud enough. Certain things have to be really close to being right, at least in my mind, for it to come off."[7]
The New York Times said that "Don't Look Down" opens Out of the Cradle with a sense of "frightened euphoria".[8] Stereo Review wrote that the song begins "with a crisp, pseudo-classical, acoustic-guitar intro that collapses into a tumble of notes before the actual song kicks in with a well-oiled, bossa-flavored beat."[9] Timothy White of Billboard said that the song falls "well within rock's melodic tradition" and features "eccentric constructions and sudden harmonic shifts, each surprise element enhancing their overall appeal."[10] BAM described "Don't Look Down" as "an ode to hope" that should "appeal to an alternative audience."[4]
The Capital Times highlighted the song's "quirky touches" and thought the song was "instantly hummable", positing that the song "succeeds not only because of [its] melodicism, but also because that sound conveys the lyrics' wide-eyed optimism."[11] Philadelphia Daily News stated that "a track like "Don't Look Down" contains a virtual hologram of hooks. Falsetto backup vocals hang in the air over cushiony rhythms, while sprightly guitar lines float in between them."[12] J.D. Considine of Rolling Stone thought that "the song effortlessly captures the balance between languor and lift found in many Fleetwood Mac singles, flowing easily from the measured cadences of the verse to the manic climax of the chorus. Buckingham doesn't stop there, though; he fills the track with all sorts of ear candy, from Mexicali string-band flourishes to sampled voices that bounce the tune along like pinball bumpers."[3]