David Bowie · “Heroes”

The Secret Life of Arabia

The Secret Life of Arabia is in C major at 105 beats per minute.

Tempo

105 BPM · Andantemedian of 229 analyses · 104.7–105.2 across the middle eight tenths

Key: C majorno sharps and no flats · the key most of the analyses agreed on
Agreement: 84%share of analyses that agreed
Analyses: 229people who ran the extractor
One beat: 571.4milliseconds, 60,000 ÷ BPM
Tuning: 444.3Hz · +17 cents from A 440
Dynamics: 3.99dB the level wanders from its average
Loudness: 0.908Essentia's 0–1 scale, not dB
Danceability: 1.175Essentia's danceability, 0–3

Source: AcousticBrainz, dump of 2022-06-23 (CC0) · MusicBrainz core data, 2026-09-17 (CC0) · how each number is measured. Measured up to 23.06.2022 — AcousticBrainz stopped collecting in 2022, so nothing released after that date is here.

What the numbers say

229 independent analyses of this recording were submitted to AcousticBrainz. Most of them — 84% — put it in C major, a key signature of no sharps and no flats. The tempo printed above is the median of the 229 readings; 100% of them land within 2% of it, and they barely differ at all.

At 105 BPM one beat lasts 571.4 milliseconds, so a sixteenth note is 142.9 ms and a dotted eighth 428.6 ms — the delay times for this recording. Counted half as fast it is 52.5 BPM, counted twice as fast 210. A score would mark that Andante, by the ranges this site uses.

The analyses put the reference pitch of the recording at 444.3 Hz, which is 17 cents above concert A at 440 Hz — the sort of drift a tape machine or a slightly different mastering leaves behind. That is a fact about this transfer of the music, not about how it was played.

The dynamic complexity of the recording measures 3.99 dB: that is how far the level wanders from its own average, so a small number means a loud, flat master and a large one means a recording that still breathes. Its average loudness is 0.908 on Essentia's 0-to-1 scale, which is not decibels and is not comparable to a streaming service's number.

10 other recordings here are in C major; the ones listed below are the closest in tempo.

Beats per bar are not in this dataset. AcousticBrainz's analysis reports a tempo, a key and a loudness, and no time signature at all, so this page does not print one — a 4/4 here would be a guess dressed as a measurement.

Keys that fit with C major

Each of these differs from C major by at most one accidental, or shares its tonic. That is the whole of what a mixing wheel encodes; here the relations are named instead of numbered.

Delay times at 105 BPM

Note value	Beats	Milliseconds	Hertz
Whole note	4	2285.7	0.44
Half note	2	1142.9	0.88
Dotted quarter	1.5	857.1	1.17
Quarter note (one beat)	1	571.4	1.75
Quarter triplet	0.667	381	2.63
Dotted eighth	0.75	428.6	2.33
Eighth note	0.5	285.7	3.5
Eighth triplet	0.333	190.5	5.25
Dotted sixteenth	0.375	214.3	4.67
Sixteenth note	0.25	142.9	7
Sixteenth triplet	0.167	95.2	10.5
Thirty-second note	0.125	71.4	14

Half time 52.5 BPM · double time 210 BPM. Every row is one beat (571.4 ms) times the fraction in the second column.

Closest in key and tempo

Recordings in C major, ordered by how near their tempo is to 105 BPM. A calculation, not a recommendation.

All songs in C major All songs at 105 BPM C major at 100–109 BPM David Bowie

MusicBrainz collapses 3 recording ids into this one. Recording id bd04833b-e811-491f-bfb1-c0b3ee6cc437.