R. I. P. David Bowie

[Peter]

I feel sadder than I expected, somehow.  Apart from the hits, I never really knew his music (I rarely buy music) but his hits were superb and hugely idiosyncratic.  The riff from "Man Who Sold The World" is the greatest two-note signature in music - ahead of Teen Spirit and Beethoven's Fifth, which is also not bad.

A real quirk.  Rest in Peace.

PS  I'm full of admiration for the way his illness seems to have been kept secret, so that his death has taken the media vultures completely by surprise.  I'd have expected nothing else, really, he really was a smooth operator.

[rafletcher]

There's a thing on the BBC website with the "10 best Bowie lyrics".

It doesn't contain mine...

"We can't dance, we don't talk much, we just ball and play
But then we move like tigers on Vaseline"

A darkened bedroom, a Dansette set to "11" and "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust" on repeat.

[Exit Stage Left]

I always liked 'All the Madmen' from 'Man who Sold the World'. It's sort of King Crimson's '21st Century Schizoid Man', especially the snare sound, re-imagined by Anthony Newley. Certainly the nearest he got to Prog.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHAjV7npClc&list=RDxHAjV7npClc#t=322

[Peter]

Ha!  When I first heard The Laughing Gnome, I thought it was Anthony Newley!

[Exit Stage Left]

Don't knock Anthony Newley, he wrote 'Feeling Good' with Leslie Bricusse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHs98TEYecM

David had a sense of humour, his official site trailed an Anthony Newley tribute album on April Fool's day in 2003.

I don't yet have a full tracklisting, but here are the songs mentioned in the press release:
DAVID BOWIE - What Kind Of Fool Am I?
BLUR - Pop Goes The Weasel
RAY DAVIES - I Guess It Couldn't Happen to a Nicer Guy
McALMONT & BUTLER - I Get Along Without You Very Well
THE PRODIGY - I Don't Want To Set The World On Fire
SUEDE - The Candy Man
PAUL WELLER - Who Can I Turn To (When Nobody Needs Me)
THE WHO - Gonna Build A Mountain

[Wascally Weasel]

Goodbye major tom...or ashes to ashes?

In irrelevant news I just found out that zowie bowie wrote and directed the film Moon.

He calls himself Duncan Jones these days and he’s made a few other films – Source Code and the forthcoming Warcraft movie.

I follow him on twitter, he seems like a decent bloke, I feel sorry for anyone losing a parent at whatever age.

[Peter]

Don't knock Anthony Newley, he wrote 'Feeling Good' with Leslie Bricusse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHs98TEYecM

I wasn't knocking him in the least, merely commenting on the vocal similarity.  And I'm well aware of Newley's writing, and have taught Feeling Good to a band I was mentalling at work.  Both extremely talented people!

[caerau]

Perhaps it's just me but tribute concerts, although a nice thought, are not something I particularly enjoy.  Now Queen, that's my passion, and the Freddie Mercury tribute concert for me, aside from the beginning of watching the bands play their own stuff (fine!), was largely an abomination of listening to people murder their songs.   
(albeit I guess the rest of the band were fine with this - but then given that May and Taylor seem to have recently sold off their back catalogue to the advertising world and did WWRY with F!ve or whatever they were called, I'm not sure their judgement alone is to be trusted )

I think it depends on the artist and the type of songs they wrote. Freddie Mercury's was so much him and Queen that anyone trying to cover it just doesn't work really. There have been some good tribute concerts George Harrison's springs to mind.

I'd put Bowie very much in that category also though - could anyone else pull off Ziggy Stardust?

[pcolbeck]

Me too.

[Exit Stage Left]

Don't knock Anthony Newley, he wrote 'Feeling Good' with Leslie Bricusse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHs98TEYecM

I wasn't knocking him in the least, merely commenting on the vocal similarity.  And I'm well aware of Newley's writing, and have taught Feeling Good to a band I was mentalling at work.  Both extremely talented people!

There's a generation that only know Newley for 'Pop Goes the Weasel' on 'Junior Choice', where you'd hear 'The Laughing Gnome'. Farewell Ed Stewart, while we're at it.

[caerau]

That's the sad testament that during the 70s Ed Stewart was a much bigger thing in my life than Bowie*. (It's Friday, it's 5 to 5, ....)


Too young here really, much like others have also commented






*True also of Shawaddywaddy and for an embarrassing summer, the Bay City Rollers   

[Andrew]

I wasn't a 'must buy all his records' fan, he not being exactly my thing, but I do respect his great talent and creativity, his desire to explore.

I have only one Bowie album, Low - it's where the Bowie orbit passed closest to my own - and it has been listened to already and is currently being listened to again. To me, it's a work of genius.

[Ruthie]

I think this must be how my Dad felt when John Lennon died.  I wish I could just hang with some other people who get it.

[Basil]

I'm hanging, Ruthie.  *waves*

 Bowie was a huge influence in my life.  So was Lennon.   I manage to be exactly the right age to have lost them both. 

Oh, I'm also of the generation that lost Hendrix.  That was a dreadful night.


Aside.  Who was it who said, "The Beatles.  They're dying in the wrong order"?

[woollypigs]

Oh cool I'm hanging out with the cool people for once *waves at Ruthie and Basil*

[rafletcher]

I think this must be how my Dad felt when John Lennon died.  I wish I could just hang with some other people who get it.

It's how I felt when John Lennon died too.

[LEE]

Aside.  Who was it who said, "The Beatles.  They're dying in the wrong order"?

Exactly the same thing can be said for David Bowie and Piers Morgan.

[hellymedic]

Those yacfers who are about my age are feeling it. We were born in the late 50s (and are in our late 50s now).

Bowie was the music of my mid-teens.

[TimC]

I'm hanging, Ruthie.  *waves*

 Bowie was a huge influence in my life.  So was Lennon.   I manage to be exactly the right age to have lost them both. 

Oh, I'm also of the generation that lost Hendrix.  That was a dreadful night.


Aside.  Who was it who said, "The Beatles.  They're dying in the wrong order"?

Yes, me too. As I said upthread, I wasn't a Bowie fan but I admire him hugely - and listening to the radio today I realise just how incredibly influential he has been.

[Tigerrr]

Bowie was the absolute centre of my world for many years. Not just the music which was ace but the whole shape changing, moving on and discovering new ways to be thing. I feel sad and closer to mortality today - it's like a member of the family - a sort of uncle or kind of older achingly cool brother has died.
Dancing to Gene Genie at crazy 70's parties with too much booze and pills was the best thing ever.

[Mr Larrington]

Aside.  Who was it who said, "The Beatles.  They're dying in the wrong order"?

I believe it was a Mr Victor Lewis-Smith, your honour.

[Redlight]

Aside.  Who was it who said, "The Beatles.  They're dying in the wrong order"?

I believe it was a Mr Victor Lewis-Smith, your honour.

Indeed it was. I think he thought he was being funny.

[Exit Stage Left]

I always liked 'All the Madmen' from 'Man who Sold the World'. It's sort of King Crimson's '21st Century Schizoid Man', especially the snare sound, re-imagined by Anthony Newley. Certainly the nearest he got to Prog.

I'd forgotten that Robert Fripp, of King Crimson fame, played on Heroes. he looks like a retired West Country bank manager now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlyJ-v871Og

[Gattopardo]

Goodbye major tom...or ashes to ashes?

In irrelevant news I just found out that zowie bowie wrote and directed the film Moon.

He calls himself Duncan Jones these days and he’s made a few other films – Source Code and the forthcoming Warcraft movie.

I follow him on twitter, he seems like a decent bloke, I feel sorry for anyone losing a parent at whatever age.

He is still zowie   Parents die before children, it is the way of life.

[Gattopardo]

Bowie played and created some great music. He also was a strange chap and consumer of illegal drugs.  His strangeness created some memorable music moments.

Didn't he go through a Nazi phase?  Also didn't he claim he was part of punk in an an interview or is my mind remembering wrong?  Didn't he write and create an album while on a diet or red peppers and cocaine.