I was just getting ready to go to bed and caught the news on CNN. He died after an 18 month fight with cancer.
We've lost one of the biggest music icons of the last 50 years.
He did get to see the release of his last album this past week on his birthday.

Rick

R.I.P.  His new album is arriving to me from Amazon today....sigh...

Dancing Dave
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ab15Q3zjUy4

Just saw the terrible news.  I did not know that he was sick.  He was a musical genius, a genre bender.   I love the music he created with Iggy Pop...Lust for Life. 

Saw him on Serious Moonlight Tour and later at a festival. 

This is a fucking tragedy.  RIP David Bowie.  Thank you for the music.  I'm just shocked and lost. 

So sad to hear of David Bowie's death. He was one of my all time heroes. Have followed his career & collected his music since the early 70's. He has inspired so many people & music artists throughout the years. A Starman in the sky forever xxx

Oh, damn, I didn't know he was sick either. I'm so sorry for him and his family that he went down like that. RIP, man.

Totally shocked and gutted.
This one hurts real bad.
RIP Ziggy Stardust.

And to find out on a Monday morning. Tragic.

Probably the biggest shocker for me since George died. Him & Lou Reed.

From the CNN obit:

"As the world mourns Bowie's death, fan Dean Podsta put it best:

"If you're sad today, just remember the world is over 4 billion years old and you somehow managed to exist at the same time as David Bowie."

Not the greatest news to wake up to.
I just watched Velvet Goldmine the other night...out of the blue (as ziggy would say).
One of my biggest thrills was to see him on Broadway as the Elephant Man, way back when...

My Glimmer Twins grew up on his video anthology...they still know all the songs...

The rumors of his  self-imposed exile must have been tied to his illness.

Every song stage should go dark today

RIP Mr Jones

Just listened....so terrible news..
I could not imagine he was sick...still can't believe
.....so sad...

What shit news. Bowie was a very cool dude.

Very sad indeed..a true pioneer in every sense....and our band continues (fingers crossed)

He's gone and left us alone with Adele and Lady Gaga and Kesha.

Very sad news, a real hero, RIP

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/12/arts/music/david-bowie-social-media-tribute.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CYcXAYNUwAE1o2I.jpg

"As well as being a wonderful and kind man, he was an extraordinary artist, and a true original" Posted by The Rolling Stones' twitter account

I heard the news right before going to bed last night.  Hubby and I talked about it for over an hour.  Seems he and the family kept the illness quiet on purpose.

Thanks for leaving us a terrific birthday gift.

Ziggy Played Guitar!

I had heard rumors that he's been sick for a while. That's one of the reasons he wasn't touring. But he kept busy with two very interesting albums. This was eerie, happening right after he released his new album. He went out as creative as he ever was. A true rock God. Musical genius and one of the great talents of our time.

sweetcharmedlife wrote on Jan 11^th, 2016 at 9:20am:

I had heard rumors that he's been sick for a while. That's one of the reasons he wasn't touring. But he kept busy with two very interesting albums. This was eerie, happening right after he released his new album. He went out as creative as he ever was. A true rock God. Musical genius and one of the great talents of our time.

I couldn't have said this better myself

....So Sad

"Put on your red shoes and dance the blues..."

My favorite Bowie is Young Americans, Station to Station, Heroes, Let's Dance and the stuff he did with Iggy--Lust For Life and Idiot. 

I really want to listen to China Girl now.  What a huge fucking loss...he was a modern time musical genius.

Condolences to his legendary beautiful wife Iman, his children and his family.

never saw him in concert…

I had heard about the heart attack 4/5 years ago, but this came as a shock.

He really loved his fans a lot to keep this private and still put out recordings…

He was everything an artist should be and he lived it until the end…

it really hasn't sunk in for me. I haven't cried…

My Facebook feed was literally all bowie and maybe 4 other things this AM, and it was same with Lemmy last week.

I wish I had something deep and profound to say… I found ChangesOne Bowie digging through my Dads records in 79/80… I'm so glad I dug through my old mans records.

Young Americans is one of the greatest songs ever!

Rest In Peace, David


http://i153.photobucket.com/albums/s209/leepullen/tumblr_nhuxa68O5x1qaetdco1_500_zpsrsxkbj8a.gif

CNNI is reporting that his producer said Bowie intentionally released the album to coincide with his death as a farewell to his fans.

Now I'm really sad.

RIP David !


http://coverjunction.s3.amazonaws.com/2013/118/eff371c3-6b7e-45f5-bd06-3e84af6a56f6.jpg

Shit! I don't know a lot about Bowie- most songs I hear I tend to like. See below for my favorite Bowie- what's yours?

https://youtu.be/CGQo6zpVzt8

The last time I saw Bowie, April 30, 2004, Saenger Theatre, New Orleans:


http://image.nola.com/home/nola-media/width960/img/tpphotos/photo/2016/01/11/-21e2b8f1bd889aec.jpg
Sean Gardner

Gutted.

As with Lou Reed and Joe Strummer, it doesn't seem real. A world without Bowie? How can that be...?

A true artist to his dying breath - as can be seen from the article and video below. Not since Johnny Cash's cover of 'Hurt', has anyone made a farewell like that (and in this case, the video was premiered in the last 72 hours of his life)

I still cant really take it in enough yet to be upset, to be honest.

It might be a bit hard to fathom if you're under 40 or grew up in the US, but he's unquestionably the greatest and most iconic artist the UK ever produced (I know some could make a case for Lennon, McCartney, Jagger, Richards to name four - but their legendary status comes from the band they were in where they collaborated with others). Growing up in the 70's he really WAS the North Star.

"Heroes" is (at a push) probably my favourite song ever (the full length version that is!). So much so that when I was in Berlin in 2014 I made a pilgrimage to the apartment where he wrote it and the studio where he recorded it.

His new album is a fabulous epitaph and after enjoying it so much last week, its going to be very hard to delve into again, now that I know the deliberate poignancy of the lyrics.

How David Bowie told us he was dying in the 'Lazarus' video



http://nme.assets.ipccdn.co.uk/images/2016_DavidBowie2_Press_060116.hero.jpg

Bowing out with typical style, David Bowie didn’t just release his last album ‘Blackstar’ to coincide with his 69th birthday last week, on January 8 – he was using it to say goodbye to the world.

An 18-month battle with cancer that hardly anyone knew about came to tragic end yesterday (January 10), but Bowie provided bleak hints about his terminal condition for his fans and followers in what was to be the final music video of his that was to be released in his lifetime.

Released only four days ago, the video for single ‘Lazarus’ was Bowie’s parting shot, opening with a blindfolded, fragile-looking Bowie laying in bed. His first words “look up here, I’m in heaven/I’ve got scars that can’t be seen” are now obviously an admission of his ill health, rather than just a fantastical musing on mortality. It soon becomes obvious that the bed he's in is a hospital one and Bowie begins to float above it, signifying his transmutation to the other side – whatever, or wherever that may be. Watching it now, it’s a statement as bold as it is bleak.



As Bowie writhes around on the bed, trying to break free, another Bowie then appears, a Bowie clad in black and stood upright, a Bowie who can still pose, pout, pick up a pen and create. Inspiration hits him and he scrawls at speed in a notebook, while the other Bowie continues to convulse. As he writes, we see a skull sitting ominously on his writing desk, the spectre of death looming over Bowie and his final creation, before he steps backwards into a wooden wardrobe, a fitting kind of coffin for an icon of style and fashion.

"His death was no different from his life - a work of Art," explained Bowie's producer Tony Visconti, in tribute. "He made 'Blackstar' for us, his parting gift. I knew for a year this was the way it would be. I wasn't, however, prepared for it." Creative to the very end, the 'Lazarus' video is a heartbreakingly sad way to bid farewell, but a more than appropriate one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-JqH1M4Ya8



www.nme.com

Geez..that video is so haunting I had to stop it. RIP

Best Bowie ever?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oYP7BOyRBs

well said Gazza.
"Heroes" always does a bring a tear to my eye when i hear it. Was watching VH-1 on friday night they had his appearance on Storytellers from 1999 on and then they did an hour block of videos from his career one of which was Heroes and the flamboyant DJ along with the new releases. I had actually gone out on friday night to to purchase his new cd i just had to have it on the occasion that it was his birthday, maybe it was ominous or something else drawing me to it that i could not wait for. i had heard a couple of tracks online however i didnt make the connection or maybe i didnt want to  "lazarus" or even "blackstar" to the demise of the Starman. A requiem it was for his fans and the world and to remember that no one truly ever dies.

Gazza wrote on Jan 11^th, 2016 at 2:07pm:

A true artist to his dying breath - as can be seen from the article and video below. Not since Johnny Cash's cover of 'Hurt', has anyone made a farewell like that (and in this case, the video was premiered in the last 72 hours of his life) I still cant really take it in enough yet to be upset, to be honest. It might be a bit hard to fathom if you're under 40 or grew up in the US, but he's unquestionably the greatest and most iconic artist the UK ever produced (I know some could make a case for Lennon, McCartney, Jagger, Richards to name four - but their legendary status comes from the band they were in where they collaborated with others). Growing up in the 70's he really WAS the North Star. "Heroes" is (at a push) probably my favourite song ever (the full length version that is!). So much so that when I was in Berlin in 2014 I made a pilgrimage to the apartment where he wrote it and the studio where he recorded it. His new album is a fabulous epitaph and after enjoying it so much last week, its going to be very hard to delve into again, now that I know the deliberate poignancy of the lyrics.

Exactly my thougts. Also from "Heroes" Sons of the silent age is a beautiful, beautiful track, one of my favorites.

RIP Mr. Bowie

And The Stars Look Very Different Today

Well, this one is hard. We saw one of David Bowie’s last live performances at Fashion Rocks at Radio City Music Hall in September 2005. He performed three songs: “Life On Mars” solo, then “Five Years” and “Wake Up” with Arcade Fire. The stunning and regal Iman was sitting across the aisle from us. I came away from the show quite disturbed because it seemed like he couldn’t quite keep his breath. I wondered aloud if perhaps he was suffering from congestive heart failure. He was still a fantastic presence on stage and it was a thrill to even be in the same room with him. I feel pretty lucky to have been the perfect age to appreciate David Bowie from 1969 and forever after. What an amazing, creative talent. The influence he had on the music world can not be overstated. He always seemed a little fragile, and certainly very private. I think he left this earth on his terms. RIP Mr. Jones and thank you for everything.

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b107/jsoxy/Fashion%20Rocks%202995_zpsbnzivuef.jpg
Fashion Rocks, NYC, 2005

Ya'll remember this?:


https://youtu.be/eQq4FH81jd0

01. Fame - 00:37
02. Changes - 05:55
03. China Girl - 10:51
04. Slow Burn - 18:29
05. Starman - 23:10
06. Let's Dance - 31:00
07. Slip Away - 41:18
08. Ziggy Stardust - 47:38
09. Heroes - 53:36
10. 5:15 The Angels Have Gone - 1:02:58
11. Sound And Vision - 1:10:33
12. Ashes To Ashes - 1:18:11
13. I'm Afraid Of Americans - 1:26:58

My mum woke me up with the news. When I was six years old, "Labyrinth" came out and I was head over heels in love with him. I remember we got the VHS and I would watch the film at least once a week, for years. It may be the film I've seen most times. And that's absolutely nothing, that's only my first memory of him.

I can't put it into words. An author wrote a great article for him today. I'm gonna try and translate it for you:

"We choose them.

Even when they're from the other side of the world.

Even if they never sat at the family table, with Easter eggs and dinner.

They're blood family.

Even if they don't get gifts in Christmas.

Even if they're not brothers or sisters.

They're the ones who caressed us when our stubborn head felt like exploding.
They're the ones who put us to bed when we came back from the edge of the cliff wasted.

They're the ones who made music for us, made us feel warm when we were naked on rooftops, shaking from the cold.

We never kissed their mouth. We never had children with them.
We never fucked.

We never exchanged swears or words of love.

But we mourn them like spouses.
Cause we were the men and women of their lives.

They just never knew."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cSAKlu0OlU

My favourite song by David

https://youtu.be/5-ceR9az3dk

https://youtu.be/w4YTOIwAaqw

That was beautiful Fotini. Thanks for translating.

It's been a sad day. I wrapped it up by giving Blackstar another spin. Beautiful parting gift from a man who added a lot of colour to the world.

One thing I did think was astonishing about Bowie's last few years was that even though he disappeared from public life for almost a decade, he somehow managed to avoid the media glare despite being one of the most recognizable music stars in the world and despite living in Lower Manhattan, of all places.  And it wasnt as if he was a recluse. By all accounts, strolling down to his local store to buy bagels was a regular occurrence.

And no interviews since about 2003. Not a single word to a journalist of any description in all that time. And to announce his return to music on his birthday three years ago by dropping 'Where are we now?' on i-tunes without anyone leaking the news was an astonishing achievement in this day and age.

His final years, as a result, are a period of his life which really intrigues me more than the 70's or anything else. Musicians in general aren't particularly great interviewees. Keith has historically been a terrific one (even though he's been prone to a bit of self parody in recent years), Dylan is another (partly because he does so few of them and has managed to remain enigmatic). Bowie certainly belongs in that category.  Tony Visconti has effectively been his 'voice on earth' for the last 3 years or so and his reminisces have been fabulous, but it goes without saying that would have been even better to have heard from the man himself.

I'd love to think that knowing of his impending demise, there was a final great secret interview made in recent weeks which was to remain unpublished while he was still alive. One can only hope. It would be a nice way to square the circle on the last decade of an amazing life.

I saw Bowie in Buffalo on the Station to Station tour in March 1976, and again in Pittsburgh in May 2004.  I had missed several other chances to see him over the years, and shortly after when he developed heart trouble and retired from touring I was glad I had taken my own dare.  "I'm Afraid of Americans" was so loud that night that the people standing in the orchestra with me were staggered back like we were standing behind a jet.  And everyone there was moved and floored by "Under Pressure" sung with bassist Gail Ann Dorsey.

When you love singers and actors and grow up just behind them, looking up to them, at a certain age in your life you begin to steel yourself against their passing, so you can write that off as inevitable when it comes, and not think as much about what you have lost...and what you are about to lose yourself, in the next decade or so.  I won't name the many I've tried to harden myself against losing, but I will say that Bowie was so vital and so promising of eternal return that it is devastating to wake up and find him gone.  One saw that he'd grown old, and sensed that he was ill, but one could never imagine him dying, nor know until now how much that would signify.  A new century has truly and sadly begun. 

And, yes, Starman - you have gone and left us alone with Gaga and Kesha and Adele, and...Sam Smith.  Bad daddy you are.

Bluzdude wrote on Jan 11^th, 2016 at 10:06am:

sweetcharmedlife wrote on Jan 11th, 2016 at 9:20am: I had heard rumors that he's been sick for a while. That's one of the reasons he wasn't touring. But he kept busy with two very interesting albums. This was eerie, happening right after he released his new album. He went out as creative as he ever was. A true rock God. Musical genius and one of the great talents of our time. I couldn't have said this better myself ....So Sad

Agree! Another Hard one to Accept
So many great songs Such a great Artist!
You are one of the Greats!

RIP Ziggy Thank you for your great Music!

This is a total shock, I can barely believe Bowie's gone. Its a huge loss but I have so many fond memories of him, his fans and his music that I have to be happy for his life. One memory I would like to share goes back to 1980 or 81. It's when his SCARY MONSTERS album came out and WMMR in Philadelphia was throwing a Halloween Party with David Bowie as the honored guest. My friend Cate got tickets from the station so we dressed in our Bowie-inspired costumes and made it to the club. Once inside, it was packed with the most wild looking group of people I had ever seen in my life. There were topless men with multiple nipple piercings, scary monsters, super creeps, super freaks, loud and tasteless fashionista, transgenders and heavily made up beautiful people. The DJ announced Bowie, who glided into the room with his goon squad. Nobody rushed him, surprisingly, but we got close enough to say hello.  He was wearing a white feathered hat and feathered one shoulder "Scary Monster" costume. The spotlight was on him, he didn't perform, but danced in the club to his music with his goon squad before waving goodbye with a quick exit. It was one of the most incredible exciting nights of my life. I will always love Bowie! Now I will have a Bowie music marathon in his honor.  

"  ................ but he's unquestionably the greatest and most iconic artist the UK ever produced (I know some could make a case for Lennon, McCartney, Jagger, Richards to name four - but their legendary status comes .................   "

**************************************************************

<  ----------- This may very well be true Gazza  .  But The Beatles arrived in America eleven weeks after the assassination of JFK  ................ and suddenly  ............. The United States of America was Young Again  .


" Best Stones Yet , Ronnie !!!!!  "

JACKY ! ® 

So cancer has taken 3/4 of Ziggy and the Spiders....and yet we sit around and worry about ISIS coming to get us, and spend billions every year on bombs and aircraft carriers....and yet the real terrorist takes the ones we hold most dear. Almost 600,000 Americans every year.

All one can say is W. T. F.???

If we spent $$ on fighting this monster, imagine the lives that could be saved.

Starbuck wrote on Jan 11^th, 2016 at 9:59pm:

If we spent $$ on fighting this monster, imagine the lives that could be saved.

I definitely agree that much more money should be spent on research towards fighting cancer. It almost got me a couple of years ago and it took my mother in 2001. Almost everyone has a friend or loved one die of cancer in their lifetime--more than one for many of us. And then there are all too many other common deadly diseases. With that in mind, looking at a list of the projects that federal funds are spent on is enough to make one puke.

Rest in peace!

A sad day indeed.

As with the Stones impossible to pick one favourite track but this one would have to be in the top five

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqBre9RfF9c

If any British RO'ers subscribe to The Times website I would be more than  grateful if they could post Charles Shaar Murray's obit. Thanks.

Any comment from Mick or Keith?

First header

http://www.rocksoff.org/i2-mickydavidbowielondres1987bydenisoregan.jpg
London 1987 by Denis O'Regan

By the other "Bill Wyman"...

---

Remembering bowie
10 Thoughts on David Bowie
By Bill Wyman   
January 11, 2016
1:48 p.m.

http://www.vulture.com/2016/01/10-thoughts-on-david-bowie.html

I first discovered him in my early teens and he's been there - a part of my daily life - pretty much ever since. He was then at his lowest ebb artistically so my initial interest was quite retrospective but the slump became an opportunity to rise again and his work of the new millenium was some of his finest and most profound.

I keep starting to listen to his songs and then stopping because it's too unsettling. It seems bizarre that I'll never hear that voice singing a new song again.

At least we have all the others, and the quantity of great songs he produced is extraordinary. Only a few can match that sort of productivity (the Stones, the Beatles, Serge Gainsbourg) and none surpass it.

But although I'm saddened and confused by this sudden absence the feeling's a little different to the last time the death of a stranger affected me so much. When Syd Barrett died there was the sense of hopes cut short in an unusually cruel way (later made better by the realisation that he'd found peace and even happiness in his later years). Bowie, however, gained pretty much everything he might have wanted, including a happy family life. Although it doesn't make death seem any less unjust it's the best any of us can hope for and I suppose there's some comfort in that.

Brian, David and Quincy, a usual name for very unusual people !

stonedinaustralia wrote on Jan 11^th, 2016 at 11:28pm:

A sad day indeed. As with the Stones impossible to pick one favourite track but this one would have to be in the top five https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqBre9RfF9c If any British RO'ers subscribe to The Times website I would be more than  grateful if they could post Charles Shaar Murray's obit. Thanks. Any comment from Mick or Keith?

Thanks- never heard that... good!

Prytania remembers David Bowie with 'Labyrinth' screening



http://image.nola.com/home/nola-media/width620/img/entertainment_impact_tvfilm/photo/19534533-mmmain.jpg
David Bowie stars in director Jim Henson's 1986 fantasy adventure 'Labyrinth.' (TriStar Pictures) (Photo12 / Polaris)

By Mike Scott, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune
on January 12, 2016


The Prytania Theatre this week remembers David Bowie, the actor and rocker who died of cancer on Jan. 10 at the age of 69, with a special installment in its ongoing Late Nite screening series. It tops this week's survey of off-the-beaten-path film events on tap for local movie fans.

Prytania Theatre Late Night screening series: 'Labyrinth' 5339 Prytania St., 504.891.2787. The theater continues its Sunday-night screening series of fan favorites, which this week's doubles as a tribute to David Bowie, who died Sunday (Jan. 10). On tap: director Jim Henson's 1986 fantasy adventure "Labyrinth" (10 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 17), starring Bowie as Jareth the Goblin King, alongside Jennifer Connolly and a cast of creations from Henson's Muppet workshop. Tickets are $10. For details visit the Prytania Theatre website.


http://www.nola.com/movies/index.ssf/2016/01/prytania_remembs_david_bowie_w.html#incart_river_home

Voodoo Chile in Wonderland wrote on Jan 11^th, 2016 at 5:08pm:

My favourite song by David https://youtu.be/5-ceR9az3dk https://youtu.be/w4YTOIwAaqw

Not sure if you've heard this isolated vocal track, but it will stand your hair on end. Especially the last minute.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8ND00HUUFs

First fan reveals touching letter from 20-year-old David Bowie




http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/5694020e38d01_bowielettermain.jpg



THE first US Bowie fan sat down and penned him a letter about his debut album – and he loved it so much he immediately wrote a reply.

Sandra Dodd, a 14-year-old from New Mexico in the US, got hold of a copy of his first album.

She liked it so much that she wrote to him and offered to start a US fan club on his behalf.

Bowie was so happy to receive praise from across the pond that he sent a heartwarming reply talking about how pleased he was that Sandra got in touch.

Nearly 50 years later, Sandra has kept the letter and it remains one of her most prized possessions.

She even photocopies it to share with avid Bowie fans across the globe.


http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389746.jpg


Speaking about the the letter, Sandra revealed: “I told him I thought the album was really good. I had lots of albums then, by groups from the U.S and UK.”

She told him that she thought he was as good as The Beatles.

“I knew most albums had one or two good songs and lots of filler. The Beatles never did that. This album hadn’t done it, either,” she added.

Sandra got hold of the album because her uncle was a manager of a local radio station and he had a copy.

Although she was yet to know what a massive sensation the then 20-year-old would become, she decided to send him a letter.

“It was weird and interesting, and I wrote him a letter. I had told him I liked his writing, and the songs were good,” said Sandra.


http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389751.jpg

http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389811.jpg



“I wish I had kept a copy of what I wrote but I was too young then, to consider it.

“It’s a beautiful piece of writing and a nice bit of history now,” she said.

Sandra said that her friends had no idea who he was.

“I don’t think anyone in the whole country had heard of him,” she said.

But when he took the world by storm shortly after that changed.

“At university, when newer friends would mention him, I would tell them the stories and offer copies of the letter. By then, photocopy machines had improved and were available,” Sandra said.

“Same, as years passed, if I learned someone was a fan of his, I would share the letter,” she added.


http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389757.jpg



Sandra also said that she was enamoured that Bowie had taken the time to respond, as mailing something across the Atlantic wasn’t as easy then as it is now,” Sandra said.

“I wrote him at the only address on the album cover, in New York. I guess that was the American publisher or distributor of the album.

“They sent the letter back very sweetly, with the address of his manager. So I mailed it again. And in those days mailing something internationally was a bigger deal than now.”

But Sandra said that the best part about getting a letter from Bowie wasn’t the fact that she now has correspondence from a world-wide star.

“It wasn’t easy to contact him (nor anyone, in the mid-60’s.) It’s hard for young people now to imagine it,” she said.


http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389737.jpg



“So the fact that he wrote back to me was great. But when people ask me about that, they’re assuming that I got a letter from someone famous.

“I got a letter from someone who was really excited to have received my letter. That’s the special part.”

Sandra also added that she offered to set up the US fan club because had there already been one, she would have joined.

And although she was the first ever U.S fan to write to Bowie, she never actually met the man himself.

“When he was filming The Man Who Fell To Earth in Madrid, New Mexico, a friend of mine was pressing me to go to the site and introduce myself. I said no,” Sandra said.

“I had already written what I had wanted to say to him. I wasn’t being a giddy fan-girl. I had been impressed by his songs, and by his writing and I had already communicated that and he was generous to share the packet of stuff with me.”


http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389744.jpg



“I didn’t want to invade his privacy and film sets don’t just let anyone on. The friend said ‘take the letter and they’ll let you in’. Really, I didn’t want to do that.

“People should give what they want to give and not be harassed or bothered beyond that. He gave us music, movies, lots of interviews.

“I thought he was very nice to write back to me.”

Sandra was sent several photos and also a British newspaper article about Bowie along with the letter.

The letter reads:

“Dear Sandra,
When I called in this, my manager’s office, a few moments ago I was handed my very first American fan letter – and it was from you.
I was so pleased that I had to sit down and type an immediate reply even though Ken is shouting at me to get on with a script he badly needs.
That can wiat (wi-at? That’s a new English word which means wait).

I’ve been waiting for some reaction to the album from American listeners. There were reviews in Billboard and Cash Box, but they were by professional critics and they rarely reflect the opinions of the public.
The critics were very flattering however. They even liked the single “Love You Till Tuesday.” I’ve got a copy of the American album and they’ve printed the picture a little yellow. I’m not really that blonde. I think the picture on the back is more ‘me’.
Hope you like those enclosed.

In answer to your questions, my real name is David Jones and I don’t have to tell you why I changed it. “Nobody’s going to make a monkey out of you” said my manager. My birthday is January 8th and I guess I’m 5’10”. There is a fan club here in England, but if things go well in the States then we’ll have one there I suppose. It’s a little early to even think about it.

I hope one day to get to America. My manager tells me lots about it as he has been many times with other acts he manages. I was watching an old film on TV the other night called “No Down Payment” a great film, but rather depressing if it is a true reflection of The American Way Of LIfe. However, shortly after that they showed a documentary about Robert Frost, the America poet, filmed mainly at his home in Vermont, and that evened the score. I am sure that that is nearer the real America. I made my first movie last week. Just a fifteen minutes short, but it gave me some good experience for a full length deal I have starting in January.

Thank you for being so kind to me and do please write again and let me know some more about yourself.

Yours sincerely,
David Bowie.


http://thestar.ie/only-i-had-heard-of-him-first-fan-reveals-touching-letter-from-20-year-old-david-bowie/

hmmm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0Jkv1cs6PE&feature=youtu.be

This is the original version of the Elvis song "Flaming Star". Elvis re-recorded it when the movie was re-titled at the 11th hour.  (It wasnt released until the mid-90s)

If you know the song and the movie, the significance of the title deals with Elvis' character riding off to his offscreen death having seen the ominous Flaming Star (or Black Star) of Death.

There have been a few theories about a deep literary significance to the title of Bowie's final statement to the world,
(see here for a good one :
http://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/bowies-blackstar-reappraised-the-clues-most-of-us-missed )

but the connection may very well be as simple as this.

Elvis' character in the movie comes from a bi-racial family (Bowie's marriage is inter-racial).  Both artists were on RCA.  Both share the same birthday (January 8th) - the date on which the Bowie album was released.

Also probably no coincidence that this was the first Bowie album ever not to feature his picture or image on the front cover.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpJzB5xsG1I

Wembley Arena, 20 June 1986. Prince's Trust Concert.

The only ever live performance of "Dancing in The Street" and off the top of my head, the only time Mick and David shared a stage together.

The show was broadcast on TV in the UK shortly afterwards but both artists didnt give permission for this to be included as they thought it was sub-par.

Its a tad underehearsed, but its still fun and Ive heard a lot worse, to be honest.

Had Rocks Off been around back then, we'd have been commenting on Mick having a serious outbreak of 'Tour Hair'

squiggle wrote on Jan 12^th, 2016 at 10:03am:

I first discovered him in my early teens and he's been there - a part of my daily life - pretty much ever since. He was then at his lowest ebb artistically so my initial interest was quite retrospective but the slump became an opportunity to rise again and his work of the new millenium was some of his finest and most profound. I keep starting to listen to his songs and then stopping because it's too unsettling. It seems bizarre that I'll never hear that voice singing a new song again. At least we have all the others, and the quantity of great songs he produced is extraordinary. Only a few can match that sort of productivity (the Stones, the Beatles, Serge Gainsbourg) and none surpass it. But although I'm saddened and confused by this sudden absence the feeling's a little different to the last time the death of a stranger affected me so much. When Syd Barrett died there was the sense of hopes cut short in an unusually cruel way (later made better by the realisation that he'd found peace and even happiness in his later years). Bowie, however, gained pretty much everything he might have wanted, including a happy family life. Although it doesn't make death seem any less unjust it's the best any of us can hope for and I suppose there's some comfort in that.

Lovely first post. I didnt really 'get' the period from the early 90's onwards for quite a while.

It took the long hiatus and absence of new music after 2004 to encourage me to re-discover that period. I'm glad I did - there's some outstanding material from that era - and when he re-emerged in 2013 I was able to embrace that new music completely.  I've been raving about the new record to everyone for the last week (although it does take a few listens) - and yet here I am in light of this week's awful news again having to re-appraise a Bowie album for things I missed.

Yet this time it's on an album that has only been officially available for 4 days.

great slideshow .

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2016/01/12/arts/music/david-bowie/s/20160112_BOWIE_HP-slide-DMXR.html

Fan reactions in his birthplace (video)

http://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/david-bowie-fan-reactions?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social

Some Guy wrote on Jan 12^th, 2016 at 12:38pm:

stonedinaustralia wrote on Jan 11th, 2016 at 11:28pm: A sad day indeed. As with the Stones impossible to pick one favourite track but this one would have to be in the top five https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqBre9RfF9c If any British RO'ers subscribe to The Times website I would be more than  grateful if they could post Charles Shaar Murray's obit. Thanks. Any comment from Mick or Keith? Thanks- never heard that... good!

Yes , isn't it. With Jagger reference to boot.

Gazza wrote on Jan 12^th, 2016 at 5:40pm:

The only ever live performance of "Dancing in The Street" and off the top of my head, the only time Mick and David shared a stage together

And with due respect to the late David Bowie, it's not the same to make a video in the studio and performing live, Mick stole the stage, absolutely

Anyways, I hope the band to play something Bowie or this one in the Olé Tour

polytoxic wrote on Jan 12^th, 2016 at 2:29pm:

Voodoo Chile in Wonderland wrote on Jan 11th, 2016 at 5:08pm: My favourite song by David https://youtu.be/5-ceR9az3dk https://youtu.be/w4YTOIwAaqw Not sure if you've heard this isolated vocal track, but it will stand your hair on end. Especially the last minute. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8ND00HUUFs

WOW Polytoxic! Thanks, never heard that one, in fact the reason I love that song is that when I heard it first, fresh, just released, I really enjoyed the singing, crude, rude, with energy, fantastic song

Edith Grove wrote on Jan 12^th, 2016 at 5:07pm:

First fan reveals touching letter from 20-year-old David Bowie http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/5694020e38d01_bowielettermain.jpg THE first US Bowie fan sat down and penned him a letter about his debut album – and he loved it so much he immediately wrote a reply. Sandra Dodd, a 14-year-old from New Mexico in the US, got hold of a copy of his first album. She liked it so much that she wrote to him and offered to start a US fan club on his behalf. Bowie was so happy to receive praise from across the pond that he sent a heartwarming reply talking about how pleased he was that Sandra got in touch. Nearly 50 years later, Sandra has kept the letter and it remains one of her most prized possessions. She even photocopies it to share with avid Bowie fans across the globe. http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389746.jpg Speaking about the the letter, Sandra revealed: “I told him I thought the album was really good. I had lots of albums then, by groups from the U.S and UK.” She told him that she thought he was as good as The Beatles. “I knew most albums had one or two good songs and lots of filler. The Beatles never did that. This album hadn’t done it, either,” she added. Sandra got hold of the album because her uncle was a manager of a local radio station and he had a copy. Although she was yet to know what a massive sensation the then 20-year-old would become, she decided to send him a letter. “It was weird and interesting, and I wrote him a letter. I had told him I liked his writing, and the songs were good,” said Sandra. http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389751.jpg http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389811.jpg “I wish I had kept a copy of what I wrote but I was too young then, to consider it. “It’s a beautiful piece of writing and a nice bit of history now,” she said. Sandra said that her friends had no idea who he was. “I don’t think anyone in the whole country had heard of him,” she said. But when he took the world by storm shortly after that changed. “At university, when newer friends would mention him, I would tell them the stories and offer copies of the letter. By then, photocopy machines had improved and were available,” Sandra said. “Same, as years passed, if I learned someone was a fan of his, I would share the letter,” she added. http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389757.jpg Sandra also said that she was enamoured that Bowie had taken the time to respond, as mailing something across the Atlantic wasn’t as easy then as it is now,” Sandra said. “I wrote him at the only address on the album cover, in New York. I guess that was the American publisher or distributor of the album. “They sent the letter back very sweetly, with the address of his manager. So I mailed it again. And in those days mailing something internationally was a bigger deal than now.” But Sandra said that the best part about getting a letter from Bowie wasn’t the fact that she now has correspondence from a world-wide star. “It wasn’t easy to contact him (nor anyone, in the mid-60’s.) It’s hard for young people now to imagine it,” she said. http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389737.jpg “So the fact that he wrote back to me was great. But when people ask me about that, they’re assuming that I got a letter from someone famous. “I got a letter from someone who was really excited to have received my letter. That’s the special part.” Sandra also added that she offered to set up the US fan club because had there already been one, she would have joined. And although she was the first ever U.S fan to write to Bowie, she never actually met the man himself. “When he was filming The Man Who Fell To Earth in Madrid, New Mexico, a friend of mine was pressing me to go to the site and introduce myself. I said no,” Sandra said. “I had already written what I had wanted to say to him. I wasn’t being a giddy fan-girl. I had been impressed by his songs, and by his writing and I had already communicated that and he was generous to share the packet of stuff with me.” http://thestar.ie/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/389744.jpg “I didn’t want to invade his privacy and film sets don’t just let anyone on. The friend said ‘take the letter and they’ll let you in’. Really, I didn’t want to do that. “People should give what they want to give and not be harassed or bothered beyond that. He gave us music, movies, lots of interviews. “I thought he was very nice to write back to me.” Sandra was sent several photos and also a British newspaper article about Bowie along with the letter. The letter reads: “Dear Sandra, When I called in this, my manager’s office, a few moments ago I was handed my very first American fan letter – and it was from you. I was so pleased that I had to sit down and type an immediate reply even though Ken is shouting at me to get on with a script he badly needs. That can wiat (wi-at? That’s a new English word which means wait). I’ve been waiting for some reaction to the album from American listeners. There were reviews in Billboard and Cash Box, but they were by professional critics and they rarely reflect the opinions of the public. The critics were very flattering however. They even liked the single “Love You Till Tuesday.” I’ve got a copy of the American album and they’ve printed the picture a little yellow. I’m not really that blonde. I think the picture on the back is more ‘me’. Hope you like those enclosed. In answer to your questions, my real name is David Jones and I don’t have to tell you why I changed it. “Nobody’s going to make a monkey out of you” said my manager. My birthday is January 8th and I guess I’m 5’10”. There is a fan club here in England, but if things go well in the States then we’ll have one there I suppose. It’s a little early to even think about it. I hope one day to get to America. My manager tells me lots about it as he has been many times with other acts he manages. I was watching an old film on TV the other night called “No Down Payment” a great film, but rather depressing if it is a true reflection of The American Way Of LIfe. However, shortly after that they showed a documentary about Robert Frost, the America poet, filmed mainly at his home in Vermont, and that evened the score. I am sure that that is nearer the real America. I made my first movie last week. Just a fifteen minutes short, but it gave me some good experience for a full length deal I have starting in January. Thank you for being so kind to me and do please write again and let me know some more about yourself. Yours sincerely, David Bowie. http://thestar.ie/only-i-had-heard-of-him-first-fan-reveals-touching-letter-from-20-year-old-david-bowie/

Wow!  He actually wrote her an entire letter!  I'm impressed!

https://youtu.be/lPvVgFfwZTs

Anyone know what ever became of ~~aZQb /TaSty FoAM~~?

I had never listened to Bowie before, but about 10-15 years ago over at Lew's joint, she ordered me to go out and procure a copy of ziggy, which i did. didn't like it the first spin....but by about the third time through, it was as if someone turned on a light, and it made perfect sense....like that scene in the wizard of oz when dorothy steps into technicolor for the first time.

not a bowie die hard - i'm only have five or six of his albums - but several of them are as complete an album as exile or abbey road....

which brings back the original question....did ~~ make the transition?

I have to admit, I was never crazy about everything he did, although he had some real gems and his commentary was more interesting to me than the melodies, but this is a wonderful example of his versatility. His impression of Mick is bang on. A good Mick Jagger is very rare, but this is fantastic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umx2KSZ-adw

Dave The Rave...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bQtHeQhU7I

Dave On Jogger...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umx2KSZ-adw

In David Bowie coverage, the media forgot to mention a major aspect of the rockstar’s life

http://www.cjr.org/criticism/bowie.php

Tom wrote on Jan 13^th, 2016 at 8:05am:

In David Bowie coverage, the media forgot to mention a major aspect of the rockstar’s life http://www.cjr.org/criticism/bowie.php

Being bi myself, yeah, that kind of pisses me off. Some say his sexual orientation was left out to be sensitive to his family's feelings, but why should it need to be? It seems disrespectful to Bowie himself as well as his bisexual fans.

The Story of David Bowie’s Forgotten Debut Single, ‘Liza Jane’

By Dave Swanson January 11, 2016


https://youtu.be/KNNfqh-iJXs



David Bowie wasn’t even David Bowie yet when he issued his debut single, a stomping R&B rocker called “Liza Jane,” with his band the King Bees on June 5, 1964. Then still using his given name of Davie Jones, Bowie was a mere 17 years old, but as evidenced by the recording, already full of fire and attitude.

Recorded for the Vocalion Pop label, “Liza Jane” is a growling tune that features Bowie on lead vocals as well as sax. Joining Bowie were George Underwood and Roger Bluck on guitars, Bob Allen on drums, and Francis Howard on bass.

The song’s origins date back to 1917, when a song called “Lil’ Liza Jane”‘ was recorded by Earl Fuller as an instrumental. The song was issued by Harry C. Brown a year later, with added vocals. King Bees’ manager Leslie Conn, who also worked for Dick James Music Publishing, made a few changes to update the song and credited it to himself. The flip side was “Louie, Louie Go Home,” a cover of a 1963 single by Paul Revere and the Raiders.

Even with strong promotion, “Liza Jane” failed to chart and quickly faded from the airwaves. In 1978, it was re-released as a single by Vocalion’s parent company, Decca, to capitalize on Bowie’s fame.

By then, Jones had long since ditched the King Bees, had a go at it with the Mannish Boys and then Davy Jones and the Lower Third, before finally going solo. In early 1966, Jones changed his name to David Bowie, but still wouldn’t find commercial success until “Space Oddity” reached No. 5 in the U.K. in 1969.



Read More: The Story of David Bowie's Forgotten Debut Single, 'Liza Jane' | http://ultimateclassicrock.com/david-bowie-liza-jane/?trackback=tsmclip

Great actor too.  He was amazing in Merry Christimas, Mr. Lawrence.  Wish he had done more acting.

Strange guy, but powered through it.  A force of will there.

"We live for just these twenty years
Do we have to die for the fifty more?"

Yikes!  Fucking hell, man.

Berliners Call for Street to Be Renamed After David Bowie in Online Petition

Henri Neuendorf, Wednesday, January 13, 2016


https://news.artnet.com/wp-content/news-upload/2016/01/David_Bowie_by_the_3065564b.jpg
David Bowie at the Berlin Wall, (1987). Photo: Denis O'Regan/Getty Images.



Following the death of the iconic musician and artist David Bowie, fans and residents of Berlin have started an online petition in an effort to change the name of the street where he lived from Hauptstrasse to David Bowie Strasse. At the time of writing the petition collected 2,992 signatures.

The legendary star shared an apartment with the American musician Iggy Pop in the German capital's district of Schöneberg in the 1970s. During that time, he recorded three albums with Tony Visconti and Brian Eno, and collaborated with Iggy Pop on the record The Idiot (1977) at Berlin's Hansa Studios.

On Monday, Bowie fans flocked to his former address to lay flowers and candles. Berlin Mayor Michael Müller said “He's one of us."

Describing Bowie as “an icon of rock and pop," the petition stated that “there are many Hauptstrassen in Berlin, but there isn't a David Bowie Strasse yet. Hundreds of thousands, even millions of people associate memories with David Bowie's music. This extraordinary artist deserves this special honor in Berlin."


https://news.artnet.com/wp-content/news-upload/2014/06/David-Bowies-catharsis-i-012-e1401964572325.jpg
Photograph used as the basis for David Bowie's Heroes (1977) album cover
Photo: Masayoshi Sukita/David Bowie Archive



One petitioner, Sarah Sladek, wrote “I signed because I think David Bowie was an outstanding artist who's influence had a lasting effect on the the music and art scene and who influenced the feelings and lives of many people. He was closely associated with Berlin because he lived and worked here; his work was shaped by this city."

Another supporter, Petra Vladi wrote, “I'm signing because Berlin, with its people and uniqueness, was a huge inspiration for David's masterpieces."


https://news.artnet.com/wp-content/news-upload/2016/01/david-bowie-berlin.jpg
Fans lay flowers at David Bowie's former Berlin residence at Hauptstrasse 155 in the city's Schöneberg district.
Photo: Sean Gallup/Getty Images



On Tuesday, district councilor for Tempelhof-Schöneberg Daniel Kruger conceded that renaming Hauptstrasse “wasn't out of the question." However, he hastily added that under current laws important individuals must be deceased for five years before a street can be renamed after them, DW reports.

Affixing a plaque to Bowie's former residence at Hauptstrasse 155 however, was still an option, Kruger said.

Bowie released three albums during his time in Berlin between 1976 and 1978. Low, Heroes, and Lodger later became known as the Berlin Trilogy.

One of Bowie's biggest hits Heroes was inspired by a couple, Visconti and his lover, that the musician spotted embracing by the Berlin Wall that divided East and West Germany.


https://news.artnet.com/wp-content/news-upload/2016/01/terry-oneill-david-bowie-scissors.jpg
Terry O'Neill, David Bowie – Scissors, 1974 (1974).
Photo: Artnet.



In a different, less likely attempt, Italian fans have launched a petition to bring Bowie back to life. The statement on the change.org petition simply reads: "Letter to God. Say NO to David Bowie dead."

Meanwhile, AFP reports that the Groninger Museum in the northern Netherlands is looking into extending the retrospective on the musician titled "David Bowie Is" after the institution was inundated with more than 18,000 ticket sales since the announcement of his death.

Bowie's last photoshoot was featured on his official website and Instagram account on his birthday, just two days before his death from liver cancer.


https://news.artnet.com/people/berlin-petition-david-bowie-street-406568

Starbuck,

I was friends with AZQB also, I think she posted on Lew's and here on Rocks off.  I don't know what happened to her, unfortunately.  I used to have her e addy. 

Iggy Pop on David Bowie: ‘He Resurrected Me’

By JON PARELESJAN. 13, 2016


http://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/01/13/arts/14IGGY/13IGGYBOWIE-master675.jpg
Iggy Pop, left, and David Bowie, during the tour for Mr. Pop’s 1977 album “The Idiot.” Credit Rex Features, via Associated Press



Iggy Pop, whose solo recording career began with two albums produced by David Bowie, said in an interview this week that he had still not fully processed Mr. Bowie’s death, at 69, on Sunday.

“The friendship was basically that this guy salvaged me from certain professional and maybe personal annihilation — simple as that,” said Mr. Pop, who is 68. “A lot of people were curious about me, but only he was the one who had enough truly in common with me, and who actually really liked what I did and could get on board with it, and who also had decent enough intentions to help me out. He did a good thing.”

He added, “He resurrected me.” Mr. Pop reflected: “He was more of a benefactor than a friend in a way most people think of friendship. He went a bit out of his way to bestow some good karma on me.”

They had lost touch after 2002, when Mr. Bowie hoped to sign Mr. Pop to his new record label — he was under contract elsewhere — and schedule conflicts prevented Mr. Pop from performing at the Meltdown festival in London that Mr. Bowie was curating.

Mr. Pop met Mr. Bowie in 1971, a period of excess when “we were all pretty bad but he was at least viable,” Mr. Pop said. In 1976, Mr. Bowie invited Mr. Pop to travel along with him as a “fly on the wall” on the tour following the release of Mr. Bowie’s album “Station to Station.” Onstage, Mr. Bowie portrayed his Thin White Duke character while flooded in white light.

“He was really disciplined,” Mr. Pop said. “That was at a time when it might be 700 people in Albuquerque, it might be 15,000 at the Garden, it might be 300 people in Zurich, etc. He did a great show every night. I don’t care where it was.”

After the tour, Mr. Bowie produced Mr. Pop’s 1977 solo debut album, “The Idiot,” while traveling in France and Germany and working together on songs — often with Mr. Bowie providing music and perhaps a title and Mr. Pop completing it with melodies and lyrics. “He subsumed my personality, lyrically, on that first album,” Mr. Pop said. He compared Mr. Bowie with the character in George Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion” and the musical “My Fair Lady.”

At times, Mr. Pop said, it was like having “Professor Higgins say to you: ‘Young man, please, you are from the Detroit area. I think you should write a song about mass production.” (He did: “Mass Production.”)

Mr. Pop’s “Nightclubbing,” a song on “The Idiot” that reflected postconcert club excursions across Europe with Mr. Bowie, was recorded with a cheap synthesizer and an early drum machine, the only equipment available after a recording session had been packed up. “He said, ‘I can’t put out a record with that,’” Mr. Pop recalled. “I said, ‘But I can.’ And he smiled, and he realized this was a playground for him. I always tried to encourage his worst impulses in those directions. I was a fan.”

When Mr. Bowie moved to Berlin, Mr. Pop occupied a room in Mr. Bowie’s apartment there “over the auto parts store,” he said. The title song for Mr. Pop’s next album, “Lust for Life,” germinated in that apartment.

Mr. Pop and Mr. Bowie, seated on the floor — they had decided chairs were not natural — were waiting for the Armed Forces Network telecast of “Starsky & Hutch.” The network started shows with a call signal that, Mr. Pop said, went “beep beep beep, beep beep beep beep, beep beep beep,” the rhythm, which is also like a Motown beat, that was the foundation for “Lust for Life.” Mr. Pop recalled, “He wrote the [chord] progression on ukulele, and he said, ‘Call it “Lust for Life,” write something up.’”

Mr. Bowie “saw me sometimes, when he wanted to voice it that way, as a modern Beat or a modern Dostoyevsky character or a modern van Gogh,” Mr. Pop said. “But he also knew I’m a hick from the sticks at heart.”

By contrast, Mr. Bowie was “worldly,” Mr. Pop said. “I learned things that I still use today. I met the Beatles and the Stones, and this one and that one, and this actress and this actor and all these powerful people through him. And I watched. And every once in a while, now at least, I’m a little less rustic when I have to deal with those people.”

Mr. Bowie made a point of visiting Mr. Pop’s parents in Detroit, where they were living in a trailer. “He came to my parents’ trailer, and the neighbors were so frightened of the car and the bodyguard they called the police,” Mr. Pop said. “My father’s a very wonderful man, and he said, ‘Thank you for what you’re doing for my son.’ I thought: Shut up, Dad. You’re making me look uncool.”


https://youtu.be/LApkTxu36h4
David Bowie and Iggy Pop on ‘The Dinah Shore Show’ in 1977.


http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/14/arts/music/david-bowie-iggy-pop.html?_r=0

Starbuck wrote on Jan 12^th, 2016 at 11:16pm:

Anyone know what ever became of ~~aZQb /TaSty FoAM~~? I had never listened to Bowie before, but about 10-15 years ago over at Lew's joint, she ordered me to go out and procure a copy of ziggy, which i did. didn't like it the first spin....but by about the third time through, it was as if someone turned on a light, and it made perfect sense....like that scene in the wizard of oz when dorothy steps into technicolor for the first time. not a bowie die hard - i'm only have five or six of his albums - but several of them are as complete an album as exile or abbey road.... which brings back the original question....did ~~ make the transition?

I was in regular contact with AzQB (Chrissie) up until about a decade ago, as was Ginda, but she seems to have voluntarily disappeared off the radar.  Last time I spoke to her, she and her husband were running a car hire company somewhere in NJ. I met them both before the NY shows in 2002. They were lovely people.

Some light relief. I dont what its like anywhere else, but when a global megastar passes on, you can always count on the regional media outlets to try and get in on the act with a story on them which has some (very often tenuous) local angle.

This one from the Croydon Advertiser (a reasonably sized town just south of London) really takes the biscuit though. They managed to track down a man who delivered Bowie's milk in 1969 for an exclusive interview.

http://www.croydonadvertiser.co.uk/Old-Coulsdon-man-delivered-David-Bowie-s-milk/story-28505240-detail/story.html

Second header with Brian

http://www.rocksoff.org/headers2016/i6-two-two-jones-with-lulu.jpg
Two-two Jones with Lulu 1973

Third header, with Keith

http://www.rocksoff.org/headers2016/i6-keith-tina-david.jpg
Keith, Tina Turner and David Bowie... The Ritz, NYC - January 1983 © Bob Gruen

Gazza wrote on Jan 12^th, 2016 at 5:16pm:

hmmm. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0Jkv1cs6PE&feature=youtu.be This is the original version of the Elvis song "Flaming Star". Elvis re-recorded it when the movie was re-titled at the 11th hour.  (It wasnt released until the mid-90s) If you know the song and the movie, the significance of the title deals with Elvis' character riding off to his offscreen death having seen the ominous Flaming Star (or Black Star) of Death. There have been a few theories about a deep literary significance to the title of Bowie's final statement to the world, (see here for a good one : http://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/bowies-blackstar-reappraised-the-clues-most-of-us-missed ) but the connection may very well be as simple as this. Elvis' character in the movie comes from a bi-racial family (Bowie's marriage is inter-racial).  Both artists were on RCA.  Both share the same birthday (January 8th) - the date on which the Bowie album was released. Also probably no coincidence that this was the first Bowie album ever not to feature his picture or image on the front cover.

And although the whole world knows their names it often mispronounces them (Prez-ley; Bough-ie).

final photos Bowie

http://www.people.com/article/david-bowie-dead-final-photos-instagram-jimmy-king

Reads that Bowie died from liver cancer

http://buzzviralpro.com/2016/01/11/david-bowie-12-facts-you-didnt-know/

From NY Post - Richard Johnson's column - 1/14/16

David Bowie had a great sense of humor. Art critic Charlie Finch recalls driving down St. Marks Place with him in 1999 when they spotted a T-shirt in a shop window showing Bowie with the words, "I F - - ked Mick Jagger." He stopped the car, told me to buy every shirt, and then handed them out to passers-by.

David Bowie Planned Post-'Blackstar' Album, 'Thought He Had Few More Months'

"His energy was still incredible for a man who had cancer," longtime Bowie producer Tony Visconti says. "He never showed any fear"

BY BRIAN HIATT January 13, 2016


http://assets.rollingstone.com/assets/2016/article/david-bowie-planned-post-blackstar-album-thought-he-had-few-more-months-20160113/224355/medium_rect/1452720992/720x405-G4Q0121-520x846_.jpg

Longtime David Bowie producer Tony Visconti recalls Bowie's last months and says the singer was planning a 'Blackstar' follow-up - Jimmy King



About a week before his death, with Blackstar[/i[ nearing release, David Bowie called his longtime friend and producer Tony Visconti via FaceTime, and told him he wanted to make one more album. In what turned out to have been the final weeks of his life, Bowie wrote and demo-ed five fresh songs, and was anxious to return to the studio one last time. Bowie had known since November that his cancer was terminal, according to Visconti, but if their final conversation was any indication, he had no idea he had so little time left. "At that late stage, he was planning the follow-up to [i]Blackstar," says Visconti, that album's producer, in an interview conducted Wednesday for a Bowie memorial package in the next issue of Rolling Stone.

"And I was thrilled," Visconti continues, "and I thought, and he thought, that he'd have a few months, at least. Obviously, if he's excited about doing his next album, he must've thought he had a few more months. So the end must've been very rapid. I'm not privy to it. I don't know exactly, but he must've taken ill very quickly after that phone call." Visconti has been working with Bowie on and off since 1969's Space Oddity, producing numerous key albums, among them 1970's The Man Who Sold the World, 1977's Low, 1980's Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps), and 2013's surprise comeback The Next Day.

Visconti first learned of Bowie's illness a year ago, when he showed up for Blackstar recording sessions in New York. "He just came fresh from a chemo session, and he had no eyebrows, and he had no hair on his head," says Visconti, "and there was no way he could keep it a secret from the band. But he told me privately, and I really got choked up when we sat face to face talking about it."

"In November, [the cancer] had spread all over his body, so there's no recovering from that."
Around the middle of 2015, however, Bowie's prognosis seemed to improve. "He was optimistic because he was doing the chemo and it was working," says Visconti, "and at one point in the middle of last year, he was in remission. I was thrilled. And he was a bit apprehensive. He said, 'Well, don't celebrate too quickly. For now I'm in remission, and we'll see how it goes.' And he continued the chemotherapy. So I thought he was going to make it. And in November, it just suddenly came back. It had spread all over his body, so there's no recovering from that."

Bowie had already finished Blackstar by November. But even before then, Visconti noticed the tone of some of the lyrics and told him, "You canny bastard. You're writing a farewell album." Bowie simply laughed in response. "He was so brave and courageous," says Visconti. "And his energy was still incredible for a man who had cancer. He never showed any fear. He was just all business about making the album."

As far as Visconti knows, rumors of additional health problems between Bowie’s 2004 heart attack and his cancer diagnosis 18 months ago are false. "When I met up with him in 2008 or 2009," he says, "he actually had some weight on him. He was robust. His cheeks were rosy red. He wasn't sick. He was on medicine for his heart. But it was normal, like a lot of people in their 50s or 60s are on heart medication, and live very long lives. So he was coping with it very, very well." In the time between the heart attack and the 2013 release of The Next Day, Bowie even took boxing lessons.

When Visconti learned of Bowie's death, the producer was on the road with Holy Holy, a Bowie tribute project that includes former Spiders from Mars drummer Mick "Woody" Woodmansey. "We deliberated whether we should continue the tour because we were all knocked sideways," Visconti says. "Monday was the worst day of my life. I gotta say. But we talked about it and said, 'We’re musicians, this is what we do. David would like it.' We played for the first time since his death last night to a very, very enthusiastic Toronto audience. There were people crying, but there were people smiling and clapping and jumping around. Listen, it was a wonderful experience to be able to acknowledge him, to celebrate his life."

Visconti and many other Bowie friends and collaborators reminisce about the musician in the next issue of Rolling Stone.



Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/david-bowie-planned-post-blackstar-album-thought-he-had-few-more-months-20160113#ixzz3xEtvsyan
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Edith Grove wrote on Jan 14^th, 2016 at 8:22am:

http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/lt/lt_cache/thumbnail/620/img/photos/2015/07/10/86/3b/GettyImages-108152380_master.jpg Big names to honor David Bowie Cox Media Group National Content Desk NEW YORK CITY -- A concert that was planned prior to David Bowie's unexpected death will continue now as a memorial show. And some big names in the world of music will take the stage to remember their fellow performer. Cyndi Lauper, The Roots and Ann Wilson of Heart had already been announced to appear at the March 31 concert called "The Music of David Bowie at Carnegie Hall." Now, Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger will also pay tribute to Bowie, The Mirror reported. It is also said that Elton John will be part of the lineup, according to The Mirror. Bowie died Sunday after an 18-month battle with cancer. He had released his 25th album just three days before. http://myconnection.cox.com/article/trending/aHR0cHM6Ly9pZGVudGlmaWVycy5jbWdkaWdpdGFsLmNvbS9tZWRsZXkvcHJvZC9uZXdzLm1lZGxleXN0b3J5LzMyMDcyNjkv/

McCartney's publicist has already denied that hes playing this show.

To be honest, the whole thing reads like a tabloid writer's wishlist - a bit like all those British superstars (including the Stones and Bowie - neither of whom were active at the time) who were mooted to play at the London Olympics.

There's been some serious bollocks written in the tabloids in the last 3 days - which you'd sort of expect about a celebrity who doesnt do press interviews.  Tony Visconti today dismissed as rubbish a former biographer's 'exclusive' on Monday that Bowie had suffered about half a dozen heart attacks in the last few years (saying that he had even started taking boxing lessions about four years ago) and just a few hours ago Bowie's official instagram and social media account confirmed they were still preparing for a private funeral - even though several UK tabloids stated this morning that he has already been secretly cremated without even any family members being present.

http://ultimateclassicrock.com/david-bowie-street-sign/?utm_source=sailthru&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=newsletter_4572276

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02272/jagger-bowie_2272305b.jpg

https://divinevarod.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/bowie-jagger-1.jpg

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http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DdOT9np1xPA/U9dTAfShy9I/AAAAAAAA1HI/1fEZZ8MtB-I/s1600/Lou+Reed,+Mick+Jagger+and+David+Bowie+hanging+out+together+at+Caf%C3%A9+Royale,+1973+(3).jpg

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http://www.bowiegoldenyears.com/1975/7509jam.jpg

http://media.gettyimages.com/photos/from-left-to-right-singers-mick-jagger-tina-turner-and-david-bowie-at-picture-id114987238

no stones....but this would be fun to be at, no?

this, i believe, was the entertainment for gazza's bar mitzvah.

https://theselvedgeyard.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/david-bowie-iggy-pop-lou-reed.jpg

https://davidbowienews.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/david-bowie-live-aid-diana-charles.jpg

Mick Jagger and Paul McCartney 'to play David Bowie memorial concert in New York'

The two legendary musicians are expected to lead the way at The Music of David Bowie at Carnegie Hall in March

David Bowie will be honoured with a tribute concert in New York later this year, with some legendary musicians set to take to the stage.

Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger are amongst those expected to remember the star.

The event - named The Music of David Bowie - was already set to take place at Carnegie Hall before the singer died on Monday, but following his passing, the 31st March event will now be a memorial show.

According to the Daily Star, The Beatles and Rolling Stones legends are expected to join the likes of Sir Elton John as part of the line-up.

Meanwhile, a statement on the event's website reads: "The unexpected death of David Bowie has turned this tribute, which we have worked on for the past 7 months, into a memorial concert...

"This year's concert will certainly be remembered as a poignant celebration of his music by his friends, peers, and fans.

"We are deeply saddened by the news. The timing of our public on-sale date is bizarre in its timing and the show is taking on many more emotions. RIP David and may God's love be with you."

Bowie Tribute Concert to Have a Second Night, at Radio City
By ANDREW R. CHOW JAN. 14, 2016

Shortly before David Bowie’s death, Carnegie Hall announced a concert honoring the singer on March 31. Now, the event, part of the City Winery founder Michael Dorf’s annual tribute series, will be reframed as a memorial concert, and a second show has been added at Radio City Music Hall, with Michael Stipe, Laurie Anderson and Cat Power joining one or both of the lineups.

The Carnegie Hall show will feature Mr. Stipe, Ms. Anderson and Cat Power along with the previously announced artists: the Roots, Jakob Dylan, the Mountain Goats, Bettye LaVette, Perry Farrell, Robyn Hitchcock and Ann Wilson of Heart. The bill for the April 1 concert at Radio City Music Hall includes Cat Power, Mr. Farrell, Ms. Wilson and the Polyphonic Spree. The house band for both shows will consist of longtime Bowie collaborators: the producer Tony Visconti and drummer Woody Woodmansey, both of whom were original members of Mr. Bowie’s Spiders From Mars.

Tickets for the April 1 concert will go on sale on January 15 at 11 a.m. at musicof.org. Tickets for the Carnegie Hall date are officially sold out.

“This year’s concert will certainly be remembered as a poignant celebration of his music by his friends, peers and fans,” reads a statement on the concert website.

Several of the acts had personal relationships with Mr. Bowie, including Ms. Anderson and her husband, Lou Reed, who died in 2013. In 1998, Mr. Bowie and Ms. Anderson collaborated for an exhibition called “Line” at the Museum Ludwig in Cologne, and Mr. Bowie enlisted Ms. Anderson for the High Line Festival in 2007.

Mr. Stipe penned a tribute to Mr. Bowie on Facebook on Tuesday, writing, “Right now, it feels as if the solar system is off its axis, as if one of our main planetary anchors has lost its orbit.”

The Polyphonic Spree, a Texas indie rock band, opened for Mr. Bowie on his Reality Tour in 2004. “He’s the first guy who took real interest and initiative and brought us over there,” its frontman, Tim DeLaughter, told Guide Live this week. “He changed our life.”

Both shows’ set lists will likely be stocked with familiar covers. Jakob Dylan’s band, the Wallflowers, played “Heroes” in 1998; the Polyphonic Spree performed “Five Years” in 2002; and Cat Power recorded “Space Oddity” in 2008.

On Thursday, Mr. Bowie’s family posted an official note on his website, indicating that arrangements were being made for a private ceremony honoring the musician’s life. “We are overwhelmed by and grateful for the love and support shown throughout the world,” the note reads. “However, it is important to note that while the concerts and tributes planned for the coming weeks are all welcome, none are official memorials organized or endorsed by the family. Just as each and every one of us found something unique in David’s music, we welcome everyone’s celebration of his life as they see fit.”

A version of this article appears in print on January 15, 2016, of the New York Times

RE: today's header...howe often did bill play a hofner?

Guys- what's that Bowie tune that goes- "ooh somebody save me, somebody, somebody"? I really want to hear that one, I don't know the name.

David Bowie was true to his art, and himself, to the very end

BY KEITH SPERA

[email protected]
Jan. 13, 2016



David Bowie died the same way he lived: On his own terms. He was a pop culture icon for more than 40 years, but wanted to — and managed to — keep his terminal cancer secret for 18 months.

He also unveiled a new album, “Blackstar,” on Jan. 8, his 69th birthday — only two days before a Facebook post announced his passing. His enduring creative spirit was undiminished to the end.

Labeling Bowie a “rock star” seems inadequate. He was a sophisticated, fearless, multi-dimensional artist. His work was far more daring and diverse than what usually flows from someone operating at his level of commercial success.

In his early Ziggy Stardust period, he craved, and thrived on, attention. His outlandish appearance(s) — going eyebrow-less is a surefire way to achieve an alien, otherworldly look — fed that need. It was all designed to challenge perceptions and norms while exploring themes of alienation.

The end result could be outlandish, but his inspirations and aspirations were not that different from many of his British rock star peers. His earliest show biz dream, he told more than one interviewer, was to play saxophone in Little Richard’s band. On his 1983 album “Let’s Dance,” he featured a then-unknown blues-rock guitarist from Texas named Stevie Ray Vaughan. Bowie loved earthy American roots music, even as he framed it within the sleek pop of “Modern Love” and “China Girl.”

Long-ago bouts of drug-fueled decadence aside, he adhered to a refined decorum, a sly bad boy with impeccable British manners, smarts and style. His “Little Drummer Boy” duet with Bing Crosby, the oldest of old-school entertainers, was decidedly traditional and sweet. The much-viewed video reveals an obvious affection between these two men of very different generations and mindsets.

Similarly, Bowie dutifully played his assigned role during a 1980 appearance on “The Tonight Show.” Host Johnny Carson, a fan of big band jazz, didn’t quite know what to make of Bowie, who gamely smiled and hit his marks like a pro.

His preening, posturing and flamboyance couldn’t mask an unmistakable vulnerability in his voice, songs and acting. It enabled him to play a marooned alien in the “The Man Who Fell to Earth,” and Joseph Merrick, “The Elephant Man,” in a touring Broadway production.

But he was anything but vulnerable when he commandeered the Saenger Theatre in New Orleans on April 30, 2004. It was the last of his very few Louisiana performances. On “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust & the Spiders From Mars” tour in 1972, he hit the famously grungy Warehouse on Tchoupitoulas, a ticket costing a princely $4. He headlined the LSU Assembly Center in Baton Rouge in April 1978. He staged his massive Glass Spider production — underwritten by Pepsi in an early, and somewhat controversial, example of corporate tour sponsorship — at the Superdome on Oct. 6, 1987, with his school chum Peter Frampton on lead guitar.

Seventeen years later, Bowie compressed what felt like an arena-sized show into the Saenger. Ray Davies, the voice of the Kinks, and Nine Inch Nails mastermind Trent Reznor, both New Orleans residents at the time, were in attendance, indicative of the breadth of Bowie’s appeal.

Backed by an equally compelling band, he was charming, engaged and absolutely in command as he rocked nearly 30 songs over two-and-a-half-hours. He opened with the classic “Rebel, Rebel” followed by “New Killer Star,” from his then-current “Reality” album. That pairing served notice that this would not be a greatest hits recital. He intended to treat newer, more challenging compositions as equally worthy.

Much of his output over the past 15 years has left me cold. But that night, he made the newer songs feel as vital as the classics. The room was absolutely combustible; Bowie and the band lit the fuse. He was on fire from start to finish.

That show felt like a victory lap. It also turned out to be one of his last.

That summer while on tour in Europe, Bowie underwent an angioplasty procedure on a blocked artery. He canceled the final month of scheduled concerts and never toured again.

Instead, he largely withdrew from public life. He apparently spent time at a wooded spread outside New York City, away from the prying eyes of paparazzi. He occasionally stepped out with his wife, the supermodel Iman. Cameras sometimes caught him on the streets in the city, hidden by sunglasses and a cap, a dapper older guy trying to go about his business anonymously.

He released new music only intermittently, and with little warning. Such was the case with “Blackstar.” Much has been made of “Lazarus,” a track that includes the lyrics, “Look up here, I’m in heaven/I’ve got scars that can’t be seen/I’ve got drama, can’t be stolen/Everybody knows me now.”

Did he intend the album as his own, Bowie-esque obituary? It would be just like him to incorporate his final act into his final art.

But even as he sought to make one last artistic statement, he didn’t feel the need to make his illness public. As he once sang, “Don’t lean on me, man. You can’t afford the ticket.”

None were available to the last chapter of his life. Ultimately, even the man who sold the world wanted to keep some of it for himself.


The Preservation Hall Jazz Band and members of Arcade Fire will lead a memorial second-line parade in Bowie’s honor on Saturday, Jan. 16, 2016. It will depart from Preservation Hall, 726 St. Peter Street, at 4 p.m.

Follow Keith Spera on Twitter, @KeithSpera.


http://www.theneworleansadvocate.com/features/14563384-32/david-bowie-was-an-artist-and-true-to-himself-to-the-very-end

I LOVED THE MAN & THE MUSIC.
BUT TO ME I'M MOST IMPRESSED WITH THE DIGNITY HE LIVED HIS LIFE,KEEPING HIS BUSINESS TO HIMSELF & TO HELL WITH THE BEGRUDGERS.

Some Guy are you talking about "Blue Jean"?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LTYvjrM6djo

Marie wrote on Jan 15^th, 2016 at 6:16pm:

Some Guy are you talking about "Blue Jean"? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LTYvjrM6djo

That's It!!

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_3gcqOK6ZgA4/SyNLm06O2xI/AAAAAAAAAHw/MSoo6SFGVcc/s400/Thats+it.jpg

Thanks!

Bowie also collaborated with Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails.

And, also check out his collaboration with Iggy Pop- Idiot and Lust for Life

Young Armenian, oh-ho-ho yeah

Some really deep theorizing into those last couple of videos. Great reading.

http://vigilantcitizen.com/musicbusiness/occult-universe-david-bowie-meaning-blackstar/

http://www.parareligion.ch/bowie.htm

I like this poignant take on the 'Lazarus' video. "Time waits for no one",  indeed.

It’s staggering how differently a piece of art can be interpreted both before and after someone’s death. In the case of the late David Bowie’s music video for “Lazarus,” what may have been viewed as an innocuous 4 minutes of trippy entertainment turns into a disturbing, emotionally raw, premeditated goodbye letter.

I appreciate the impact “Lazarus” — and by extension the entirety of Bowie’s final album Blackstar — has and will have on his fans. We now understand that it was always meant as a final gift from Bowie to his fans.

But for me, that video is a warning.

There’s a scene about 3 minutes into the “Lazarus” video that’s difficult to watch. Scratch that, the entire video is difficult to watch now. Let’s call this scene harrowing. Bowie sits at a desk, frustrated and seemingly impatient to find the right words to jot down in the notebook in front of him. Suddenly a brief smile lights up his face and he begins enthusiastically scrawling on the pad in front of him.
A few seconds later, it’s as if Bowie is overwhelmed. He’s frantically writing now, face wrinkled in concentration, writing so furiously that his hand spills off the page and down the front of his desk.

To me, it’s screaming that Bowie had so much left to say. To contribute. To create. But time has run out.
There’s sage advice embedded here, a thinly veiled warning: Do not waste any more time not expressing yourself. Say what you need to say, boldly and without reservation. Nurture your creativity and don’t be shy about it. Stop constantly consuming and start creating before it’s too late, and that dark, mysterious wardrobe into nothingness consumes you.
Leave your mark. Start today.


Published in The Happy Startup School
Jason Evangelho

David Bowie's last days: an 18-month burst of creativity

Over the last months of his life, the singer was able to shake off late career doldrums and, despite his illness, find a final creative surge


https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/1c64142fbdeee1a65c492376b2700b00f8e0121e/0_23_791_475/master/791.jpg
This picture, published for the first time, was taken by David Bowie’s longstanding photographer Jimmy King in September last year and captures him on the set of the video for Blackstar in Brooklyn, New York


For more than a decade before his death David Bowie seemed to disappear. Beset by ill health after an on-stage heart attack in 2004, he largely withdrew into a life at home in New York, becoming a ghost in the city where he had lived for a quarter of a century.

Yet as the world comes to terms with his death this week, admirers are digesting a remarkable late burst of creativity, a dramatic 18-month flourish capped by an apparently exquisitely well-crafted exit.


At 69, Bowie reasserted himself both as a musician – Blackstar, the album released two days before his death, is topping charts around the world – and as a questing creative figure whose vision is still playing out on the New York theatre stage.

How did Bowie pull this off from the penthouse duplex he shared with wife, Iman, and 15-year-old daughter, Lexi, in the Nolita section of downtown Manhattan?

The singer’s encroaching frailty meant he kept his life local. The theatre where his play Lazarus is running is no more than a few minutes walk away; Magic Shop, the studio where he recorded albums Blackstar and The Next Day, is even closer, on Crosby Street.

https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/1930afc1ca0381a8c37a057789d2ce3dd002985f/0_47_1100_660/master/1100.jpg
Magic Shop recording studio in Manhattan where David Bowie recorded Blackstar
Photograph: Hannes Bieger

Each place would offer Bowie a last opportunity to work in the musical and theatrical worlds that he had specialised in amalgamating throughout his career. “He wasn’t any single thing,” longtime collaborator Mick Rock told the Guardian. “He was the great synthesizer.”

The picture that has emerged over the past few days is of a man who was able to shake off late career doldrums and, in spite of declining health, find a final, focused burst of creativity.

First, in 2013, came The Next Day, an album that was a stylistic tour of his career; then the V&A’s David Bowie Is – an exhibit of 300 objects of Bowie memorabilia revealing the consideration with which he had preserved the artefacts of his career; the play Lazarus, now set for London’s West End; and finally Blackstar, a jazz record that launched with a video that appears to anticipate his death.

According to Bowie’s longtime producer Tony Visconti, Bowie had known since at least November that his cancer was terminal. But even in his final weeks, Bowie had no idea how little time was left and was talking about a Blackstar follow-up.

Pictures from the opening night of Lazarus on 7 December last year showed Bowie still handsome and immaculate but possibly showing signs that he may have been unwell. Theatre producer Robert Fox, who worked with him on Lazarus, said Bowie never complained.

“The work was great and working with him was wonderful but it wasn’t great that he wasn’t well. It was not good at all. Some days he just wasn’t able to be around, but whenever he could be, it [his cancer] didn’t interfere with his contribution. It was just horrible for him, rather than difficult for us.”

Fox believed the work was not specifically coloured by Bowie’s sense of his own mortality. “The struggle with mortality goes on whether or not you’re unwell. People write about that stuff even when they’re in perfectly good health,” he said. But Fox, who helped Bowie find a director and cast the actors, concedes it must have had some effect.

“He would talk about his illness only to the extent that it affected his work. Not in any other way. He never grumbled. But I don’t think he planned on not being around. He was optimistic that something (a treatment) would come along that meant that he could be.”

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David Bowie arrives at the premiere of the musical Lazarus. Photograph: BR/ dana press/PA

Bowie had been battling cancer for six months when he entered Magic Shop’s expansive studio facilities in January 2015 to record his 25th album. The studio, which has also been used by Coldplay and Arcade Fire, was already known to him; he had recorded much of his previous album The Next Day there. But instead of rock musicians, he brought seven demos to progressive jazz saxophonist Donny McCaslin.

The sessions were short and light-hearted, typically running from 11am to 4pm over three sessions of a week through to March. James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem came in to add synths and percussion and the tracks were finished off in Visconti’s own studio in April.

Visconti, who produced the album over the first few months of 2015, told Rolling Stone that Bowie showed up for some Blackstar sessions without eyebrows or hair after undergoing chemotherapy.

“There was no way he could keep it a secret from the band,” he told the magazine. “But he told me privately and I really got choked up when we sat face to face talking about it.”

Bowie’s affliction had not dulled his enthusiasm for work. “His energy was that of a very young person diving into everything with fearless joy and abandon,” said recent Bowie collaborator Maria Schneider, the orchestral-jazz composer. “Not to say he wasn’t serious. He was very clear about what he did and didn’t like.”



Annie-B Parson, of New York’s Big Dance Theater company, was the choreographer on the Lazarus musical and worked in close proximity with Bowie from September until the opening night in December.

She said she did not know he was ill and did not think the actors knew either as they worked quickly to develop the show in a tiny studio at the New York Theater Workshop.

But the director of the musical, Ivo van Hove, told her something that she only now realises the significance of. “At the beginning, he said this was the saddest piece he had ever worked on,” she said. “It’s deeply connected to death and a person contemplating his own existence from the first moment we see him.”


During rehearsals, Bowie sat quietly, elegantly dressed in grey sweater and white shirt, writing with a stub of pencil on a piece of paper. Physically, “all criss-crossed”, the choreographer noted, his slender arms and legs twisted about each other in concentration. Bowie would not intervene, but the creative team would get feedback.

“He insisted on spectacle. What struck me was that Bowie was from some other place, he wasn’t of this planet and he was cool with that,” Parson said.

It only occurred to her with hindsight that a person’s knowledge that they may have limited time left might fuel their creativity. Bowie was suddenly prolific, driven. “There was almost an insistence that he had so much to say. He needed to get out these songs in time. And he did,” she said.

Speaking on Friday from Warsaw, van Hove said: “The first thing that struck me when I met in a room in New York with David and Enda [Walsh, Bowie’s co-writer on the piece] and they read it to me and played some of the music was the existential theme – life and death and is there life after death or can you go on living just in your mind or your imagination?”

When Bowie told van Hove, in strictest confidence, in November 2014, that he had cancer and might not survive the project, the songs he was writing became deeper, especially Lazarus, the song of the eponymous musical and single.

“It is like his testament,” said van Hove.

Bowie’s creative surge was stunning. When he was feeling ill after treatment, he would stay away from rehearsals, but was intimately involved when in attendance and a genuine collaborator who thrived off his cohorts’ ideas, van Hove said.

“He was private about the details of his health situation. I didn’t question him, but I knew he did not want to die. He was in a struggle for life during those 18 months,” he said.

Some of the songs in the musical convey huge inner rage and a protest about violence in society, overlaid with poetry and layers of sound. “But in person he was always the perfect gentleman,” van Hove said. As Bowie became sicker, later in 2015, van Hove said he saw fear in his eyes. “He was fragile,” he said.

After the opening night of Lazarus, Bowie had to sit down backstage with van Hove and Iman, exhausted after taking his bow. “I escorted him to his car and I somehow knew it was the last time I would see him.”

Music video director Johan Renck was already thrilled to be working with his childhood hero last July on the title track of the diamond heist TV drama The Last Panthers that he had directed in England, when the British pop icon told him there was more to the tune they had just recorded. A lot more – a version that turned out to be Blackstar, the towering single from the album Bowie had been writing.

“I flew from London to New York and met with him at his office in Soho to listen to the full track. He put his hand on my shoulder and said with a grin – ‘I must warn you, it’s 10 minutes long’. There was no way I could say no. He had this warmth and this infectious smile and I knew it would be an interesting journey,” Renck said.


The two began a fiercely intense and, as it turned out, all too short collaboration.

“Over Skype he said ‘I feel I have to tell you this. I’m very ill and I may not make it’. I had been in this playful mood, pitching ideas back and forth with him like giddy 12-year-olds and I was absolutely shocked. He said: ‘I don’t even know if by the time we shoot this video you will have to have a replacement for me to perform in it’,” Renck said.

Bowie gave Renck no details of his cancer, only that he would be in cycles of treatment that meant he would have “my good periods and bad periods”, the director said. Bowie asked Renck not to tell a soul – this is the first time he has spoken publicly since Bowie’s death.

When Bowie and Renck came to shoot the video for Blackstar in September and, in November, the next single Lazarus, the mood was exuberant.

They shot Bowie performing for one day for each video and just five hours on those days in a studio in Brooklyn. That was all his health would take, Renck said.


https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/0efd9d899b4f6c239e0e4505767b568cb90100f4/0_12_1368_821/master/1368.jpg
Dsvid Bowie as Button Eyes in the Lazarus video. Photograph: handout/Handout

Bowie wanted it to feature an isolated village, then Renck came up with the idea of rituals that mixed the occult with a celebration of life. Bowie also wanted a scarecrow in the video, Renck said, and sent Renck his sketch for the macabre character Button Eyes that he plays in both videos. The sketch showed a bandaged head, buttons for eyes and just a small strip of a Mohawk for hair.

“Bowie didn’t know if he would have hair left by the time of the shoot,” said Renck.

In fact he did, a splendid shock of silvery grey hair – though he had to be careful or it came out in tufts because of his cancer treatment.
   
Unlike the sweeping anthem Blackstar, Renck described Lazarus as a little gem. Bowie reappears as Button Eyes, tormented on a hospital bed.

“I just thought of it as the Biblical tale of Lazarus rising from the bed. In hindsight, he obviously saw it as the tale of a person in his last nights,” said Renck.

While working, Bowie talked of his family but kept himself quite private, while being very easygoing and friendly with the small crew that worked on the intimate shoot.

He would arrive so suave in suit and fedora and sip cups of tea, Renck said, Despite the warning, he did not realise the star was so gravely ill because he seemed so spritely while shooting. He would get tired and take breaks, Renck said, but he seemed so happy.

The video of Lazarus shows Button Eyes and also Bowie’s other “character”, a dancer in a slick suit, gyrating in classic Bowie camp style then writing frenetically, a man desperately running out of time. Finally the figure retreats into a wardrobe and shuts the doors behind him.

It’s haunting but also witty, mocking death, Renck said.

“So British, the wit, like a guilt thing, making sure it’s not coming across as too serious or pretentious – and yet that enhances the humanity of it.”

Renck and Bowie also agreed that the joke was that the star, legendary for his gender-bending and fluid sexuality, was going “back into the closet”.

“The closet, or coffin, if you will,” said Renck.

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/jan/15/david-bowies-last-days-an-18-month-burst-of-creativity?CMP=share_btn_fb

Factory Girl wrote on Jan 16^th, 2016 at 10:56am:

Bowie also collaborated with Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails.

That was an amazing tour IMO...I really felt like I was witnessing something that would become legendary

http://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/david-bowies-matchmaking-pal-recalls-7193056

This is priceless...and it has a photo of Bowie with his mother on his wedding day!

David Bowie’s final album, Blackstar, debuts at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart with almost 181.000 units, giving his first No. 1 album.

The greatest hits collection Best of Bowie also reaches a new peak at No. 4 (it reached #70 on 2002).
Blackstar and Best of Bowie bring the artist’s total of top 10-charting albums to nine. He previously hit the region with The Next Day (peaking at No. 2 in 2013), Let’s Dance (No. 4, 1983), ChangesOneBowie (No. 10, 1976), Station to Station (No. 3, 1976), Young Americans (No. 9, 1975), David Live (No. 8, 1974) and Diamond Dogs (No. 5, 1974).

He has 10 albums that either re-enter or debut on the Billboard 200 chart this week.

About the Stones, Hot Rocks checks in at #188 too.


THE BILLBOARD 200
(Issue 01/30/2016)

1 BOWIE*DAVID BLACKSTAR 180,819
2 ADELE 25 142,605
3 BIEBER*JUSTIN PURPOSE 103,687
4 BOWIE*DAVID BEST OF DAVID BOWIE 93,516
5 TWENTY ONE PILOTS BLURRYFACE 43,172
6 THE WEEKND BEAUTY BEHIND THE MADNESS 38,869
7 STAPLETON*CHRIS TRAVELLER 32,712 ­
8 TILLER*BRYSON T R A P S O U L 32,542
9 G­EAZY WHEN IT'S DARK OUT 28,742 ­
10 FETTY WAP FETTY WAP 28,632

11 GOMEZ*SELENA REVIVAL 27,447 ­
12 ONE DIRECTION MADE IN THE A.M. 26,380
13 MENDES*SHAWN HANDWRITTEN 24,468
14 BROWN*CHRIS ROYALTY 23,770 ­
15 SWIFT*TAYLOR 1989 23,607 ­
16 COLE*J. 2014 FOREST HILLS DRIVE 21,395
17 DRAKE AND FUTURE WHAT A TIME TO BE ALIVE 21,277
18 PLATTEN*RACHEL WILDFIRE 21,089
19 ADELE 21 21,005
20 HUNT*SAM MONTEVALLO 20,387

21 BOWIE*DAVID RISE & FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST 18,580
22 TRAINOR*MEGHAN TITLE 17,327
23 COLDPLAY A HEAD FULL OF DREAMS 16,620
24 SHEERAN*ED X 16,371
25 RHETT*THOMAS TANGLED UP 16,077
26 FUTURE DS2 15,693
27 HALSEY BADLANDS 14,759
28 TWENTY ONE PILOTS VESSEL 14,662
29 BRYAN*LUKE KILL THE LIGHTS 13,620
30 DRAKE IF YOU'RE READING THIS, IT'S 13,404

31 THE CHAINSMOKERS BOUQUET 13,359
32 WILLIAMS*JOHN STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS 12,961
33 HAMILTON / O.B.C.R. HAMILTON / O.B.C.R. 12,948
34 CARA*ALESSIA KNOW­IT­ALL 12,800
35 GOULDING*ELLIE DELIRIUM 12,621 ­
36 FALL OUT BOY AMERICAN BEAUTY/AMER 12,579 ­
37 BEATLES BEATLES 1 11,937 ­
38 FLO RIDA MY HOUSE 11,871
39 SOUNDTRACK STRAIGHT OUTTA C(EX) 11,327
40 LOVATO*DEMI CONFIDENT 10,736

41 LAMAR*KENDRICK TO PIMP A BUTTERFLY 10,714
42 SHELTON*BLAKE RELOADED: 20 #1 HITS 10,572
43 KING*ELLE LOVE STUFF 10,525
44 UNDERWOOD*CARRIE STORYTELLER 10,515 ­
45 SCOTT*TRAVIS RODEO 10,488 ­10 11,671
46 SMITH*SAM IN THE LONELY HOUR 10,045
47 MARTINEZ*MELANIE CRY BABY 9,611
48 VARIOUS ARTISTS NOW 56 9,535 ­
49 JACKSON*MICHAEL NUMBER ONES 9,296
50 PENTATONIX PENTATONIX 9,185 ­

51 DNCE SWAAY 9,103 ­
52 ADELE 19 9,049
53 DISTURBED IMMORTALIZED 8,943
54 CHURCH*ERIC MR. MISUNDERSTOOD 8,939 ­
55 G­EAZY THESE THINGS HAPPEN 8,897
56 SIVAN*TROYE BLUE NEIGHBOURHOOD 8,896
57 BOWIE*DAVID HUNKY DORY 8,776
58 STUD*MIKE THESE DAYS 8,682
59 QUEEN GREATEST HITS 8,418
60 JEREMIH LATE NIGHTS: THE ALBUM 8,160

61 DRAKE TAKE CARE 8,148
62 HOZIER HOZIER 8,087 ­
63 METALLICA METALLICA 8,055 ­
64 CAM UNTAMED 8,014
65 BOWIE*DAVID PLATINUM COLLECTION 7,808
66 FLEETWOOD MAC GREATEST HITS 7,574
67 DAYA DAYA 7,456
68 BOWIE*DAVID NOTHING HAS CHANGED 7,453
69 DRAKE NOTHING WAS THE SAME 7,452
70 MINAJ*NICKI PINKPRINT 7,446

71 BIG SEAN DARK SKY PARADISE 7,439 ­
72 BAY*JAMES CHAOS & THE CALM 7,339 ­
73 NATHANIEL RATELIFF & NATHANIEL RATELIFF & 7,168
74 YOUNG*CHRIS I'M COMIN' OVER 7,059
75 NIRVANA NEVERMIND 6,975
76 RAE SREMMURD SREMMLIFE 6,972
77 LAMAR*KENDRICK GOOD KID M.A.A.D CITY 6,941 ­
78 EMINEM CURTAIN CALL 6,823
79 KIDZ BOP KIDS KIDZ BOP 30 6,809 ­
80 EMINEM EMINEM SHOW 6,699

81 LOGIC INCREDIBLE TRUE STORY 6,698
82 DAIGLE*LAUREN HOW CAN IT BE 6,525
83 GIDDENS*RHIANNON TOMORROW IS MY TURN 6,472
84 GRAMMER*ANDY MAGAZINES OR NOVELS 6,246
85 DERULO*JASON EVERYTHING IS 4 6,220
86 X AMBASSADORS VHS 6,195 ­
87 FLORIDA GEORGIA LINE ANYTHING GOES 6,178
88 FURIOUS 7 / O.S.T. FURIOUS 7 / O.S.T. 6,125
89 SMITH*JORDAN THE COMPLETE SEASON 9 COLLECTI 6,125
90 BOWIE*DAVID LET'S DANCE 6,043

91 JOURNEY GREATEST HITS 5,988
92 BROWN*ZAC BAND JEKYLL + HYDE 5,935
93 MAROON 5 V 5,924
94 MAJOR LAZER PEACE IS THE MISSION 5,921
95 ROSS*RICK BLACK MARKET 5,913
96 IMAGINE DRAGONS NIGHT VISIONS 5,867 ­
97 DEL REY*LANA BORN TO DIE 5,851
98 UNDERWOOD*CARRIE GREATEST HITS: DECADE #1 5,657
99 MARLEY*BOB & THE WAILERS LEGEND 5,632
100 OLD DOMINION MEAT AND CANDY 5,453

101 5 SECONDS OF SUMMER SOUNDS GOOD FEELS GOOD 5,446 ­
102 ALEXANDER*JOEY MY FAVORITE THINGS 5,419 ­
103 COLE*J. BORN SINNER 5,281
104 SHEERAN*ED + 5,265 ­
105 PUSHA T KING PUSH­DARKEST BEFORE DAWN: 5,262
106 TY DOLLA $IGN FREE TC 5,236
107 FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH GOT YOUR SIX 5,225
108 AC/DC BACK IN BLACK 5,189
109 SIA 1000 FORMS OF FEAR 5,176
110 BEATLES ABBEY ROAD 5,159

111 CAGE THE ELEPHANT TELL ME I'M PRETTY 5,158
112 TUPAC GREATEST HITS 5,157
113 EAGLES GREATEST HITS '71­75 5,124
114 EMINEM MARSHALL MATHERS LP2 5,079
115 KELLY*R BUFFET 5,069
116 PINK FLOYD DARK SIDE OF THE MOON 5,069
117 ALABAMA SHAKES SOUND & COLOR 5,057
118 A$AP ROCKY AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP 5,043
119 ELDREDGE*BRETT ILLINOIS 4,999
120 SOUNDTRACK FIFTY SHADES OF GREY 4,978

121 THE WEEKND TRILOGY 4,966
122 IMAGINE DRAGONS SMOKE + MIRRORS 4,952
123 PANIC! AT THE DISCO TOO WEIRD TO LIVE TOO RARE TO 4,935 ­
124 BROWN*ZAC BAND GREATEST HITS SO FAR 4,932
125 SHAKILA 11:11 CITY OF LOVE 4,897
126 MUSE DRONES 4,893
127 JOEL*BILLY ESSENTIAL BILLY JOEL 4,891
128 WEST*KANYE GRADUATION 4,890
129 PRESLEY*ELVIS ELVIS 30 NO. 1 HITS 4,882
130 BEYONCE BEYONCE 4,823

131 ALDEAN*JASON OLD BOOTS, NEW DIRT 4,819 ­
132 MARS*BRUNO DOO ­ WOPS & HOOLIGANS 4,815
133 LIL DICKY PROFESSIONAL RAPPER 4,811 ­
134 BOWIE*DAVID ALADDIN SANE 4,800
135 VANCE JOY DREAM YOUR LIFE AWAY 4,793
136 BEYONCE I AM...SASHA FIERCE 4,791
137 WINEHOUSE*AMY BACK TO BLACK 4,775
138 J COLE COLE WORLD: THE SIDELINE STORY 4,706
139 VARIOUS ARTISTS BIG BEETHOVEN BOX 4,705
140 LED ZEPPELIN LED ZEPPELIN 4 4,697

141 BRYAN*LUKE CRASH MY PARTY 4,641
142 JOHN*ELTON GREATEST HITS 1970­ 2002 4,635
143 BOWIE*DAVID LOW 4,588
144 SINATRA*FRANK ULTIMATE SINATRA 4,557
145 BEATLES BEATLES:THE WHITE ALBUM 4,543 ­
146 EMINEM RECOVERY 4,524
147 GUNS N'ROSES GREATEST HITS 4,519
148 TIMBERLAKE*JUSTIN 20/20 EXPERIENCE COMPLETE 4,492
149 WALK THE MOON TALKING IS HARD 4,463
150 ARCTIC MONKEYS AM 4,423

151 BOWIE*DAVID NEXT DAY 4,372
152 BRIDGES*LEON COMING HOME 4,341 ­
153 ALSINA*AUGUST THIS THING CALLED LIFE 4,309
154 METALLICA AND JUSTICE FOR ALL 4,308 ­
155 MEEK MILL DREAMS WORTH MORE THAN MONEY 4,307 ­
156 N.W.A. STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON 4,305
157 FLORIDA GEORGIA LINE HERE'S TO THE GOOD TIMES 4,284
158 A$AP ROCKY LONG.LIVE.A$AP 4,282
159 FALL OUT BOY SAVE ROCK & ROLL 4,277
160 VARIOUS ARTISTS FROZEN 4,276

161 GRANDE*ARIANA MY EVERYTHING 4,270
162 MUMFORD & SONS WILDER MIND 4,247
163 GRIZFOLK WAKING UP THE GIANTS 4,204
164 ONE DIRECTION FOUR 4,201 ­
165 TOVE LO QUEEN OF THE CLOUDS 4,194
166 SOUNDTRACK GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY: AWESO 4,193 ­
167 MADONNA IMMACULATE COLLECTION 4,174
168 METALLICA MASTER OF PUPPETS 4,163
169 WEST*KANYE MY BEAUTIFUL DARK TWISTED FANT 4,146
170 EMPIRE OF THE SUN WALKING ON A DREAM 4,130

171 GILBERT*BRANTLEY JUST AS I AM 4,128 ­
172 GUETTA*DAVID LISTEN 4,110
173 CHILDISH GAMBINO BECAUSE THE INTERNET 4,089
174 BALLERINI*KELSEA THE FIRST TIME 4,083
175 ENYA DARK SKY ISLAND 4,069
176 KID INK SUMMER IN THE WINTER 4,041 ­
177 KELLY*TORI UNBREAKABLE SMILE 3,998
178 KRAMER*JANA THIRTY­ONE 3,997
179 CREEDENCE CLEARWATER REVIVAL VOL. 1 ­CHRONICLE­20 GREATEST H 3,961
180 BOOSIE BADAZZ IN MY FEELINGS (GOIN THRU IT) 3,952

181 LOGIC UNDER PRESSURE 3,934
182 DR. DRE DR. DRE 2001 3,931
183 COLLINS*PHIL HITS 3,900
184 ONE DIRECTION MIDNIGHT MEMORIES 3,897
185 BRING ME THE HORIZON THAT'S THE SPIRIT 3,889
186 PANIC! AT THE DISCO FEVER YOU CAN'T SWEAT OUT 3,888
187 SONGZ*TREY TRIGGA 3,887
188 ROLLING STONES HOT ROCKS 1964-­71 3,861
189 GROBAN*JOSH STAGES 3,860
190 GREEN DAY AMERICAN IDIOT 3,824

191 SHINEDOWN THREAT TO SURVIVAL 3,791 ­
192 BON JOVI SLIPPERY WHEN WET 3,786
193 R. CITY WHAT DREAMS ARE MADE OF 3,785
194 FRANKLIN*KIRK LOSING MY RELIGION 3,777
195 LITTLE BIG TOWN PAIN KILLER 3,770
196 MARS*BRUNO UNORTHODOX JUKEBOX 3,761
197 MY CHEMICAL ROMANCEBLACK PARADE,THE 3,747 ­
198 VARIOUS ARTISTS WOW HITS 2016 3,720
199 EMPIRE CAST EMPIRE: ORIG SNDTRK, S2­V1 3,670
200 MACKLEMORE & RYAN LEWIS THE HEIST 3,669

Dancing In The Street: New Orleans Throws A Memorial Parade For David Bowie


January 19, 2016
ALISON FENSTERSTOCK



http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2016/01/19/bowie_eg4_2580-098273bf849a42ce78dd4e8d68746a24247453c8-s800-c85.jpg
Win Butler (with red megaphone) and Regine Chassagne (lower left, with keytar) of Arcade Fire lead a parade through New Orleans' French Quarter with members of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band in honor of David Bowie.
Erika Goldring for NPR



Mardi Gras Day was still close to three weeks away. But on Saturday afternoon, Jan. 16, the French Quarter was gridlocked with costumed frolickers, a massive, glittery throng radiating out through the narrow streets from the historic traditional-jazz venue Preservation Hall. The occasion? A parade in memory of David Bowie, led by the Preservation Hall Jazz Band.

It's not a stretch to imagine that David Bowie fandom would be rampant in a city for which flamboyant, gender-ambivalent dressing up, not to mention music, is a way of life. That, combined with a perfectly warm and sunny afternoon, the beginning of the Carnival season and, certainly, interest in the parade's co-hosts Win Butler and Regine Chassagne of Arcade Fire, who have lived in New Orleans for about two years, drew multiple thousands of fans downtown — so many that the blocks outside the Hall and the parade's end point, the rock club One Eyed Jacks, were almost impassable. The band, led by Butler, who sang through a small red megaphone and Chassagne, who played a keytar, left Preservation Hall and gamely shoved its way through the mass toward the Mississippi River and then back, along a route about a half-dozen blocks long, playing Bowie songs arranged for parading brass.

Bowie was an ardent fan of Arcade Fire. In 2005, they recorded a live EP together; eight years later, he contributed backing vocals to the band's album Reflektor. Standing on Preservation Hall's balcony with Chassagne and Ben Jaffe, the Hall's creative director, Butler spoke briefly about the shock of his friend's death. "It felt like a planet exploded," he said. He opened a bottle of wine and poured a splash onto the crowd.

Chassagne and Butler have been spending a lot of time with the Hall band since relocating. In December, they joined the group on a weeklong trip to Cuba. Just before leaving, Jaffe said later, they had begun rehearsing Bowie's "Modern Love," with its ebullient horn bursts, together. (When the parade and its aftermath were done and the huge crowd dispersed, the band members returned to Preservation Hall to play the night's three regular trad-jazz sets. The couple joined them onstage to close the first one with "Modern Love.")

Since his death, an avalanche of keen appreciations have been written on the multiple layers and levels of David Bowie's omnivorous musical appetite, including his plastic-soul forays into funk and disco. Bowie, whose first instrument was the saxophone, would have likely been pleased or at least entertained to hear "Modern Love" and "Fame" arranged for strutting, with sousaphone thump and trumpet blasts, as well as explosively brassy, rumbling versions of "Suffragette City" and "Heroes." Blackstar, his sweeping, atmospheric final testament, was another showcase for his ongoing interest in jazz, employing the avant-garde Donny McCaslin Quartet as backing band. And not for nothing, Bowie has cited as a powerful influence and inspiration Little Richard, who honed his own wild sound (and look) in career-making early-'50s sessions at Cosimo Matassa's J&M Studio in the Quarter.

Second lines come from the older jazz funeral custom in New Orleans, the structured ritual of accompanying a body from the site of a memorial service to the site of burial. The "first line" comprises the casket, family and close friends and a band with parade-friendly — that is, portable — instrumentation: bass and snare drums and horns. The second line is the group of onlookers that follows, walking first to the somber rhythm of a dirge, and then, after the body is "cut loose" at the cemetery, dancing to a joyous, upbeat brass-band whomp. (The dirge that began Preservation Hall's parade was "Oh! You Pretty Things," played at a solemn tempo.) Late in the nineteenth century, Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs — community groups that are exactly what they sound like, cooperating to help members in need and to have fun — began presenting second-line parades with brass bands out of pure celebration. Most New Orleans weekends, except during the hottest summer months, deliver at least one such parade.

Both expressions of the second line are deeply New Orleanian practices, invested with history and meaning. After the event, as Butler DJed Bowie songs on the club's balcony while Chassagne and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band's Walter Harris drummed along, Ben Jaffe, who also plays bass and sousaphone in the Hall band, pointed out that he had been careful to bill it as a memorial parade. "The idea of a second line is so sacred," he said. "Not a lot of people from outside of New Orleans have been honored with that." (The only one most people I asked could remember, in recent history, was a massive second line in memory of Michael Jackson organized by the Revolution Social Aid and Pleasure Club in June 2009, a week after Jackson's death.)

Jaffe took over management of the venue and band shortly after graduating from Oberlin College's conservatory in the early '90s. His parents, Allan and Sandra Jaffe, had run the place since 1961, hiring players who remembered the earliest days of jazz and creating a gathering spot — often racially integrated, flouting Jim Crow — for French Quarter bohemians and fans of traditional jazz, whose popularity had been on the wane. Preservation Hall still presents three traditional sets nightly, in a hundred-ish-capacity showroom that hasn't changed much in fifty-odd years. The audience sits on wooden benches or on the floor, quite literally at the band's feet; there's no bar or restroom access. But over the course of the younger Jaffe's tenure, the Hall has also carefully expanded its purview to present or record with an eclectic list of collaborators. John Oates, Jimmy Buffett (who began his career busking on the streets of the Quarter in the '60s, as Preservation Hall was starting its own) Bombino, the Alabama Shakes and Shovels and Rope have all played the Hall in the past three years.

Tom Waits, Ani DiFranco, Merle Haggard, Jim James and Jason Isbell, among others, have all also recently recorded with the Hall band, which is an active host to its performing guests. During those special live performances, the band doesn't cede the stage; it actively backs the featured act. Those new experiments are arguably helped along by the fact that many members of its current first-string band are younger, more connected to pop, R&B and even hip-hop, as well as traditional jazz. Last year, the Hall band shared the stage with local bounce-music icon DJ Jubilee as well as with the rappers Fiend, who frequently collaborates with Curren$y, and Nesby Phips, a great-nephew of Mahalia Jackson who's worked with Juvenile and Lil Wayne. There's also the natural hybridity of music in South Louisiana, where brass bands and zydeco musicians have regularly adopted elements of funk, soul, pop and hip-hop for decades.

A parade for David Bowie fits not unreasonably into the evolving Hall. It surely fits into New Orleans, a city that believes so strongly in the transformative power of masking that its calendar includes a season — and since 1875, a legal holiday — during which obscuring your identity and trying on new ones is the rule. The French Quarter teemed with Ziggy Stardusts, Goblin Kings and creepy clowns but also with people in sundry unrelated wigs, masks, tutus, boas, hats, suits, ties, gowns and other regalia following, arguably, one of the great directives of Bowie: Feel beautiful, being yourself. Or being somebody else.


http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2016/01/19/bowie_eg4_2477_custom-ceb899d6365281c7cef44d6eefb78429e1acdf12-s800-c85.jpg
Paraders and onlookers at the corner of Royal and St. Peter Streets as Arcade Fire and Preservation Hall Jazz Band lead a memorial parade for David Bowie through the French Quarter on Jan.16.
Erika Goldring for NPR



Among the costumed revelers in their freaky best were several sporting copies of the gauzy blindfold Bowie wore in the video for the Blackstar single "Lazarus," which was released three days before his death and is now, of course, widely read as a work of art about it. In the video, with the fabric around his eyes, he clutches the blanket of a narrow hospital bed as the camera closes in on the veins that stand out on his bony hands and throat, and the deep wrinkles around his mouth. He's made himself into a grim specter of mortality, a vision of death — or of a strange zone after life but before death, where the light is gray and the shadows get longer.

A lot of traditional masking groups take to the streets on Mardi Gras Day, including Mardi Gras Indians, in their elaborately beaded and feathered suits, and Baby Dolls, women in poofy bloomers and frilly hats whose practice dates back to black Storyville, at the beginning of the twentieth century. One of those, thought to be about as old, is the North Side Skull and Bones Gang. At the crack of dawn, carrying sticks and wearing handmade skeleton suits, they start to knock on doors in the Treme neighborhood. Most wear papier-mache skull masks and aprons hand-printed with messages like "The End Is Near," "Too Late" or ominously, "You Next." They kick off the last day of carnival, the literal farewell to the flesh, as visions of death come knocking, a stark reminder that all flesh really is temporary.

In an entry on jazz funerals and second line parades for Knowla.org, the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities' encyclopedia of all things boot-state, Tulane music professor Matt Sakakeeny wrote that the jazz funeral "celebrates life at the moment of death." The Carnival season and its aftermath, Lent and Easter, is similar, a cycle of life, death and rebirth marked by ceremony.

So much of the strange and elegant Blackstar resonates now as a graceful final testament, a sort of ceremonial exit run through — especially "Lazarus" — with awareness of mortality. Like the Skull and Bones gangs or the Lazarus maskers, it was a reminder of death during the celebration of life, and like a jazz funeral, a burst of vitality in the midst of mourning — an escort from the world of the living to whatever comes after, a celebration of life at the moment of death, the last great transformation.


http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2016/01/19/bowie_eg4_2496_custom-d67f72d15809676f981efd17824874b0d98a411f-s800-c85.jpg
Fans on St. Peter Street outside Preservation Hall.
Erika Goldring for NPR


http://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2016/01/19/463578959/dancing-in-the-street-new-orleans-throws-a-memorial-parade-for-david-bowie

More pics from the parade:




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Saints hero Steve Gleason joins the procession as Arcade Fire and Preservation Hall hold a second line tribute through the French Quarter in honor David Bowie on Saturday, January 16, 2016. (Photo by Michael DeMocker, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune)

http://image.nola.com/home/nola-media/pgmain/img/tpphotos/photo/2016/01/16/-e9c61a65282a17ff.JPG

http://image.nola.com/home/nola-media/pgmain/img/tpphotos/photo/2016/01/16/-7da2d32c6a54c288.JPG

Cheers for the article and pics, Edith. Beautiful.

Elvis Presley asked David Bowie to be his producer, claims country star

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/jan/21/elvis-presley-david-bowie-produce-record-request-country-star-dwight-yoakam

David Bowie impersonates...


https://youtu.be/NrtXFTw2ico

I have lost five family members since last July. I've never known anything like it. It's fucking scary. Now I've got fucking skin cancer, damned Australian UV levels. Fuck the beach! I come home from my cousin's funeral, and I hear on SKY; Bowie's dead. I don't get all dewy eyed when celeb's die, but Bowie; I'm gutted. I know we all gotta go one day but, this is one tough mofo to bear RIP Bowie. An innovator to the end.

Let's not forget Tone N. in all this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BGL-a_FrHk

http://www.msn.com/en-us/music/celebrity/david-bowie-invisible-new-yorker/ar-BBohncu?ocid=EIE9HP

Fitting tribute from Conan, who was a bit teary eyed at the end.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4d8QrRJvsE

Mick Jagger reminisces on his friendship with Bowie in 'Rolling Stone'

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/mick-jagger-remembers-david-bowie-he-would-share-so-much-with-me-20160126

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/30/nyregion/david-bowies-will-splits-estate-said-to-be-worth-100-million.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=mini-moth&region=top-stories-below&WT.nav=top-stories-below&_r=0

Alice Cooper on His Dinner With David Bowie and Ray Bradbury

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/alice-cooper-on-his-dinner-with-david-bowie-and-ray-bradbury-20160208

http://40.media.tumblr.com/b532c0d1aa0b5c77074f8c5c6ff1afc7/tumblr_o2hms6z4D81tiniwao1_500.jpg

David Bowie – 1971

January 27, 2016 by: John Swenson



Readers may be shocked by some of the comments Bowie expresses here, but Bowie later disavowed many of these kinds of comments blaming them on mental instability caused by his drug problems.–Ed.



A day after David Bowie died I got a phone call from manager Rueben Williams. “Tell me your Bowie story. I know you’ve got one.” Well, yes—I interviewed Bowie in 1971 on his first trip to America. It was for Zygote magazine, which folded before the story could be published. The Man Who Sold the World was the new album, before Bowie became Ziggy Stardust and went on to fame. He talked a lot about his philosophy and what he was planning to do. We took him to the airport on his way back to England and when we picked him up at the apartment where he was staying he was listening to a new album, the Velvet Underground’s Loaded, over and over again.



http://www.offbeat.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/davidbowie.earlperry-392x518.jpg
Photo by Earl Perry



I pulled out my old loose leaf notebook with the handwritten transcript in pencil and re-read the interview. I became a fan of Bowie’s after Space Oddity. The title track, with its astronaut Major Tom, was a great science fiction–oriented piece, but other tracks also had fascinating SF themes. The mysterious “Cygnet Committee” reminded me of the Philip K. Dick novels I was greedily devouring, and “Memory of a Free Festival” was a psychedelic meditation complete with an alien visitation that rivaled anything Pink Floyd had produced.

I was puzzled by The Man Who Sold the World when I first listened, expecting more of Space Oddity. There was no way I could have known that the radical shift between projects was a precursor to Bowie’s relentlessly variegated sequence of ideas and identities. But there was a connection through the two albums that continued into his next record, Hunky Dory, and its follow up, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars. Bowie was envisioning—perhaps even conjuring—a new evolution of humans: Homo Superior.



Please explain “Cygnet Committee.”

That first part is supposed to be the kind of guy who would put money into so-called underground activities, putting backing behind it hoping that he would get something out of it on a material level. And it did soothe his conscience a bit. There’s probably people over here like that as well. A kind of harmless… Okay call him a liberal, then. Ah, the second section were the Cygnet Committee, the people he had helped. I didn’t bother spelling this out at the time, but I realized very quickly after I recorded it that I should have been a little more specific. Although it’s worked nicely because some people have taken it totally different from the way I intended it and they’ve got a fine old meaning out of the whole thing.



Space Oddity strikes me as being religious. “Memory of a Free Festival” is sort of like the drug religion.

It was a drug-oriented festival. Even if I had tried to write the song without drugs in mind I would have rather not written the song. Everybody was, all of us were very heavily into drugs.

The physical body is being put to the limits of its exertion at the moment. Never before in the history of mankind have we been required to do so much in such a short space of time. It’s very hard for us to be natural.



Do you still consider yourself a Buddhist? Do you look at it as a religion or a philosophy?

[After a long pause, Bowie points out the window to a hotel across the street.]
The lights over there are very amazing to me. They are twinkling and they seem very wonderful things, and yet I have them in my own room but I don’t really take much notice of them. If that’s any kind of answer…  It’s with me all the time; I’ll never be able to forget it, because possibly I am it a bit. I can still look at it as an incredible way of life or a philosophy. I wish that I could become… disciplined enough to immerse myself in that lifestyle. But I fall back on the fact that I’ve absorbed a lot of it already. Then I think, well I’m doing it the Western way. Or maybe I’m not doing it at all, just taking out of it what I needed to get through my existence.



There’s a big difference between those two albums, not only an attitude difference but a difference in the kind of images that the songs give. In some ways The Man Who Sold the World was a depressing album. Space Oddity seemed a lot clearer, less confused.

Well, I’m enjoying life much more. I’ve slowed down a hell of a lot. I’m still too close to that new one that’s just come out, to listen to it and analyze it. It would be better if you could take a specific song…



All right, “The Width of a Circle.”

“Width of a Circle” covers a period from when I was about 17 to just before I recorded this album. Jesus, my next album is going to be totally different from either of these two. I can’t relate to Man very easily because I’m still pretty near to it and I’m still having something of a difficult time at the moment. It’s much calmer again and it’s back to that, but with a different edge because now I’m happy, and I really mean it now, I’m happier than I’ve ever been. I got married last year, I’ve been married for one year, and it’s been the best year of my life. My wife’s pregnant now and I’ll have a child in two months’ time. I don’t live in London anymore and I intend on coming over here to live. I made up my mind yesterday that I’m coming here to live—only for a couple of years, ’cause there’s a lot of other places I’d like to live in as well. Everything’s exciting again.



What about “All the Madmen”?

The guy in that story has been placed in a mental institution and there are a number of people in that institution being released each week that are his friends. Now they’ve said that he can leave as well. But he wants to stay there, ’cause he gets a lot more enjoyment out of staying there with the people he considers sane. He doesn’t want to go through the psychic compromises imposed on him by the outer world. [Pauses.] Ah, it’s my brother. ’Cause that’s where he’s at.



How about “She Shook Me Cold”?

Well, the two guys I was working with, drummer Woody Woodmansey and guitarist Mick Ronson, are semi-pro musicians from the North. They had a lot of trouble with my stuff ’cause they’re blues freaks, ah, and it’s all very hard and ultra-masculine stuff, so I thought I’d write one for them. And they loved it; they played their guts out on it! Tony Visconti is still producing, doing Tyrannosaurus Rex and such. “Black Country Rock” was written for Marc Bolan.

“The Supermen,” that was the seed of an idea of Homo Superior I was toying with. The coming of the New Man. I’ve written a lot of songs around that theme and only today I got an insight into another vehicle by which Homo Superior would arrive here. They were taping a show at WABC AM, one of the public service shows, and the Jewish Defense League people were being interviewed. There was a guy sitting on a piano bench in the studio. He’s taking Hebrew lessons with the fellow who’s the head of the JDL. It was Bob Dylan, who has gotten very involved with his Jewish heritage.

Ain’t that a mindfucker? As you can see there is food for thought. The “revolution” might not be so much of a political thing when it does come, but a race survival thing, as it surely is becoming here as part of the black/white struggle. If the population explosion goes on at the rate it’s been going, the politics of the whole thing will drop out and will become a matter of a race revolution. Whether that will produce a race of Homo Superior, we shall see. This idea is only vaguely seeding itself in my head at the moment, just today, and yesterday. I’ve got to think about it a lot more before I write about that particular idea. That was purely a mystical thought, a humanoid that lived forever, even though his gods were dying. It’s a murderer, a guy capable of murdering someone who found a way to kill people; he would be the new god.



I flashed on ancient Greek war heroes who would die intact when I heard that.

Yeah. It wasn’t based on that but it certainly is a parallel. I saw an interesting thing the other night on one of the Star Trek shows. Gassy show. When that embryonic force got into the spaceship and neutralized all their weapons yet kept them fighting each other inside the ship and thriving on that energy. If that had stayed around it would have been like that, it probably would have approached the Superman.



Are the songs you’re writing on this theme going to be the basis of your next album?

The new LP is just going to be a general series of observations, I’ve got like 20 numbers so far, two albums’ worth at the moment. My ego says I should put out a double album but my sales figures show that I shouldn’t do one.

By the time I’m ready to record I’ll select the ones that are up to my present way of thinking. However I’ll be thinking two months from now I don’t know. I’m a radical thinker in that I go from extreme to extreme. I find it stimulating. I’d hate to think that people considered me to have a point of view. The foremost way of expansion is to accept. Listen to people and learn from everyone and everything you see. We are told we have ultimate knowledge within ourselves and I think we can somewhat get onto the right road by looking at our fellow man. You can do so much on your own, but you can’t hide the fact that we are here with each other.



How do you see your role as an artist communicating through albums?

I like a professional attitude to media because it’s so important that if you’re going to communicate, you communicate right. You should know and study your media before you use it, and music is a very hard medium to use and you have to master it. You have to be graphic to be effective because this is a very fast era and to impress you must hit hard. People must be able to understand you instantly.

I would like to fulfill an image… because the people in this business are purely images. The audience just relates to whichever image they want. I would like to supply yet another image. I would like to supply the image of the underlying feeling of… the coming of a new world, not necessarily a new society.

It’s a very intangible state at the moment; hopefully the LP will explain it all.



Do you see yourself coming out a tradition of English psychedelic “head” bands like Pink Floyd, Arthur Brown, Procol Harum?

Don’t forget that England’s always been more of a philosophic nature than America.



But the American counterpart to that is the Grateful Dead, which is a totally different direction.

Well, dare I say that the Americans approach it with more of a primitive idealism. Not so much that, but also because everything moves so fast over here you’ve got to cut out the crap and get right down and lay home an idea very hard, and in very graphic details, whereas in England, we take our time about that and philosophize… we’re lethargic, we don’t produce any action. We just talk a lot.



Do you think that’s behind the development of these fantastically intricate concept bands?

Yes. Also, there’s more of a classical strain running through our entire musical tradition, whereas the young people in your country seem to be very aware that their heritage lies in the folk music tradition of this country.

There’s another thing to consider, with Traffic living in the shadow of Stonehenge and all. England is the strongest mystical force in the Western world. We don’t know it, none of us know it now, but it’s being revived gradually. There are so many empires of magical thought in our country that we’ve lost, forgotten through the ages.

Do you know who else was very hot on England’s magical force? Hitler. He wanted to possess our country for that reason; he needed that power to develop his Aryan race. Himmler, his right hand man, sent over 117 million pounds of SS money trying to find the Holy Grail in England. In England, the Druids have access to a lot of the Nazi books. They were turned on to the idea of Homo Superior long before anyone else. They found out that that was what the Nazi thing was about and they just collected all the books before anybody else got interested in it, or even was aware that there was such a thing as Homo Superior.



What is David Bowie?

What is David Bowie? David Bowie is the image, David Jones is me. But David Bowie is not a false person; I mean I am, also, David Bowie. I am schizoid. I’m as schizoid as my brother, except that I’m in the music business where I can get away with a lot more than my brother could get away with in the job that he had. I mean he was put into an institution for being like me. This is the fantastic quality of this business. Our level of standards of living is totally insane and absurd—to the civilian [laughs at the word] world. This army, it’s a pop army of madmen. The whole thing’s a symbolic army. I’m sure this is true, especially in England as we don’t have any more National Service, especially ’cause of this big virile blues kick that we’ve got going. Ah, it does feel like an army; I get a bit scared at times.


http://www.offbeat.com/articles/david-bowie-1971/

Edith Grove wrote on Apr 26^th, 2016 at 9:43am:

Readers may be shocked by some of the comments Bowie expresses here, but Bowie later disavowed many of these kinds of comments blaming them on mental instability caused by his drug problems.–Ed

lol! blame it on drugs. the man had nothin to apologize for

https://youtu.be/UUfXaF4g6lg

Something Cool Apparently Happens When David Bowie’s ‘Blackstar’ Is Exposed to Sunlight

By Nick DeRiso May 3, 2016 2:15 PM


http://cdn.pigeonsandplanes.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/bowie-blackstar-change.jpg



Some industrious fans have apparently discovered one more parting gift from David Bowie. They say they left the vinyl-edition cover of Blackstar, the late rocker’s final release, exposed to sunlight – and were thrilled as the image transformed.
Originally conspicuously black, in keeping with the title, the star on the LP’s cover reportedly becomes dotted with an entire galaxy of stars. See for yourself in the above image, which was uploaded to Imgur. (We recommend you take the vinyl disc itself out of the sleeve before trying this at home, by the way.)

Blackstar arrived just days before Bowie’s sudden death in January. Only later did fans learn of his lengthy, secret battle with cancer, and how Bowie had struggled to complete the project. “He made Blackstar for us, his parting gift,” Tony Visconti, Bowie’s longtime producer, memorably said. “I knew for a year this was the way it would be. I wasn’t, however, prepared for it.”

Afterward, every element of the album was dissected, from its lyrics to its stark cover to its imagery-laden videos. In some cases, you didn’t have to look far: Blackstar opens with the line, “Look up here, I’m in heaven.”

On the other hand, this latest Easter egg moment, if true, was so well hidden that it took months to discover. “He always did what he wanted to do,” Visconti said. “And he wanted to do it his way and he wanted to do it the best way. His death was no different from his life – a work of art.”


Read More: Something Cool Apparently Happens When David Bowie's 'Blackstar' Is Exposed to Sunlight | http://ultimateclassicrock.com/david-bowie-blackstar-sunlight/?utm_source=sailthru&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=newsletter_6651427&trackback=tsmclip

Edith Grove wrote on May 12^th, 2016 at 5:46am:

Something Cool Apparently Happens When David Bowie’s ‘Blackstar’ Is Exposed to Sunlight By Nick DeRiso May 3, 2016 2:15 PM http://cdn.pigeonsandplanes.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/bowie-blackstar-change.jpg Some industrious fans have apparently discovered one more parting gift from David Bowie. They say they left the vinyl-edition cover of Blackstar, the late rocker’s final release, exposed to sunlight – and were thrilled as the image transformed. Originally conspicuously black, in keeping with the title, the star on the LP’s cover reportedly becomes dotted with an entire galaxy of stars. See for yourself in the above image, which was uploaded to Imgur. (We recommend you take the vinyl disc itself out of the sleeve before trying this at home, by the way.) Blackstar arrived just days before Bowie’s sudden death in January. Only later did fans learn of his lengthy, secret battle with cancer, and how Bowie had struggled to complete the project. “He made Blackstar for us, his parting gift,” Tony Visconti, Bowie’s longtime producer, memorably said. “I knew for a year this was the way it would be. I wasn’t, however, prepared for it.” Afterward, every element of the album was dissected, from its lyrics to its stark cover to its imagery-laden videos. In some cases, you didn’t have to look far: Blackstar opens with the line, “Look up here, I’m in heaven.” On the other hand, this latest Easter egg moment, if true, was so well hidden that it took months to discover. “He always did what he wanted to do,” Visconti said. “And he wanted to do it his way and he wanted to do it the best way. His death was no different from his life – a work of art.” Read More: Something Cool Apparently Happens When David Bowie's 'Blackstar' Is Exposed to Sunlight | http://ultimateclassicrock.com/david-bowie-blackstar-sunlight/?utm_source=sailthru&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=newsletter_6651427&trackback=tsmclip

Yeah, it warps.  :aimama

'Blackstar opens with the line, “Look up here, I’m in heaven.” '

Not true.  That's the third song, "Lazarus."

Wake up, Bowie.

Great article with fantastic pics here:

http://mashable.com/2016/05/21/iggy-pop-david-bowie-friends/#X7R_7uzWskqX

Bernard Fowler played "Diamond Dogs" at Bowie's birthday celebration in NMYC

David Bowie's Band, Simon Le Bon, La Roux, Gary Oldman & Others Gather For Birthday Celebration

http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/rock/7647930/david-bowie-band-simon-le-bon-la-roux-gary-oldman-birthday-celebration-concert

Also another show at the Brixton Academy

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/concerts/david-bowie-tribute-gig-brixton-academy-flagrant-mess-absurd/

Is he still dead?

Our friend and ex-regular of Rocks Off, Fernando Aceves has an exhibition next Friday

"David Bowie: Among the Mexican Masters," Forest Lawn Museum, 1712 S. Glendale Ave., Glendale; Jan. 27-June 15; free. eventbrite.com/e/david-bowie-among-the-mexican-masters-tickets-30535365099

Rare Photos Capture David Bowie Soaking Up Mexican Culture
Thursday, January 19, 2017 at 8:26 a.m.
By Siran Babayan

http://www.laweekly.com/arts/rare-photos-capture-david-bowie-soaking-up-mexican-culture-7804390

http://images1.laweekly.com/imager/u/745xauto/7804393/image_2_.jpg
En la pirámides de Teotihuacán

http://images1.laweekly.com/imager/u/745xauto/7804394/image.jpg
Cameleón en el Palacio Nacional

http://images1.laweekly.com/imager/u/745xauto/7804392/image_1_.jpg
En el museo Frida Kahlo

Woman at David Bowie's Rochester arrest sets record straight 40 years later



By Ben Axelson
on January 22, 2017



Chi Wah Soo knew what really happened that night that David Bowie got arrested in Rochester, but it took 40 years for her to finally build up the nerve to tell someone.

The 61-year-old owner of Chi Wah Organica in Brighton faced accusations of being the "narc" who led police to Bowie, rocker Iggy Pop and fellow partygoers after a 1976 concert in Rochester.

But after a year and half spent earning her trust, filmmaker Matt Ehlers got Soo to reveal the details of the night that has become local rocklore in Rochester, The Democrat & Chronicle reported.

Ehlers has been working on a documentary about Bowie's arrest, called "Bowie Goes to Jail," and Soo's account was a missing piece to the puzzle.


http://image.newyorkupstate.com/home/adv-media/width380/img/newyorkupstatecom_national_desk_blog/photo/2017/01/22/21920636-large.jpg
David Bowie's famous mugshot from his arrest in Rochester.



"Everyone has the wrong idea of what happened," was all Soo would say to a Rochester reporter at the time. "They can think what they wish, but I know I'm innocent."

Soo was 20 when she and some friends went to see the legendary rocker in Rochester. During the concert, Soo got near the stage where Bowie noticed her and handed her a bracelet that had landed on stage.

According to Soo, a man approached her after the concert with a note saying, "Meet me at my party. David."

"Hello love," were the first words Bowie said to her as she walked in the door, Soo recalled.

She, Bowie and a group of other people including Iggy Pop, Bowie's bodyguard and two other women then went to Bowie's corner suite at what was then the Americana Rochester on State Street.

Soo told Ehlers that the two other women turned out to be undercover police working with investigators in an adjacent hotel room who were listening to the group through the wall. Police were acting on a tip that Bowie had cocaine.

Soo explained that Bowie's entourage did not have cocaine, but when they asked one of the undercover officers Deborah Kilborn where they could score some, it was enough for police to raid the room.

"That was the start of the nightmare," said Soo, recalling seeing officers slam the door into Bowie's face as he began to respond to it.

It turned out the group did have marijuana, but the charges against Bowie, Soo, Iggy Pop and the body guard were all eventually dropped.

Soo said she gave Bowie a traditional Chinese wedding blanket at their arraignment, which she claims shows up in the music video for "China Girl." She isn't sure if the song is about her, and said she and Bowie never spoke again.



Watch more of Soo's interview from the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle: http://www.newyorkupstate.com/rochester/2017/01/woman_at_david_bowies_rochester_arrest_sets_record_straight_i_know_im_innocent.html

Beautiful photos!

China Girl wasn't released till '83, this was '76.

That One Time Witches Tried To Steal David Bowie’s Urine


https://www.ultimate-guitar.com/articles/features/that_one_time_witches_tried_to_steal_david_bowies_urine-65615

This just in................David Bowie is still dead. :warhorse