Month: December 2003

Who to dance with on a Sunday night…

The Italian fan organisation, Moonage Daydream, has its annual fan meeting next week in Bassano del Grappa. With exhibitions of rare memorabilia, a special display of Philippe Auliac‘s wonderful pictures, live bands and Bowie music, the three-day event promises to be the usual treat for Bowie fans, and I have to admit that I’m very sad not to be able to attend.

Anyway, the organisers, Daniele, Monia, Giusi and Marco, sent me the following information which should answer any questions those of you thinking of attending may have…

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From the 4th to the 6th of January in Bassano del Grappa the annual David Bowie tribute will take place in collaboration with the National Bowie fan?s meeting.

This is now the 6th event of it?s kind which will be held on the eve of David Bowie?s birthday. Each year in this town we see various artists and personalities, which are linked to one of the most influential stars in the history of rock.

Why in Bassano del Grappa and not in Milan?

It may seem strange but Bassano del Grappa can boast the highest number of Bowie fans in relation to the number of residents.

This year?s event aims to bring together lifelong fans and new admirers by giving them visual and musical material to deepen their knowledge of the artist.

This 3 day event will be organised and supported by: the website www.moonagedaydream.it which promotes the artist in Italy, and by the local bars etc. which in these three days will make available their space for the showing of videos, organisation of exhibits and for the closing party, where it will be not only possible to listen to live bands playing ?Bowie hits? but to dance to the Duke?s successes and many other artists who have collaborated with him, such as T-Rex, Placebo, Roxy Music, Lou Reed and Iggy Pop.

Thanks to the contribution of P. Auliac you will be able to see almost 20 unedited photos dedicated to Bowie, which date from 1976 to 2003. These will be displayed in Sotto Underbar (1 Via Gamba, Bassano del Grappa.). During this event will be realise a videocassette that will contain Birthday Greetings fans wish to leave for ?the Duke? for his birthday on 8th January. The messages will subsequently be shown on our website.

Moreover an exhibition entitled ?Golden Years for Teenage Wildlife? is planned which thanks to the support of collectors, rare memorabilia and CDs from the period 1975 to 1979 will be on show. It was in this period that David Bowie spent a good three years in Berlin and worked with the legendary Brian Eno. This exhibition will be held in the ?Saletta Pagina Piegata? of Birreria Ottocento (2 Via S. Giorgio, Bassano del Grappa).

At Shindy Club will play four live band: Radiofiera, Mosika Sound, Mastica & Piol who will join to give us a Bowie Hot Night. At 00.30 will start the dancing party.

All Bowie Fans and Bowie Curious are welcome!

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Wow… sounds good eh? Click on either of the above images for even more information. When is somebody going to organise something similar here in the UK… that’s what I’d like to know.

Leave ’em a note saying “Happy New Year”…

It’s a new year folx… and we here at BowieNet wish another wonderful twelve months upon you all. As I’m sure you’ve all realised, 2004 is the 40th year since David Bowie released his first professional recording, Liza Jane, as Davie Jones with The King-Bees.

The recording was released by Vocalion, on June 5th, 1964, and we’ll tell you a little more about it on the day of it’s actual anniversary… btw, that’s the cover of the original sheet music above… and yes, that is David’s old mucker George Underwood stood next to him.

Anyway, here’s David’s new year message from the MBs:

The New One – Well, now, just you have the most perfect and wonderful New Year, and may your families and friends be safe and happy in this coming 2004 – Sailor.

Thanx Sailor, and the same to you from all of us.

Uncage the colours…

Those Dutch fruitcakes have produced the December 2003 issue of The Voyeur. It’s packed with the usual glut of great pictures from the lens of The Voyeur’s very own Antoine Loogman… and they’ve even gone colour, a bit. There’s a whole stack of interesting new features and reviews, best outlined in this bit from head voyeur, Peter Smit:

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The December 2003 issue of ‘The Voyeur’ is out now!

International David Bowie fanclub ‘The Voyeur’ again managed to produce a magazine even more beautiful than the previous one. Next to a lot of interesting articles as an extra this edition of “The Voyeur” contains four full colour pages with unique photographs from The Voyeur’s Antoine Loogman.

In the December issue of ‘The Voyeur’ you can read all about the Tommy Hilfiger photoshoot and David and Iman’s stay in Amsterdam. Also in this edition reviews from European Reality concerts, dvd reviews and much, much more.

In this issue:

Watch out for ‘The Voyeur’
Welcome to ‘The Voyeur’
Bowie, fans and paparazzi
Rumours and lies and stories they made up
Rotterdam (4:45 sharp)
Thrill of excitement in Zurich (by Willy-Jan van Gemert and Leon Haan)
Frankfurt (concert review)
Four full colour pages with unique photographs
Reality live 2003 (by Allert van Harten)
DVD 15 (official and unofficial DVD releases)
Dublin, Ireland, 2003.11.22 (by Dara O’Kearney)
Dublin, Ireland, 2003.11.23 (by Dara O’Kearney)
Reality Worldtour 2003-2004
European song schedule

Interested in becoming a member and getting yourself a copy of this magazine? Visit ‘The Voyeur’ at http://go.to/bowiefanclub or send an email to thevoyeur@home.nl

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Thanx for that Peter… great cover shot, Antoine. That bird sure is scary!

Put that magic jump on me…

Paul Kinder, of the quite brilliant BowieWonderWorld fan site, pointed me in the direction of this one, and Jonathan of Seven Music Promotions kindly supplied the prizes for this BowieNet competition… those prizes being ten copies of an exclusive 12″ only vinyl pressing of Magic Dance, remixed by the very talented Danny S.

But, before we get on to the competition, here are a few details from the press release and subuzz.com who are selling this very limited white label 12″ online:

Hot new producer DANNY S has remixed DAVID BOWIE‘s ‘Magic Dance’ from the film Labrynth. Bowie and his management loved the mix and it was included on the Club Bowie CD. There is a very limited pressing of the mix on vinyl (2000 copies only), along with an exclusive dub on the b-side. It will be for sale in the usual record stores, however the bulk of the vinyl is being sold via www.subuzz.com.

Danny S is one of the rising stars in House music and has projects due for release with some of the most credible names in Dance music.

Release details:
Title: Magic Dance
Tracklisting:
Danny S Magic Party Mix [mp3 sample]
Danny S Magic Dust Dub [mp3 sample]
Artist: David Bowie
Label: 7mps
Cat No: DBD001
Released: 23rd December 2003
Price: £5.00 ($ 8.61 )

Description: LIMITED PRESSING!! Rising star Danny S does the business on this Bowie gem taken from the film Labrynth. The Danny S Magic Party Mix is featured on the Club Bowie album but the harder and darker Magic Dust Dub is only available on this vinyl.

Reviews: Danny S delivers two superb mixes. The Magic Party mix is an in your face party mix which uses the vocal hook very well, but look out for those incredible sub bass frequencies which will test any system to the max. The dub is a tougher workout – excellent production and technical wizardry throughout – this is Bowie remixed with respect, an essential piece of plastic for fans and dj’s alike.

There you have it children… a highly collectable release indeed. The original white label promotional version of this 12″ only release, differed only in that it didn’t have the identifying sticker on the sleeve, as pictured above.

I’ve decided to keep the question Labyrinth-based as Magic Dance originally appeared on the soundtrack. I know there are a lot of Labby Kidz out there, (Hi Baby Steve) so I’m sure the demand for this item will be pretty stiff. Anyway, on to the question:

The original Labyrinth soundtrack album had five of its twelve tracks credited to David Bowie alone… What are the titles of those five tracks.

Pretty easy I know, but I’ll try and make the next one a little more tricky again. Send your answers to TotalBlamBlam@davidbowie.com with a subject line of: BowieNet Holiday Give-Away Part 3.

I’ll announce the winners a week from now, after TRG has selected ten sets of correct answers when the competition ends at midnight on January 4th UK time.

Usual rules, only one entry please, and if possible e-mail from your BowieNet account. If for some reason you can’t use your BowieNet account, then you must at least include your BowieNet user name in your entry.

You can still enter this competition, even if you have already entered parts one and two of the Great BowieNet Holiday Give-Away. Stay tuned for even more contests over the next few days.

I’m just about the best…

David Bowie has been overwhelmingly voted man of the year in France’s premier rock magazine, ROCK&FOLK. In the current issue of the publication, (see above) David has received Hero of the Year and Artist of the Year, and he’s scored the hat trick with Concert of the Year too.

DB was also voted third Sex Symbol of the Year (I can almost here the cries of “outrageous injustice” from the MBs), while Reality and New Killer Star were voted third Best Album and third Best Song of 2003 respectively. Reality was voted second Best Album Sleeve (well done Rexy) and the fourth Best DVD was Best of Bowie.

Most bizarrely, David was given the dubious distinction of third place in Come Back of the Year! Didn’t notice he had been away actually, but there ya go… I’m sure the voters’ hearts are in the right place.

There is also a two-page celebration of David’s 2003 in the same issue, written by our good friend Jérôme Soligny. I know I’ve said it before, but those Frenchies have bloody good taste!

Well done David, nothing less than you deserve… here’s to a few more countries catching on!

Waiting for the gift of Sound + Vision

And so, on to the second of our BowieNet Holiday Give-aways. We have five copies of the very sexy four-disc Sound+Vision box set to give to five very lucky BowieNetters. We’ve told you all about this one already, (See original BowieNet story: 07/18/03 NEWS: SOUND+VISION BOX SET DUE IN THE AUTUMN) but, just to recap, here’s what this beautifully packaged set contains…

Apart from the 72 compiled tracks of hits, album cuts, rarities and remixes, covering the period 1969 to 1993, the box also includes a 96 page booklet with lots of rare colour pictures, 4 large photocards and a full size poster tracking Bowie?s career.

OK, what do you have to do to enter this one, I hear you worry? Well, you just have to find the four separate Sound+Vision photocards, (all pictured in the montage above) that I’ve dotted around a few past news stories. Then all you have to do is mail me with the four dates in the news where you discovered each of the cards. Using the following format for your entry:

Photo Card 1 = 01.31.1999 – Photo Card 2 = 05.30.2003 – etc., etc. Obviously those two dates aren’t necessarily correct, just giving you an idea for presenting your findings.

So, once you’ve found the dates for all four photocards, e-mail with those four dates to TotalBlamBlam@davidbowie.com with a subject line of: BowieNet Holiday Give-Away Part 2.

I’ll announce the winners a week from now, on January 3rd 2004, after TRG has selected five sets of correct answers when the competition ends at midnight on January 2nd UK time.

Usual rules, only one entry please, and if possible e-mail from your BowieNet account. If for some reason you can’t use your BowieNet account, then you must at least include your BowieNet user name in your entry.

You can still enter this competition, even if you have already entered part one of the competition for the Reality Tour Edition. Stay tuned for even more competitions over the next few days.

No gifts of money do we give… (But we could save you a few bob over the next week)

Firstly… A very merry Christmas to those of you that celebrate such things, and happy holidays to the rest of you, from everybody here at BowieNet. I’d also like to thank everybody who has sent me e-mails and e-cards personally, thank you so much for that… and to those of you that have sent e-mails to me to forward to David, rest assured they have been sent, as will be any more I am sent today.

OK, on to that give-away. We’ll start gently. We have five copies of the above two-disc Reality set that includes the album on CD, and a region 2 encoded DVD of the Reality portion of September’s Riverside show in Hammersmith. It may be worth checking that you can actually play region 2 on your player before entering… don’t worry there’s plenty more to come yet… and everybody can enter as many of the contests as they want to.

This one’s easy to enter, to make up for the fact that the next ones are going to be a bit of a challenge. So all you need to do is send an e-mail to me at TotalBlamBlam@davidbowie.com with a subject line of: BowieNet Holiday Give-Away Part 1.

I’ll announce the winners a week from now, on January 1st 2004, after TRG has selected five of you when the competition ends at midnight UK time on New Year’s Eve.

Usual rules, only one entry please, and if possible e-mail from your BowieNet account. If for some reason you can’t use your BowieNet account, then you must at least include your BowieNet user name in your entry.

Stay tuned for more shortly.

I’m happy, hope you’re happy too…

For those of you that missed it, David Bowie, as Sailor, offered his compliments of the season on the MBs earlier today, with the following message:

“Happy Holidays Folks – A quick holiday this year then on to the rest of the U.S. shows. Have a safe and peaceful time, y’all, and see you on the road. – sailor and family.”

Apart from responding with personal replies, you’ve all done David proud by voting for Reality over on the BBC site in their Album Of The Year poll. When I posted the story yesterday, (12/23/03 NEWS: HELP BOWIE BEAT BEATLES IN BBC BEST ALBUM POLL) Reality was already in first place with 34 per cent of the vote, but thanx to the five hundred or so BowieNetters that have voted so far, it now has 74 per cent, a massive leap of 40 per cent!

Here’s the breakdown, (in percentage order) as it stands right now, numbers in brackets indicate number of votes cast:

David Bowie – Reality (605) 74%
The Beatles – Let It Be…Naked (78) 10%
Neil Young – Greendale (41) 5%
Kraftwerk – Tour De France Soundtracks (39) 5%
Steely Dan – Everything Must Go (28) 3%
Paddy McAloon – I Trawl The Megahertz (15) 2%
Robert Palmer – Drive (14) 2%

Let’s see if we can get that up to at least 80 per cent by the end of Christmas Day.

For those of you that insist on a continued service from BowieNet over the holiday period, please do stay tuned. We plan to have a give-a-way of lots of goodies from the vaults over the next few days.