Month: February 2008

If I could control tomorrow’s haze…

As I’m sure the majority of you understand and are bored of hearing, we don’t like to announce any upcoming Bowie product until we have a firm release date.

This is so that we can avoid any grumbles if that date is rescheduled, as is sometimes the case and is perfectly normal procedure.

The EMI issue of Santa Monica, (David Bowie’s live recording from October 20th, 1972) is no secret to anyone as it was first hinted at with last year’s Target CD wherein a version of The Jean Genie from the show was included. (09.12.2007 NEWS: TARGET RELEASE BOWIE CD TO MARK NEW DUFFTY RANGE)

However, release dates as early as April and May are being bandied about, when the truth is that there is no firm date yet and it’s unlikely you’ll see Santa Monica before June.

Hopefully you’ll agree it will have been worth the wait, as EMI are planning a delicious package for this release.

I won’t spoil the surprise with details just yet, suffice to say the limited edition will be a one-off run with no repress and a vinyl version will also be made available.

Five days, that’s all we’ve got…

We told you all about The Enemy‘s cover of Five Years last September when they released it as an extra track on one of the CD formats of their single: You’re Not Alone. (09.21.2007 NEWS: THE ENEMY COVER BOWIE ON NEW SINGLE)

Well, if you didn’t want to shell out for it back then but are still curious to hear it, NME.com has answered your prayers by making it a free download until Friday, February 29th.

Regular readers of these news pages will know that Tom Clarke, frontman with The Enemy, is a big fan of David Bowie’s songwriting skills anyway, (05.18.2007 NEWS: LIFE ON MARS? ‘GREATEST SONG EVER WRITTEN’ & 09.08.2007 NEWS: LIFE ON MARS ONE OF 10 MOST PERFECT SONGS EVER) claiming that Life On Mars? is the best song ever written. Who’s going to argue with that?

You can reach the NME download page by clicking on either of the Toms above.

In the corner of the morning in the past…

Here’s an exclusive first look at that elusive fourth shot of Dolph Smith and David Bowie that we promised you a couple of weeks back. (02.04.2008 NEWS: BOWIE VISIT TO MEMPHIS INSPIRES FILM COURSE)

Today is exactly thirty five years to the day that David visited the Memphis Academy of Art on February 26, 1973.

Mike McCarthy, who is running THE FILM CLASS THAT FELL TO EARTH that we mentioned in the earlier piece, has been in touch to say it’s all going well and there are a couple more additions to the site.

I don’t know how he gets the time, but first up is this excellent essay Mike has penned, entitled: BOWIE VERSUS ELVIS

There’s also a new review up (albeit with a couple of factual errors) by Richard DeLisi: David Bowie live in Memphis As Ziggy Stardust and the Thin White Duke. It’s accompanied by more photos of The Thin White Duke at the Mid South Coliseum on March 6th, 1976, like the one above, also taken by Richard DeLisi.

Thanks again for all this Mike…and good luck with the rest of the course.

And I still hold some Ashes to me…

Released via Virgin TV in the UK tomorrow is the BBC’s triple CD compilation: Top Of The Pops – The 80s.

The sixty-track CD includes David Bowie’s Ashes To Ashes, cashing in nicely on the hugely popular TV show of the same name and getting a three week lead on the Ashes To Ashes soundtrack CD, which is released on March 17th and which will obviously also include the same Bowie track.

Anyway, some generous folks or other are running a contest to win twenty copies of Top Of The Pops – The 80s, a contest which runs until March 21st, in fact…click on the TOTP logo above to reach the contest page and go here for the full tracklisting.

So I, I got to tell you…

Tony Visconti, who often enjoys a trawl through the BowieNet message boards, was inspired to respond to a post by BowieNetter Robpongi regarding DB’s recording of the John Lennon song, Mother.

Over to you Tony…

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Hi Blam – I’ve read that string that Robpongi created about Mother. I love that recording and David’s vocal performance.

Robpongi says this, ” And, yes, that is definitely Reeves on lead with Gail and Mike on bass and piano too for sure. Now, I am wondering “why” this was never released as a full-fledged single!?!?!?! Really, this is so exceptionally good, there is no doubt that it would have gone top 10 immediately on release, for sure! ”

For the record, it was recorded on Nassau (the island). The drummer was Andy Newmark, guitar Reeves, but piano and organ were played by the studio owner. David brought the ADAT tapes back to New York and overdubbed a vocal with me, and Reeves played a solo. I played bass and mixed it on rather primitive equipment (but that’s another story). So, no Gail and Mike on that one.

I’ve attached some photos from that session. I took the one of David (the guy who loaned us his “Elvis” mic wanted a piccie of David holding it) and May Pang took the other.

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Thanx for clearing that up Tony…I’m sure Robpongi will be chuffed, as will be the other BowieNetters with the excellent pix.

Waiting in the wings…

You’ve no doubt already read news stories regarding David Bowie’s contribution to Scarlett Johansson‘s debut album of Tom Waits covers, Anywhere I Lay My Head.

The album, produced by TV On The Radio?s Dave Sitek, includes ten Tom Waits covers and one original composition, Song for Jo, and is due via Atco/Rhino on May 20th.

It seems many of the press stories regarding the album are going big with the Bowie contribution angle, which I guess is understandable. But nevertheless, this is what David said when I asked him whether he thought we should now acknowledge his part in the recordings…

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“I’ve seen the press on this and I suppose the record company wanted to spin my involvement a little more than it actually warrants. All I contribute are these oo’s and ah’s on a couple of tracks.

I popped up to Avatar Studios, way up on w.53rd Street in Manhattan and laid down my humble parts in an hour or so, double and sometimes quadruple-tracking them. David Sitek, the producer, originally asked me to do three songs, but for one of them, I Don’t Wanna Grow Up, I didn’t feel I could contribute much to it (lol) so I left it alone.

The songs are great, really good Tom Waits stuff, and Scarlet’s performances are mystical and twice cool. She creates a mood that could have been summoned by someone like Margery Latimer or Jeanette Winterson.”

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Thanx for that David, much appreciated.

As I’m sure you all know, the two tracks that David oo’d and ah’d on were Falling Down and Fannin? Street. The tracks were originally issued by Tom Waits on the albums: Big Time from 1988 and 2006’s Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards respectively.

Scarlett is cleanly pleased at David’s decision to take part as she is a long-term fan whose attention was first grabbed when she saw Labyrinth, (09.11.06 NEWS: BOWIE LEFT SCARLETT JOHANSSON SPEECHLESS) a long time before the making of The Prestige in which they both appeared.

Anyway, I’ll leave you with the full tracklisting for Anywhere I Lay My Head…

01 Fawn
02 Town With No Cheer
03 Falling Down
04 Anywhere I Lay My Head
05 Fannin? Street
06 Song for Jo
07 Green Grass
08 I Wish I Was in New Orleans
09 I Don?t Want to Grow Up
10 No One Knows I?m Gone
11 Who Are You?

Chuckling away, laughing all day…

For those of you following this, (01.29.2008 NEWS: EXCLUSIVE STILL OF HARTNETT AND BOWIE FROM AUGUST & 02.04.2008 NEWS: ANOTHER EXCLUSIVE BOWIE STILL FROM AUGUST) above is another still of David Bowie as Ogilvie in August, enjoying a little joke in a private moment with the film’s director, Austin Chick.

Members can view a larger version of the picture on the on the MBs where they may want to join in a just-for-fun caption contest to help them through the weekend.

Hold my face before you…

I’m sure you’re all aware of sleeveface.com the site where you can post images like the ones in the montage above. In fact, we posted something similar here on BowieNet some time ago, where I started the ball rolling by incorporating my boxer, Henry, into the sleeve of Diamond Dogs. But I’ll be damned if I can locate that news item now…Bowie Doggy Bag to the first person to e-mail me with the news item.

Anyway, it seems the idea of: “one or more persons obscuring or augmenting any part of their body or bodies with record sleeve(s) causing an illusion” has really caught the public’s imagination here in the UK, with recent pieces about sleeveface.com in both The Guardian and The Mirror.

Both the aforementioned publications used the above shot created by somebody called See Gee. The post was originally accompanied by the following caption: “Back in the 70s, Bowie often used to come round to watch Scooby-Doo with us… his folks didn’t have a colour TV at the tiime. He didn’t even bother to take off his coat – he didn’t want to miss a single second.”. Well, it could be true.

For zillions more Bowie sleeves (and many other artists…including more Iggy) check out sleeveface.com and the links to Facebook and flickr.

Update:

Hey man, oh Henry, get off the couch…

A few of you had the patience to locate our original news item from more than two years ago (01.16.2006 SNIPPET: BOWIE SLEEVES HELP CREATE NEW WORKS OF ART) which you can reach by clicking on Henry’s nose. But, Jackie_C was the first into the inbox with the correct information…so if you could furnish me with your address, Jackie, we’ll have your Bowie Doggy Bag out to you shortly. Thanx to the rest of you that took part.

Here’s the link to the original thread on the boards too.

Last night they loved you, opening doors and pulling some strings, Angelique…

Congratulations to singer.songwriter Angelique Kidjo for winning the Grammy for best Contemporary World Music album at the 50th annual Grammy Awards, held on Sunday at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

Congrats are also due to her handsome producer, one Anthony Visconti, for his hand in creating this epic of a recording. Here’s a bit from Tony regarding the win…

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I’m so proud of her. Angélique Kidjo has finally won a Grammy in the Contemporary World Music category. This was her fourth nomination. I am proud, so proud, to be her producer on this album. And credit must be given to Angélique’s husband, Jean Hebrail, who co-wrote the songs and gave me much needed advice about how best to record African music.

The name of the album is Djin Djin. It features guest appearances by Peter Gabriel, Alicia Keys, Joss Stone, Josh Groban, Carlos Santana, Ziggy Marley and Amadou and Miriam. This was a trip of a lifetime for me. Well, a metaphorical trip, I didn’t go to Africa, Africa came to me in New York. I’ll never forget those wonderful recording sessions, the enthusiasm of everyone involved and the spontaneous dancing that broke out in the control room when we knew we had a great take!

And great thanks to a very deserving record company, Razor & Tie, who along with Starbucks, financed and promoted this wonderful album.

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I know how excited Tony was to be involved with the making of this album, and it’s great to see such enthusiasm rewarded in this way.

Click on the above screen grab to watch an EPK about Angelique and the making of Djin Djin.

I’ll leave you with a brief report from Billboard.com which includes some poignant words from her acceptance speech…

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Singer.songwriter Angelique Kidjo won her first Grammy, for best contemporary world music album, after five nominations. She dedicated her award to her parents in Benin, to the African continent, to “the women of Darfur, the women who are fighting every day to give their kids an education,” and to late Billboard editor Timothy White, whom she said encouraged her from the earliest days of her stateside career. With the Grammy win, “I really believe I can do anything,” said Kidjo, who starts a U.S. and European tour at the end of February.

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Look at that caveman go*…

The wonderfully clever Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain have demonstrated something that David Bowie made no secret of, and indeed it’s something he had the good grace to highlight with a notation regarding it on the back cover of Hunky Dory back in 1971. (See above)

Of course, I’m talking about Life On Mars? and the fact that DB said the song was a “kind of modern take on My Way”.

But first, a brief history lesson for those not familiar with the song’s journey…

Back in 1968 a twenty one-year-old David Bowie wrote English lyrics for a French song entitled Comme, D?Habitude, and it became a song he called Even A Fool Learns To Love. The track only reached demo stage (DB actually just sang Even A Fool Learns To Love directly over the top of Comme, D?Habitude and it was never released. But, soon afterwards songwriter Paul Anka heard the original version, bought the rights and rewrote it as My Way.

Here’s a bit from an interview where DB was more specific about Frankie’s inspiration when it came to writing Life On Mars?

“There was a sense of revenge in that because I was so angry that Paul Anka had done My Way that I thought ‘right, I’ll do my own version’. And it basically was my kind of modern take on My Way…there are clutches of melody in it that were definite parodies of My Way”

You can listen to the snippet of interview that the above is taken from courtesy of the BBC’s Radio 2 here.

Finally, go here to see just how the UOGB have demonstrated how similar Life On Mars? and My Way are in terms of their chord structure…but, be sure to keep watching to hear songs by others that also neatly fit the My Way structure…even if the original artists never noticed the fact themselves.

* Today’s lyric quotation comes courtesy of The Hollywood Argyles song, Alley Oop.