Month: June 2008

Looks like you’ve been there too…

“She slips into the unforgiving silver catsuit with confidence and gets excited about the Ziggy Stardust lightning-flash across her face.”

That’s the first line from an interview with UK TV and radio presenter Fearne Cotton in today’s News Of The World give-away magazine, Fabulous.

There’s no more mention of Bowie in the interview itself, but I thought you may like to see these pix anyway.

Top marks to the stylist for getting exactly the right guitar (except for the wrong colour headstock) and the facial expression mimicking Bowie’s own in the Rebel Rebel shot on the right.

Click on Bowie’s bulge to read the interview and view more Fearne pix.

Thanx to dumdumboy for the pointer.

Every chance, every chance that I take…

Lovely piece in the Culture section of The Sunday Times by Mark Edwards regarding Low and, more specifically, Always Crashing In The Same Car. Here’s the intro for those that haven’t already seen it…

“The best album ever made is David Bowie?s Low. The best song on it is Always Crashing in the Same Car. You may hold a different view. I suppose I might even be wrong. But what I do know is that they are, respectively, the most important album and song in my life.”

It’s a piece that has Bowie fans of a certain age nodding in agreement as you can read from these responses on the on the MBs.

You can read the whole Sunday Times piece by clicking on the image above.

Meanwhile, I’ll leave you with an unusual Japanese RCA advert for both Low and The Man Who Fell To Earth, which I’m sure you will agree is cool in the extreme.

What’s up with the album sleeve…did you notice it’s reversed? Did any get printed like that? Please let us know if you have one and you’ll be given an immediate Bowie Collectors spot…speaking of which, stay tuned for the next exciting instalment very shortly.

Two of the no wave boys…

David Bowie has contributed a few words in praise of Thurston Moore and Byron Coley‘s new publication, NO WAVE. Here’s an excerpt from the press release…

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NO WAVEPost-Punk. Underground. New York. 1976-1980. By Thurston Moore and Byron Coley

No Wave. Post-Punk. Underground. New York. 1976-1980. (Abrams Image, late-June 2008, $24.95) is the first book to visually chronicle the collision of art and punk in the New York underground of 1976 to 1980. This in-depth look at the avant-garde movement of the 70s and 80s focuses on the true architects of No Wave from James Chance to Lydia Lunch to Glenn Branca, as well as the luminaries who intersected the scene, such as Debbie Harry, Brian Eno, Iggy Pop, and Richard Hell.

This rarely documented scene, the creative stomping ground of young artists and filmmakers from Jean-Michel Basquiat to Jim Jarmusch, as well as the musical genesis for the post-punk explosions of Sonic Youth, is here revealed for a new generation of fans and collectors.

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At the time, the scene was partially captured in audio for posterity by Brian Eno via the NO NEW YORK album, above left. But, as David suggests in his quotation below, this book finally adds some vision to the sound.

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“This is just a great book. Moore and Coley wade into the mire that was No Wave and pull all kinds of order into it, if that could be possible. I’ve never been part of a scene, though if I were I might have opted for this one. Listening in from Berlin where I was then working and living, it seemed a tonic but faceless form. This adds the features.” – David Bowie

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NO WAVE is available now and you can read much, much Moore about the book and its authors here.

For in truth, it’s the beginning of nothing…

Rumours abound that David Bowie is to appear at KOKO in London as part of the iTunes festival. Rumours without foundation I’m afraid.

Bowie himself says: “There is not a shred of truth to this. I have no idea how this rumour got legs. It must have been a Danish/dancical/choreography sort of thing.”

Last night they loved you…

Well, I’ve heard of wearing your influence on your sleeve, but BowieNetter jungtheforeman has been in touch with details of where Paul Weller was wearing his at a show in London last night.

Over to you Jung…

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Hi Blammo – myself and lawman were both lucky ticket winners of the ITV2 live at IndigO2 concert series this week. Couldn’t help but notice that, further to Bowie’s e-mail about his haircut, Weller was sporting an Aladdin Sane button badge on his jersey. God’s honest truth.

I did take some pix with my phone (see above) but you can’t quite make out the iconic Aladdin Sane image. Lawman had the eagle eyes to spot the badge first. We were only 2 or 3 rows from the stage…Best wishes, jungtheforeman.

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Thanks Jung. I have enlarged the button badge area as an inset in the picture above, and it clearly is Aladdin Sane…lovely touch by Mr Weller there.

The show was filmed for TV and will be shown on itv 2 in the UK in the near future…come to think of it, Paul’s hair doesn’t look too far off a Ziggy cut in the grab above…is something afoot? Go and get the Schwarzkopf red! 😉

my love is your love?

Today is the sixteenth anniversary of David and Iman’s official church wedding in Florence, above. I’m sure you’ll all want to join us once again in wishing them both a wonderful day!

Two wedding days mean two chances each year to send them our congratulations and BowieNet members can make a personal contribution to the well-wishing by adding to the message board thread started by Bianca here.

:))

The Sun Machine is coming down…

The story above appeared in the 30th May – 12th June 2008 issue (No. 1211) of Britain’s favourite fortnightly satirical publication, Private Eye, last week.

For those not familiar with this most excellent British institution, Wikipedia describes the Street Of Shame column thus: “Street of Shame ? covering journalism, newspapers and other press stories. The term “Street of Shame” refers to Fleet Street. Usually largely written by Francis Wheen and Adam Macqueen.”

And here are links to those two stories that we published even before The Sun came up…

08.29.2007 NEWS: KNOCK KNOCK. WHO’S THERE? DOCTOR. DOCTOR WHO?

05.17.2008 NEWS: BOWIE’S THE MAN WHO FELL TO EARTH MUSICAL?

All you’ve got to do is win…

It’s the penultimate week of our ten week Rex Ray contest, (04.06.2008 NEWS: THE GREAT REX RAY GIVE-AWAY STARTS TODAY) and I see a great sadness on the horizon when we no longer have a weekly Rex Ray contest. Best not think about that just yet.

But first, the winner of the quite beautiful artist’s proof (AP) above of an unpublished DB portrait by Rex Ray and again signed by them both in 2006.

And the winner is: kennymoore

Well done kennymoore, please send us your real name and address and we’ll have your prize flying to you like a mad thing.

Above is the first of the two remaining APs and as with all of these, it was signed by both DB and Rex in 2006. And, as I’ve said before, as far as I am aware, there are no more than three or four of these in existence.

However, I should point out that there is some slight damage to the top right hand corner of this one, even though it doesn’t encroach on the image area. Probably won’t show once it’s framed.

All you have to do to be in with a chance of being winner number nine and claiming the above, is contact me here before midnight NY time on Saturday June 7th.

Usual BowieNet rules apply: Only one entry per BowieNet account per week, and please remember you must enter using your BowieNet e-mail or at least supply your BowieNet user name. If you do neither of these things you won’t be eligible to enter.

The ninth winner will be announced next Sunday June the 8th and the contest for the last artwork will commence at the same time.

Aint that poster love?

OK, no messing with this one. We posted this contest a couple of weeks back, (05.22.2008 NEWS: BOWIE IS ONE NIGHT ONLY’S INSPIRATION – WIN POSTERS) and here are the ever so lucky winners…

BE INSPIRED POSTER (Above left)

LizSK2
lordofthethings
loz
spidey
zardoz

MY INSPIRATION POSTER (Above right)

bianca
Diamonddude1
gaz
mandn
Starlady

So, well done you lot…a fair few familiar names this time. Send me your postal details and we’ll have these away to you pronto.

Come to the show tonight…

We’ve had a great response to this poll which we set back in April. (04.26.2008 NEWS: VOTE FOR YOUR FAVOURITE BOWIE BOOTLEG)

Following on from His Master’s Voice (released officially as Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars (The Motion Picture Soundtrack) in 2003) and David Bowie, commonly known as Santa Monica, (due for official release as David Bowie – Live Santa Monica ’72 at the end of the month) and following the announcement that The Thin White Duke was next on the EMI schedule list, we asked what other bootlegs you would like to see get the official treatment.

As I stressed at the time, it doesn’t mean it will ever happen, it’s just good to know what you like.

I’ll post a more detailed breakdown of the voting in the near future, but meanwhile here’s the top five…

1st = STRANGE FASCINATION: Los Angeles, Universal Amphitheatre – September 5th, 1974
2nd = 50 DEAD DOGS: New York, Madison Square Garden – January 9th, 1997
3rd = STAGE 1. HURLING DISDAIN: St. Louis, Riverport Amphitheatre October 11th, 1995 & London, Wembley Arena November 17th, 1995
4th = THE THIN WHITE DUKE: Uniondale, Nassau Veteran’s Memorial Coliseum March 23rd, 1976
5th = THE BEWLAY BROTHERS AT THE HAMMERSMITH: London, Carling Apollo (a.k.a Hammersmith) – October 2nd, 2002

Strange Fascination was way out ahead and is clearly a firm favourite with you (rightly so) and even though 50 Dead Dogs managed 2nd place, it’s highly unlikely that a recording such as this would ever be officially released due to the licensing nightmare of all the other artists involved.

Hurling Disdain seemed to be the favourite record of the DB/NIN and 1995 Outside shows and despite saying that The Thin White Duke was going to be released in aforementioned news item anyway, that didn’t stop it getting enough votes to put it in fourth place.

Finally, The Bewlay Brothers At The Hammersmith was the popular and most excellent choice to represent the year 2002.

Well, it proves you have good taste, even if some of my personal favourites didn’t make the top five. Such as early shows on bootlegs like CLOSE TO THE GOLDEN DAWN and STARMAN OVER THE RAINBOW via tons of others through the thirty plus years right up to A REALITY CHECK…and no, that’s not just because I’m name-checked on that one!

Click on each bootleg title for a more detailed description over at the very informative BASSMAN’S DAVID BOWIE PAGE.