Month: October 2008

Which came as some surprise…

You may not have made much sense of today’s headline…Andre‘s post from the MBs yesterday will explain everything…

———————————————————————————————————————–

Five Years ago tonight, the first night of A Reality Tour, was a special night for us. It happened to be the 25th Anniversary of our wedding to the day. Our first concert together had been David Bowie and the Spiders at Preston Guildhall in June 1973.

Total Blam Blam had got the message of the anniversary to David and I had got tickets that had us within touching distance of David Bowie at the front. Textbook, thanks to Bowienet ticket allocations. A great night was in prospect and we were in the same hotel as the band.

Imagine Sue?s surprise when David stopped the show with ?By the way?does anyone happen to be celebrating their 25th Wedding Anniversary tonight?.? and wishing us a Happy Wedding Anniversary. I had hoped something special would happen and if I was surprised, Sue must have been shocked! David dedicated The Man Who Sold The World to us, which was truly amazing.

Apart from the thanks to David, the real big thanks were due to Blammo, for even attempting to get something to happen. I had a hunch our luck was in but from years of following David, it was totally out of the blue and unique.

We went to many other dates on the tour, as usual, but that first amazing night at the Forum in Copenhagen will be one of the most memorable nights of 32 years of following David on tour.

We were there to meet David at the hotel afterwards to thank him and have a photo. Thanks David and thanks Blammo, you?re the best.

Andre and Sue XX

(Anyone got a DVD of the night please?)

———————————————————————————————————————–

So there you have it. Congratulations to Andre and Sue for thirty years of marriage (yesterday) and at least thirty five of Bowie fandom!

The pictures in this piece are from those I took on the night but never used in the original news stories. (10.07.2003 NEWS: EUROPEAN LEG OF REALITY TOUR KICKS OFF TONIGHT + 10.08.2003 NEWS: A REALITY TOUR: REPORTS, PIX AND PRESS RELEASE)

And there are plenty where they came from, if anyone’s interested in seeing more.

You can share your memories regarding that opening date of A Reality Tour in aforementioned message board thread along with several other BowieNetters who have posted words and pictures from the night.

I was walking down the high street…

BBC Two has just launched a new five-part documentary series called British Style Genius. If you’re interested in the evolution of British fashion from the late sixties to the present day, it’s well worth a watch.

The first episode, High Street, featured three Bowie songs on the well-researched soundtrack: Drive-In Saturday, Boys Keep Swinging and The Prettiest Star.

Iggy Pop‘s The Passenger and Lou Reed‘s I’m So Free (both Bowie productions) also featured, not to mention The Pixies‘ Cactus.

British Style Genius is broadcast on Tuesday evenings in the UK on BBC Two at 9:00pm.

Those with access to the BBC iPlayer can watch the first episode online here.

In walked luck and you looked in time…

Following on from the recent sale of the unreleased Dance album proof cover, which sold for a paltry £190 GBP in August, (08.08.2008 NEWS: ULTRA RARE BOWIE PROOF GOES FOR A SONG) a couple more very nice items have gone on eBay recently for what I personally believe to be at prices far below their true value.

Of course, you could argue that the price something sells for on eBay must be close to its true value, but regular eBay bidders know how this very often just isn’t the case…sometimes particularly rare items just seem to slip under the radar.

One such item that didn’t slip under BowieNetter maarten‘s radar was the above RCA promotional 12″ from 1977.

Apparently part of The RCA Segue Series, the record contains David Bowie’s Sound And Vision segued into Iggy Pop‘s Sister Midnight. The A side is stereo and the B side contains a mono version of the same thing.

I’m sure there are people out there familiar with this issue, but all of the collectors I have spoken to have never heard of it…including myself.

Had this been the only copy I had ever seen I may have been a little more suspicious of it as the label doesn’t seem particularly well printed. However, it’s possibly just a poor scan as a copy sold on eBay for $100 USD back in June with a better reproduction of the label.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that the item is legit as it still seems strange that nobody had heard of it in over thirty years then suddenly two surface in the space of four months. Despite this, I’m keeping an open mind at the moment as there is evidence of another release in the series from 1978 by Vicki Sue Robinson.

Anyway, Maarten won this latest copy for a credit-crunch friendly $45 USD using eBay’s Buy It Now feature, which, if this record is legit, is a bargain indeed. I look forward to his verdict once he has had a chance to inspect the thing.

Watch out for more on the very interesting anorak magnet that is the Illustrated db Discography Forum.

Next up is a copy of the Man Of Words/Man Of Music album on Mercury that sold for $200.00 USD on eBay. That in itself is a pretty good price for the album in this condition. However, it’s what came with it that made it such a good buy…

Aside from the album, (which also contained a very rare Mercury records return card) there was a 10×8 Mercury promotional photo. A very desirable collectable made all the more valuable by what seems to be a genuine Bowie signature from the time.

You can see the signature quite clearly in the inset above and apparently the message from David reads: “To Sharon, a photo, Bowie”. I believe that had more Bowie collectors noticed this signed picture the auction may have realised two to three times the sum it did.

Hopefully I’ll be able to make this a regular feature on these pages, though I would prefer to see totalblamblam as the successful bidder in auctions such as these in the future!

I’d send my photograph to my honey…

We told you about the official 2009 David Bowie Ziggy Stardust calendar last month. (09.04.2008 NEWS: OFFICIAL ZIGGY STARDUST CALENDAR DUE NEXT MONTH)

Here’s the blurb from the back cover…

———————————————————————————————————————–

Shot using just one roll of film by Brian Ward on London?s Heddon Street on a cold, wet, January night in 1972, David Bowie?s Ziggy Stardust LP remains one of the most iconic covers of all time.

Only a handful of low quality images have ever appeared from this legendary session. But now Slow Dazzle has exclusively produced twelve pages of large format, high quality outtakes and alternate cover shots, annotated with informative notes and collected here in all their uncropped glory for the very first time.

———————————————————————————————————————–

You may be able to make out some of the image thumbnails on the back cover. Either way we’ll be posting a couple of them nearer the calendar’s publication.

I’ve had a few concerned e-mails regarding the unofficial 2009 calendar, below.

Well, not only is it unofficial, but it looks like it isn’t even going to be made now. So save your pennies for the official 2009 David Bowie Ziggy Stardust calendar.

His script is you and me, boy…

Last month, HMV’s My Inspiration campaign celebrated two years since it’s very first poster, which you may remember was a Frank Ockenfels shot of David Bowie from 1999 with a lyric he had selected from Syd Barrett‘s Gigolo Aunt. (09.09.2006 NEWS: HMV CAMPAIGN – SYD IS DB’S INSPIRATION)

That was followed in May of this year when One Night Only chose Changes as their inspiration. (05.22.2008 NEWS: BOWIE IS ONE NIGHT ONLY’S INSPIRATION – WIN POSTERS)

Now, as you can see from the poster above, The Script have chosen “Heroes”. Obviously this isn’t the first time the band has expressed an interest in the track. (08.28.2008 NEWS: THE SCRIPT’S COVER OF HEROES CHOSEN FOR 2012 OLYMPICS)

HMV has just announced details of the 100th poster in the campaign via a two-page press advert in the current music monthlies. It’s Bob Dylan and though the adverts state that you can view the full set from Bowie to Dylan at this address: www.hmv.com/myinspiration …at the moment it seems you can’t.

However, Q magazine has come to the rescue with a gallery of all 100 posters here…even if they haven’t listed them in chronological order.

I’ve made myself at home…

Not too much in the current music monthlies. But, Q magazine has a feature entitled: I LIVE IN A ROCK STAR’S HOUSE…which does what it says on the tin.

The current occupiers of David’s birthplace at 40 Stansfield Road, Brixton, are Neil Handley, Lisa Rail and Michael Jackson, (not that one) all pictured above. Here’s a bit from the article…

————————————————————————————————————-

The main drawback to living in a famous property, they say, is the occasional “goldfish bowl!” effect when tourists peer through the windows. “I was lying on the couch sick one day and there were half a dozen people outside taking photos,” says Rail. “I was too sick to get up and close the blinds.”

————————————————————————————————————-

Elsewhere in the mag, host of chat show Happy Hour, Al Murray, (40-year-old Oxford graduate (so he’s not as daft as he makes out) and direct descendant of William Makepeace Thackeray) is the subject of the My Collection column.

In it he lists nine things he holds dear and one of those is David Bowie’s Hunky Dory album…

————————————————————————————————————-

“This is a very odd but brilliant record, and it’s his voice, I think, I’m drawn to most. It’s like with Miles Davis – the one constant thing throughout all of his music was his trumpet. With Bowie it’s his voice. his voice has carried him through everything, even some of his less successful projects. But then, the man has been going for 40 years. You have to experiment. He did.”

————————————————————————————————————-

According to a few reviews I’ve seen, Keane seem to appreciate the work of David Bowie too. Indeed, Q recommends listening to Scary Monsters if you like the new Keane album…It seems Ashes To Ashes is one of their particular favourites.

I spotted nothing much worth mentioning in the other mags.

If members in countries other than the UK that keep a regular eye on the music press fancy contributing anything you think we may be missing, please get in touch.

Well the bitter comes out better on a stolen guitar…(sorry, couldn’t resist)

Earl Slick has been in touch again with the terrible news that his favourite guitars have been stolen.

The two Gibson Les Pauls were made and customised especially for the commencement of David Bowie’s A Reality Tour in 2003.

The picture above shows Earl playing the black one last week, shortly before it was stolen. He is playing the same guitar in the shot below from dress rehearsals in Brussels in October 2003

The other guitar is a cherry red version of the same model, both sporting a Bigsby Vibrato Tailpiece and both with Earl Slick clearly incorporated in each headstock. (See inset in top picture)

The guitars were stolen from a parked van in either Albany, New York or in Montreal, Canada on September 25th.

Any information from BowieNetters hearing a whisper as to the location of either or both would be very gratefully received.

Needless to say, this setback can’t stop the live debut of The Eons‘ at The Colony Café, Woodstock, New York, tomorrow. (09.29.2008 NEWS: EARL SLICK’S THE EONS DEBUT AT WOODSTOCK FILM FEST)

The show will go ahead at 9.30pm and will now include contributions from French Canadian Anik Jean on both vocals and guitar.

See aforementioned news story for further details and ticket information.

Looks so wrong and out of place…

With a little under two weeks until the final batch of iSELECTBOWIE territories get their CDs (North America October 14th) we thought it would be nice to give a handful away.

EMI have given us five copies, one of which could be yours if you correctly identify the anagram from the list of ten below that isn’t an anagram of iSELECTBOWIE…

Belie Cow Site
Boil Sweet Ice
Bowie Sect Lie
Elbow Ice Ties
Lice Bites Woe
Low Bee Cities
Lo Website Ice
Obese Lice Wit
Ole Bi Sweetie
Stoic Ewe Bile

These anagram contests do seem to be popular and they do give more of a chance to the non-expert.

To be in with a chance of being one of the lucky five, send your answer to me here before midnight NY time on Friday October 10th.

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.

To ensure speedy delivery of your prize, you may want to include your postal details in your entry so that we can post on the Saturday morning ahead of the North American release on Tuesday October 14th.