Month: May 2013

 

“You could spend the morning talking with me”

 

A fair few of you have been asking when the chat feature on www.davidbowie.com would be functional.

Well, thanks to the persistent nagging from our newest administrator, LadyOfMachinery (Annie Darling), and some jiggery pokery by our talented tech team, BowieNetters are once again chattering.

A select bunch of misfits and ne’ er-do-wells have been kicking around in there in the last few hours and it’s just like the good old bad old days once more.

So go check it out and enjoy the company of fellow-minded Bowie fans and if it gets too hot in the main room, chill out in the privacy of a private chat with your bestest buddy.

Go here and click on the CHAT tab to get started. But be warned, it’s more than addictive.

 

“Bow-wow, woof woof, bow-wow, wow”

 

Diamond Dogs was released this day in 1974 and if you really need a reminder of just how good it his, listen here on Spotify.

Pictured here is a print of Guy Peellaert’s original artwork and the withdrawn RCA sleeve before the poor pooch’s emasculation.

Diamond Dogs rule, OK.

 

“In the corner of the morning in the past”

 

After ten weeks on the UK’s Official Album Chart, David Bowie’s #1 album, The Next Day, remains in the Top 50.

You may have seen new posters for the album on the streets. But, if not, we’ve reproduced it here for your digital enjoyment.

If you absolutely must have a hard copy of it, check out today’s Guardian for a full page advert in The Guide.

Bowie fans of a certain age will be familiar with the slogan that has been appropriated for this new ad, as it was used to promote the “Heroes” album back in 1977.

 

“Switch on the TV we may pick him up on channel two”

 

David Bowie – Five Years: The Making Of An Icon

9:20pm – 10:50pm – BBC2, BBC2 HD

Enough said.

 

“I could make a transformation as a rock & roll star”

 

Back on April 9th, we had the pleasure of attending the V&A for the Boy George talk with Paul Gorman, wherein they both endeavoured to explore the impact and influence of the Bowie style on George himself and the New Romantic scene of the 1980s and beyond.

Our personal guest on the night was one Danie Cox of The Feathers, who made an immediate impression on George before the start of the show with her striking Ziggyesque appearance. Read about that encounter here.

In fact, George was so impressed with Danie, he demanded she parade herself onstage and gave her a part in the video for his next single, Coming Home.

Fast forward a few weeks to Paul Morley’s residency at the V&A during the last weekend of April, when he was installed to write a Bowie book over two days.

We published exclusive extracts at the time and you may remember this particular excerpt:

 

Saturday, April 27, 12.23pm

And then someone comes up to my desk to ask me to fix their phone. And then someone comes up to my desk to ask me to turn the music down – there is a DJ in the Entrance, playing music by and inspired by Bowie, which just happens to be my favourite, from Magazine and Joy Division to Philip Glass turning ‘Heroes’ into a symphony made of blown glass and steel. It all sounds perfect to me.  She is livid; her world is falling apart, busted by the decadence of these rude intruders into her calm, collected and soothing sanctuary.

I do not want to be too rude and suggest that of those in the museum she is on the older side, but she is not shall we say the type who will talk of the moment she first discovered David Bowie. She has yet to discover Bowie. She is right now not in the mood to ever discover Bowie. “We don’t expect this racket in here!” she explodes during the particularly sensational and for some legendary Mike Garson piano solo on ‘Aladdin Sane.’ I toy for a moment with trying to explain why the music should not be turned down or off but UP, especially during this particular beautifully berserk solo, which is joyously harmonising with the light pouring from the skies into the vast entrance, but decide she looks in the mood to have me deported if I oppose her in any way. Bitterly disappointed that I am in fact of no use to her, she charges off to search out those in control who might get rid of this horrific noise, so that she can enter the Med and Ren, and appreciate all those quiet, settled centuries without Garson’s startling piano. A few minutes later a young lady in a scarlet Bowie wig wearing cut off denim shorts draws the attention of everyone in the Grand Entrance by dancing the slowest, look-at-me-but-don’t-look Moonage Daydream daydreamy movement to ‘Moonage Daydream,’ as though this is actually a happening, a wonderful breaking through decades of tightening formality, and I think that by now the older lady not wearing the scarlet wig and threatened by Garson’s piano is planning her own counter-revolution, or feeling that she is sitting in a tin can far above the earth.

 

Well you probably guessed it already, but the ‘young lady in a scarlet Bowie wig wearing cut off denim shorts’ was none other than 22-year-old Danie Cox. Except it wasn‘t a wig. Danie is committed to the look and it’s her very own crowning glory.

Anyway, Danie sings for a band called The Feathers who are a very exciting glam/punk three-piece based in London, with a line-up consisting: Danie Cox – Lead vocal + guitar, Molly Spiers MacLeod – Vocal + bass, Dazzle Monroe – Drums

The band are known to cover one or two Bowie tunes at their shows and will be issuing their debut single on Charles Of London’s new record label, Rock ‘N’ Roll Star/When Was The Last Time You Had Sex?

You can catch The Feathers for free in London tomorrow night (25th May) at The Forge in Camden.

And if you want a flavour of what they sound like, here’s a track that isn’t on the new single, Takes One To Know One. 

 

 

“We’ve got five years, what a surprise”

 

The BBC’s Ariel page has an item by Claire Barrett entitled David Bowie from the horse’s mouth.

It’s a piece which mainly concerns itself with some of the things Director Francis Whately said, by way of introduction, at the preview screening of his David Bowie Five Years film at the V&A.

You can read the item here.

Meanwhile the image here lists comments from many of the reviews that we just so happen to agree with.

 

 

“Fractured words and Branca-sonic”

 

The first Tin Machine album was released on this day in 1989.

It’s a recording that has an unfair reputation, possibly more to do with lazy journalism and word of (bad)mouth than anything in the grooves.

If Tin Machine is a release you’ve avoided, give it a try on Spotify now. 

More than two decades later, it mainly still kicks bottom somewhat.

 

We were sad to learn today that Trevor Bolder has succumbed to his fight with cancer at the age of 62.

The Uriah Heep bassist was probably best known to Bowie fans for his work across four Bowie studio albums: Hunky Dory, Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane and Pin Ups.

Trevor also played bass as one of The Spiders From Mars on the attendant Bowie tours along with fellow Spiders, Mick ‘Woody’ Woodmansey and the late Mick Ronson.

David Bowie had this to say about him:

 

Trevor was a wonderful musician and a major inspiration for whichever band he was working with. But he was foremostly a tremendous guy, a great man.  – David Bowie

 

See also the tributes to Trevor from his fellow bandmates in Uriah Heep, here. 

 

The picture here is of Trevor and David when Ziggy and The Spiders performed Starman on Lift Off with Ayshea in June 1972.

 

 

“Five years stuck on my eyes”

 

Last week we told you that the Radio Times would be publishing a front-cover Bowie feature today, and what do you know? They have.

You can scroll across the images above to view the spreads inside the magazine, but if you want to read the two-page feature about Steve Turner’s personal encounters with a pre-fame Bowie, we’re afraid you’ll have to splash out £1.60 at your local weekly TV listings publication outlet.

Turner’s feature is followed by two pages of contributions from half a dozen folk that crossed Bowie’s path at some point during his career.

In case you missed it last time, here’s the blurb from the Radio Times site:

 

David Bowie – Five Years: The Making Of An Icon

9:20pm – 10:50pm – BBC2, BBC2 HD

 

Documentary exploring five key years in the singer’s career, which saw him redefine himself as an artist by adopting a different persona – each one marking a shift in musical direction. Featuring interviews with his collaborators, the programme focuses on five pivotal years in Bowie’s career as a recording artist – from 1971’s ultimate glam-rock icon Ziggy Stardust and reinvention as the impeccably dressed soul stylist the Thin White Duke in 1975, to his regeneration in Berlin with the critically acclaimed 1977 album Heroes, 1980’s Scary Monsters triumph and Let’s Dance’s global success in 1983.

 

Director – Francis Whately

Executive Producer – Phil Dolling

Producer – Francis Whately

 

 

“Switch on the TV we may pick him up on channel two”

 

Having enjoyed the preview screening of Francis Whately’s Five Years documentary at the V&A last week, we’re pleased to be able to report that the film is a true treasure for all that appreciate the work of David Bowie.

If you think you’re familiar with all the footage of David Bowie that’s out there, then you didn’t reckon on the skill of the researchers for this 90-minute visual feast.

Beautifully edited, in both sound and vision, Five Years is a film you will want to watch more than once and it just confirms how lucky we are to be around while David Bowie is a creative force on the planet.

Hats off to Francis and his team.

We’re not going to give you any spoilers because you just need to see it, but here’s the blurb from the Radio Times, who will be publishing a front-cover Bowie feature next week.

 

David Bowie – Five Years: The Making Of An Icon

 

9:20pm – 10:50pm – BBC2, BBC2 HD

Documentary exploring five key years in the singer’s career, which saw him redefine himself as an artist by adopting a different persona – each one marking a shift in musical direction. Featuring interviews with his collaborators, the programme focuses on five pivotal years in Bowie’s career as a recording artist – from 1971’s ultimate glam-rock icon Ziggy Stardust and reinvention as the impeccably dressed soul stylist the Thin White Duke in 1975, to his regeneration in Berlin with the critically acclaimed 1977 album Heroes, 1980’s Scary Monsters triumph and Let’s Dance’s global success in 1983.

 

Director – Francis Whately

Executive Producer – Phil Dolling

Producer – Francis Whately

 

Watch the TV trailer here.