Month: October 2006

To the girl with the mousy hair…

The mobile media company, 3, announced the launch of a major campaign earlier this week designed to raise the profile of it’s new 3MusicStore service.

The campaign kicked-off with a 30 second TV spot which first aired in the UK on October 16th. The advertisement features a man with an acoustic guitar, (similar to Ziggy’s blue guitar used for Starman on TOTPs) a young girl and a dog sitting around a camp fire on an idyllic moonlit beach.

The man plays a rendition of David Bowie’s classic Life On Mars?, the arrangement of which (considering the instrumentation) obviously owes more than a little to Seu Jorge‘s treatment of the song for the soundtrack of The Life Aquatic than it does to the Hunky Dory original.

After we hear about twenty five seconds from the end of the first verse and into the chorus, the camera pulls back and pans left to reveal fireworks that appear to be coming out of the ocean.

The ad was written by Yan Elliot and Luke Williamson at WCRS and shot on location by Trakor.

It’s a charming little piece displaying a great sense of style, and I for one would love to see a full-length version where the whole song is performed.

Seu Jorge plays guitar…

Been waiting for an excuse to run a contest for these Seu Jorge CDs for quite a while, and now I have a tenuous link in the story below that gives me one.

If you’re not familiar with these recordings, then frankly you’ve not been paying attention…(08/27/04 NEWS: TWO BOWIE SONGS ON LIFE AQUATIC SOUNDTRACK & 11.09.2004 NEWS: BOWIE SONGS ON LIFE AQUATIC SOUNDTRACK & 12.03.2004 NEWS: SEVEN DB SONGS ON LIFE AQUATIC SOUNDTRACK CD & 12.25.2004 NEWS: THE LIFE AQUATIC GOES NATIONWIDE IN THE USA TODAY & 12.27.2004 NEWS: THE LIFE AQUATIC SOUNDTRACK COMPETITION DAY ONE & 12.28.2004 NEWS: LIFE AQUATIC COMP DAY TWO, PLUS DAY ONE WINNERS & 12.29.2004 NEWS: LIFE AQUATIC COMP DAY THREE, AND DAY TWO WINNERS & 05.06.05 NEWS: MORE BOWIE ON LIFE AQUATIC DVD SET & 10.15.05 NEWS: DB COMMENTS ON SEU JORGE BOWIE COVERS CD)

If you want to win one of five copies of the original soundtrack (above right) which includes Seu’s version of Life On Mars? (see story below) AND one of five copies of the Studio Sessions (above left), which contains thirteen of Seu’s Bowie covers, simply tell me what the two Bowie originals are on the original soundtrack CD AND send me the short quotation of David’s regarding Seu’s versions of his songs.

When you have your answers, (all available somewhere in aforementioned news items) send them to me here.

Usual BowieNet rules apply: Only one entry per BowieNet account, and please remember you must enter using your BowieNet e-mail or at least supply your BowieNet user name if you don’t have access to BowieNet e-mail.

The contest will be open until midnight UK time on Sunday October 29th and we’ll announce the winners shortly thereafter. Good luck kidz!

You’re playing with the spider who possess the sky…

We originally told you about the BAAL EP back in July, (07.12.06 NEWS: BAAL EP AND BTWN EXTRAS DIGITAL DOWNLOADS DUE) and again in August when the release date was put back. (08.21.2006 NEWS: BAAL EP DIGITAL DOWNLOAD DELAY)

In the latter story EMI informed us that BAAL would be delayed until “early next year”. Well, you can’t get much more accurate than that, as it’s now been rescheduled for a January 1st 2007 release via iTunes.

Here’s the tracklisting again, (with slightly revised timings) for those of you that aren’t already familiar with this superb recording:

David Bowie in Bertolt Brecht?s Baal digital EP

01 Baal?s Hymn (Der Choral Vom Großen Baal) (4.00)
02 Remembering Marie A. (Erinnerung An Die Marie A.) (2.04)
03 Ballad Of The Adventurers (Die Ballad Von Den Abenteurern) (2.00)
04 The Drowned Girl (Vom Ertrunkenen Mädchen) (2.24)
05 The Dirty Song (0.37)

See the original news item for more details. The David Mallet directed video for The Drowned Girl is also scheduled to be released via iTunes on the same day.

EMI has just provided us with details of another digital download EP also scheduled for a January 1st 2007 release: BOWIE 1965!.

The EP above was first issued by EMI in 1979, collecting together David’s four 1965 Parlophone recordings with The Manish Boys and The Lower Third, in much the same way that Pye cashed in in 1972 with their release of four of the six sides David recorded for them in 1966.

The tracklisting for BOWIE 1965! is the same as that 1979 EP:

BOWIE 1965! digital EP

01 I Pity The Fool – The Manish Boys
02 Take My Tip – The Manish Boys
03 You’ve Got A Habit Of Leaving – Davy Jones (And The Lower Third) (Pictured on the sleeve above)
04 Baby Loves That Way – Davy Jones (And The Lower Third)

As I’m sure you know, Take My Tip was the first of his own compositions that David ever released. It’s also the source of today’s seemingly irrelevant lyric quote…I guess the old other-worldly spider theme started earlier than you may have suspected.

Also, DB was obviously proud enough of the two Lower Third songs to re-record them for the Toy project.

It would have been nice to have been able to include the two alternate Manish Boys takes which first surfaced on the Early On compilation, but I’m guessing licensing issues didn’t allow it to happen.

And me I’m on a radio show…

I don’t really need to say anything here, as Spaceface already said it ages ago in the calendar which you can access by clicking on the Bowie Calendar tab above, funnily enough.

In fact I won’t say anything, apart from this bit, and the bit above if you could just ignore those bits.

PS – Sorry, did mean to say you can listen online by clicking on Ziggy‘s gold circle above.

Here are we, one magical moment…

David and Iman were photographed arriving at a private screening of The Prestige in New York last night, (Wednesday) as evidenced in the above WireImage.com shot.

The evening’s entertainment took place at….Actually, why don’t I hand you over to the magic man himself to tell you about it…

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“We went to a private screening of The Prestige last night. Special event in aid of Hugh Jackman on cover of Vogue Homme. They threw the screening and small dinner at intimate Philippe Chow uptown restaurant afterwards.

Film went down very well causing all present to spend dinner trying to analyse and work out the complex Chris Nolan style screenplay. (Remember Memento??)”

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Thanx for that David, you’re always very welcome around these parts you know! For the record, Bowie wore Jil Sander and Iman wore a period 1900s jacket and blouse with jeans.

Reviews praising DB’s portrayal of Nikola Tesla have begun appearing, a few of which I’ve pasted excerpts from below…

Variety – “On the other hand, perpetually undervalued as an actor Bowie brings an elegant, enlivening edge to Tesla…”

Hollywood Reporter – “Bowie is quite wonderful as Tesla — mysterious, exotic yet somehow the film’s most reasonable man…”

Los Angeles Times – “Having this great original (Nikola Tesla) played by another great original, David Bowie, was a stroke of casting genius. Bowie gives an immaculate performance…”

Arizona Daily Star – “Bale and Jackman are intense and passionate. David Bowie matches their efforts, entering the film at the midpoint as scientist Nikola Tesla…”

MSNBC – “Bowie effectively plays Tesla as if he were an indifferent alien, resigned to the unfortunate fact that mankind can tolerate only so many innovations at a time…”

That last line could almost be describing one TJ Newton…Anyway, well done David, sounds like you’ve turned in yet another cracking performance.

The Prestige opens across The States tomorrow. (Friday)

What made my life so wonderful?

Today’s Daily Mail newspaper in the UK has a two-page spread by Becky Sheaves about make-up artist Carolyn Cowan, 46, who claims David Bowie gave her some powerful advice while she was employed on a Tin Machine video shoot in Dublin, in July 1991.

Here’s an excerpt from the piece:

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I was booked to go to Dublin to do David Bowie’s make-up for a video. The night before the shoot, I sat alone in the bar of my hotel drinking whisky, chain-smoking cigars and watching, of all things, the finals of the Miss Ireland contest. I didn’t get to bed until 3am; by 5am I had to be up and working.

David Bowie took one look at me, hung-over, red-eyed and incoherent, and told me I was in trouble. He was in recovery from drug addiction and badly wanted me to get well, too.

But I was furious. I’d expected a fun, party time. Instead, every day of the shoot, David asked me if I had managed to stay sober the night before. And, of course, I hadn’t.

By the third day, he had persuaded me to go to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. Everything he’d said had finally got through to me and I’m now so grateful for his intervention. For as I sat there in the church hall, surrounded by old Irish drunks, I suddenly had what I can only describe as a spiritual epiphany. I felt filled with the possibility of getting clean and glimpsed a life beyond drink or drugs.

There and then, I admitted I was an addict and vowed to get clean. And I have been ever since.

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You can read the whole article online here.

Thanx to all of you who mailed or messaged me about this item…but mostly thanx to Doug ‘Experimental Hair’ Doig for being the first to notify me at 11:30pm last night!

You Belong In Rock&Folk…

The extremely French Jerome Soligny has been in touch with details of the 40th anniversary edition of Rock&Folk magazine.

UK fans will know just how important the magazine was to us teenagers back in the 70s, (as it was of course to the rest of the world) as it often seemed to be the only source of decent quality Bowie photos printed on glossy magazine pages.

The fact that none of us understood a word of several important and in-depth features back then didn’t seem important…At least not when, on the rare occasion that one could get hold of a copy of the mag, you could run straight off to the French teacher for a translation!

Anyway, the magazine continued to boast many exclusive Bowie interviews and features right up to the present day.

Here’s David’s birthday message in the current issue of the magazine, for those that can’t read the small French stuff in the scan above:

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For all at Rock and Folk, my very best wishes to you for this 40th birthday. You are true survivors and we have come a long way together, you and I. Thank you so much for being there for all of us artists and I personally look forward to talking with you again in the near future.

David Bowie

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So happy 40th birthday too from the Bowie fans around the globe whose bedroom walls you managed to brighten in such a stylish way.

And ten lucky peoploids…

OK – I won’t prolong the agony on this one. Here are the ten BowieNetters that will be receiving a signed by David Bowie and Mick Rock official 2007 limited edition calendar.

chrisgaffney
JAYL
Jozef
kingtommy
LamBugi
paul
paulaf
Spike
toni2
Webwolf

If you lucky buggers could please furnish me with your real names and addresses, we will lay these beauties on you as soon as they have been signed by both the guilty parties.

Stay tuned for some equally exciting competitions over the coming days and weeks…honest, there are some very cool contests on the way.

You still have the rest of October to order the limited edition calendar with a BowieNet discount, as outlined in this news story: 10.01.2006 NEWS: OFFICIAL 2007 BOWIE/ROCK CALENDAR ON SALE NOW!

Here today, gone tomorrow…

Don’t forget that today is the last day of our contest to win one of ten limited edition official 2007 calendars signed by both David Bowie and Mick Rock.

If you’ve not yet entered, see the original news item we posted two weeks ago for details. (10.02.2006 NEWS: SIGNED OFFICIAL 2007 BOWIE/ROCK CALENDAR CONTEST)

We will stop accepting entries after midnight tonight UK time…so that still gives you a good seven hours to get your act together if you haven’t yet.

It’s the terror of knowing…

David, if you’re reading this, it may be best to turn away now before what might well have been one of your 60th birthday surprises is ruined!

Right, now he’s gone it’s safe to tell you that Ex-Eurythmic and all-round groovy gal, Annie Lennox, has posted details on her site regarding an upcoming Radio 2 DB special called Inspirational Bowie…Here’s the scoop word-for-word from Aberdeen Annie’s official site:

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Annie recently contributed to ‘Inspirational Bowie’ – a one hour radio documentary to tie in with David Bowie’s 60th birthday. The programme hears from performers who have been moved by Bowie’s music utilising interviews with a large cross section of performers who have been touched by David’s influence.

As well as Annie there are interviews with New Order, The Dandy Warhols, Brett Anderson, Moby, Elbow, Boy George, Simple Minds, Richard Hawley, Neil Hannon, Marc Almond and others are planned to be included.

The programme INSPIRATIONAL BOWIE will be broadcast on BBC Radio 2 Saturday 6th January 2007 at 21.00. Just so you don’t miss it, we will remind you in the new year.

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Well, we’ll also do the same and we’ll also keep you informed of any other 60th Bowie birthday celebrations as we get them. Providing David’s not looking that is.

Thanks to jeffk on the BowieNet MBs for the pointer.