Month: February 2008

I’m happy, hope you’re happy too…

Such is the popularity of the new series of the BBC’s Ashes To Ashes (02.03.2008 REMINDER: ASHES TO ASHES STARTS IN THE UK ON THURSDAY) in the UK that the current issue of the Radio Times (9-15 February) has another feature on the programme and the new romantic movement in particular.

It’s a three-page piece that includes recollections from various characters around the scene, and it seems that somebody at the Radio Times knows their Bowie, as they have reproduced the above label taken from a promo 12″ of Space Oddity segueing into Ashes To Ashes that was released as: The Continuing Story Of Major Tom in 1980.

It’s no secret that David Bowie used some of the characters that frequented Steve Strange‘s Blitz night club in both his Ashes To Ashes and Fashion videos. The club was the very epicentre of all things foppish, frilly and fashionable mutating as it did from Bowie Night’s at it’s predecessor, Billy’s.

Midge Ure, (who was about to find success as the second leader of Ultravox) remembers well the evening that DB visited Blitz looking for likely extras to populate aforementioned videos:

“There was a huge flurry of activity one night when David Bowie turned up. You have to imagine all these really cool kids…their make-up melted! Cool flew out the window and they were all running around [hysterical voice]: ‘David Bowie’s here! David Bowie’s here!'”

Ashes To Ashes continues this Thursday at 9:00pm on BBC1, when I’m sure even more of the programme’s cast will join in the lyrical refrain used for today’s lyric quotation.

Became the special man…

Compiled by “Culture-section regulars”, the Sunday Times Culture Section (Music) from the weekend just gone has what they reckon to be The 20 most influential albums.

As you can see, David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars is at number three, and here follows an excerpt from the article…

“Pop music has always been about much more than just music; so, in our list, we?ve taken a broad view of what these albums are influencing. If we had limited ourselves exclusively to musical influence, for example, we might have removed Ziggy Stardust (musicians inspired by glam tend to favour Marc Bolan as a template) and replaced it with Bowie?s Low, which sowed the musical seeds for the next decade.

But Ziggy was the album that changed our world. It told us that if you didn?t like the way you were, you could just reinvent yourself.”

You can read the whole thing here. Thanx to Spaceface for the pointer.

Hooked to the silver screen…

BowieNetter Martyn Hammond pointed me in the direction of this crazy site last week and I think it’s something you’ll all find of interest.

Using David Bowie’s visit to Memphis in 1973 as the central point, Elvis and Bowie-mad film-maker Mike McCarthy has worked hard to create this wonderful thing.

Mike McCarthy is running a Bowie-centric film course at the Memphis College of Art from February 19th to April 1st to celebrate the 35th Anniversary of David Bowie’s visit to the MCA. Here’s a bit of the course description from the site…

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Students will use David Bowie’s visit to MCA in 1973 to conceptualize Memphis (and Overton Park’s) impact on American Pop Culture. Stories by Dolph Smith

(pictured with DB in the montage below) and others, rock and roll films, and pre-production emphasis on writing, storyboards, directing and producing will encourage students to create a short narrative piece using Bowie’s visit as a metaphor or literal device for their own experiences and imagination.

Students will produce a 10 to 15 minute rock and roll film (not a rock video) that entertains experimental thoughts but with EMPHASIS ON NARRATIVE) using Bowie/Memphis/Yourself as a theme while considering what you would like to do versus what you can accomplish in the time given (6 weeks + one month). (I have shot feature length movies on film in sixteen days or less.)

Preparation on writing the script: How to treat the theme(s): Alienation, Rock stars, Art teachers, the city where rock and roll was created. late night TV horror hosts, Overton Park Shell, Elvis Presley, The Meaning of Life, subversion, assimilation. Midtown. How is all this assimilated and translated personally through the filmmaker – versus what the filmmaker can realistically pull off within the time frame of the course.

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You can read much more about THE FILM CLASS THAT FELL TO EARTH here or by clicking on the image above.

Here’s more blurb about Bowie’s actual visit…

February 25, 1973: Four months following his first Ellis Auditorium appearance, Bowie returns to Memphis, and on the next day visits the Art School. Note Bowie’s eyebrows are missing as he is now in full Aladdin Sane mode. Artist and Teacher Dolph Smith and his son Tim welcome David Bowie to MCA (then called the Memphis Academy of Art). Daughter Allison was hiding behind her Father’s leg. These are the only four photos known to exist (so far) of this evening at the Art School.

Go here to read what Dolph has written so far and stay tuned for that elusive fourth picture mentioned above, which we’ve been promised an exclusive of for February 26th, exactly 35 years to the day since Bowie’s visit.

It’s worth spending a bit of time on the site to view stuff like the above flyers, see more photographs and read reviews of the Bowie live shows. Reviews like the hilarious one below which, frankly, makes the reviewer seem a bit of a buffoon…still, as you can read, the kids always knew when they were on to a good thing, “They loved it. They screamed. They yelled. They danced on their seats and begged for more David Bowie” …even if the reviewer was clueless.

To be right in that photograph…

As promised last week, (01.29.2008 NEWS: EXCLUSIVE STILL OF HARTNETT AND BOWIE FROM AUGUST) above is another still of David Bowie as Ogilvie in Austin Chick‘s upcoming movie, August.

Members can view a much larger uncropped version of the picture with DB in context.

I never done good things, I never done bad things…

As we told you back in April of last year, the BBC time-warp 1970s cop show that was Life On Mars? has hit the fast forward button to the 1980s and mutated into Ashes To Ashes. The first episode is to be broadcast on Thursday 7th February at 9.00pm on BBC One in the UK.

This week’s Radio Times magazine has a six-page cover feature wherein co-creator/writer Ashley Pharoah talks about the influences that went into the making of the new show, including David Bowie’s Ashes To Ashes pierrot character, which takes on an altogether more sinister role for this production.

Here’s Ashley: “I remember the first time I watched the preposterous, brilliant video for David Bowie’s Ashes To Ashes. It was very, very scary. This clown is our homage in the series.”

You can view the trailer for Ashes To Ashes along with the synopsis and other stuff by clicking on the image above.

If you miss this first episode, don’t forget that if you’re in the UK you are now able to use the BBC iPlayer where you can watch BBC programmes from the last seven days on your computer.

Failing that, the 4-disc region 2 DVD set of Ashes To Ashes will be available from May 12th 2008.

He thinks he’d blow our minds…

When I first heard that this film featured a cover version of David Bowie’s Starman, I baulked at posting an item on BowieNet simply because, and I’m uncomfortable saying this, the film looks like it’s probably a lot of old toilet.

However, I’ve relented on account of the amount of people who have e-mailed in to say what a big bunch of fun they found it…particularly the Starman performance.

A thinly-veiled spoof of Walk The Line, (the popular Johnny Cash biopic from 2005) Walk Hard documents the rise and fall of one Dewey Cox, who believes that donning a space suit (see above) and covering Starman may be enough to revive his flagging career.

But the big question remains: Is this the version of Starman to finally knock The Krankies’ version off the top of the pile?

Well, you can judge for yourselves just how successful Dewey’s attempt was by either checking out the film, or listening to the full version on the newly-released soundtrack CD. Investigate further by clicking on the image above.

Because my love for you, Would break my heart in two…

Following on from the region 1 DVD release of The Heartbreak Kid in December last year, the film, which has a healthy dose of Bowie tunes sprinkled liberally throughout (08.20.2007 NEWS: SIX BOWIE TUNES IN NEW BEN STILLER MOVIE) is now available on region 2 DVD also.

The soundtrack CD, which was released in October, contains both Ashes To Ashes and Suffragette City.