In the corner of the morning in the past…
Had a call a little while back from BowieNetter Kenneth Chennells, (he doesn’t want me to use his member name…you’ll soon understand why!) who read a couple of excerpts over the phone to me from
Here’s the first bit he read out to me…
———————————————————————————————————————–
Escaping to Mountain Studios, Switzerland (where Bowie would later to record Let?s Dance) Bowie, May, Taylor, Deacon and Mercury locked themselves in the studio and penned an album that continued the exploration of the pressures and demands of modern life (themes that would also appear in Queens following album ?The Works? with songs like ?It?s a hard life? and ?I want to break free.?) The album makes reference to one of Bowie?s previous alter egos in the title and the collaboration was aptly named ? The Duke & The Queen and was simply titled ?PRESSURE.?
In 1983, Bowie signed an expensive contract with EMI Records and released the huge hit album Let’s Dance. As Queen’s fame and success was also catapulting ever higher, the timing for the release of ?PRESSURE? stalled and it was eventually agreed that the window of opportunity had passed. The album was shelved and the rest is history?.
———————————————————————————————————————–
But why had I never even had a sniff of this story in the 25 years that had passed since the album was shelved? It all sounded highly unlikely to me. Anyway, it got worse when Ken read this excerpt out too…
———————————————————————————————————————–
Throughout 1999 and up until 2000, Albarn managed to demo 18 tracks with musicians ranging from Ray Davies, Robert Del Naja (3D from Massive Attack) and Morrissey. He even convinced David Bowie to record a vocal over the telephone. Bowie’s was in the studio, working on an album to be titled ?Toy?, which in the end was never released (but that?s another story!) By the end of the millennium, the result was a collection of duets Albarn entitled ?True Britannia.?
Around about the time he was mixing the soundtrack he had written for the crime comedy Ordinary Decent Criminal, Albarn set up a hideaway in a north London pub, began mixing the True Britannia LP and excitedly started to make plans for a release the following year..
By 2002 though, with Gorilla?s in full effect, Blur ever omnipresent, and New Labour seeming to do a good enough job of incriminating themselves, Damon had grown weary of the idea of attacking a time that had actually made him quite a lot of money and was very much now a footnote in history?With so much else on his plate, it wasn?t hard for him to promptly shelve the project and move on?
———————————————————————————————————————–
Again, if this were true, surely some news of it would have leaked considering so many other artists were involved with it’s creation?
Having looked further into the story myself, this intro to The Observer piece should have been a bit of a clue to Ken: “Let me make this clear – ‘Lost Masters’, these sleevenotes and their accompanying images: it’s make-believe. It’s a world for music lovers where anything is possible…”
The whole article was actually a piece about a new fantasy website:
It’s a good fun site that’s worth a look and as they say themselves on the site: “Wouldn’t it be great if this story was true?”