It was long, long ago, long ago…
Admittedly, this one’s been a long time coming considering it ended in September. But here are the results as promised, (10.24.2007 NEWS: SONY BOX DUE FOR AMERICA AND EUROPE IN DECEMBER) “during the first weekend of December”.
First up, the answer to the first part of the contest (08.07.2007 NEWS: SONY JAPAN PAPER SLEEVES CONTEST PART ONE) in which you had to work out the identity of the five album sleeves from enlarged sections of each:
Part 1 = Heathen
Part 2 = Reality
Part 3 = ‘hours…’
Part 4 = 1. Outside
Part 5 = Earthling
OK, that was the very easy part. On to the second part of the contest. (08.25.2007 NEWS: SONY JAPAN PAPER SLEEVES CONTEST – FINAL PART) We asked…
David Bowie promoted all of the above albums with some kind of tour or other. But, which albums since Ziggy Stardust were not specifically promoted with a tour? (Only include studio albums and don’t include Tin Machine.)
Here’s how I arrived at the answer…
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The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars (1972) The touring proper started with the promotion of this album with many songs being played from it during the first Ziggy Stardust tour that kicked off in February 1972, though the album wasn’t released for another four months in June 1972.
Aladdin Sane (1973) The album was heavily promoted from the 2nd US tour in February until July 3rd 1973 in the UK. The UK programme for The David Bowie Tour 1973 featured the Aladdin Sane image as the front cover as did the press ads for the tour.
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Pin Ups (1973) No tour, though The 1980 Floor Show was used as a vehicle to promote the album.
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Diamond Dogs (1974) Huge American offensive for The Diamond Dogs Tour. David Live, the live album recorded at the Tower Theatre in July, was made available in time for the Philly Dogs leg of the tour later in the year. (See below)
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Young Americans (1975) Difficult one this. Though there was no specific tour, most of the songs from the first version of the Young Americans album (The Gouster) were played on the final leg of the 1974 Diamond Dogs Tour, which became known as The Soul Tour or The Philly Dogs Tour. So the album was promoted in theory even if it couldn’t be bought for a few more months and a couple of the tracks hadn’t actually been recorded yet.
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Station To Station (1976) Known to fans as The Station To Station Tour, this tour was officially called The 1976 David Bowie World Tour…either way, it’s obvious which album it was specifically promoting.
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Low (1977) See “Heroes”
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“Heroes” (1977) Retrospectively labelled The Stage Tour, (after the live album which came from it) The 1978 World Tour, as it was officially known, is often remembered as a tour in support of the “Heroes” album, particularly when one considers that David’s self-portrait drawing that became the identity for the tour was based on the Sukita shot from the “Heroes” album cover.
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However, it could be reasonably argued that the tour promoted both Low and Ziggy Stardust to an even greater degree when one analyses the repertoire. There were almost twice as many songs performed from both Low and Ziggy as there were from “Heroes”, and in fact, only one less from Station To Station. It just so happens that “Heroes” was the most recent album and was obviously going to get the most attention in tour publicity…not to mention the latest film, Just A Gigolo. Indeed.
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For arguments sake, I think most people agree that The 1978 World Tour was primarily in support of the “Heroes” album. But, it can’t truly be said that it wasn’t also in support of Low or that it was a tour specifically promoting “Heroes” alone either. So, I’m accepting either answer for the sake of this contest.
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It should be added that after a four month break, The 1978 World Tour reconvened in November for dates in Australia, New Zealand and Japan, by which time the Stage album, recorded earlier in the year in America, had been released.
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Lodger (1979) No tour.
Scary Monsters (1980) No tour.
Let’s Dance (1983) The hugely successful Serious Moonlight Tour was clearly promoting Let’s Dance, even if only half the songs on the album were included in the setlist.
Tonight (1984) No tour.
Never Let Me Down (1987) The Glass Spider Tour really did devote a sizeable chunk of its setlist to the most recent album release, Never Let Me Down, with all but two of the original album’s eleven tracks being played at some point on the tour.ÂÂ
Black Tie, White Noise (1993) No tour.
The Buddha Of Suburbia (1993) No tour.
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So there you have it. Presuming you got part one of the contest correct, if you had the following list (with or without Young Americans, Low and “Heroes” for the reasons stated above) your name went in the correct answers bucket.
Pin Ups (1973)
Lodger (1979)
Scary Monsters (1980)
Tonight (1984)
Black Tie, White Noise (1993)
The Buddha Of Suburbia (1993)
I also included answers that excluded The Buddha Of Suburbia as, even though it was a new Bowie studio album, it was in effect a soundtrack album, too.
And these are the ten names that The Random Selector plucked from aforementioned bucket.
federica
joeromanelli
keithbubb
lesnrob
peterbraster
rikfiend88
roomcq
simone
steeoui
themadman
If you could all get your names and addresses through to me pronto, you’ll have your box set through within the month.
Stay tuned for a contest to win the non-Japanese version (10.24.2007 NEWS: SONY BOX DUE FOR AMERICA AND EUROPE IN DECEMBER) of this same box set which is released tomorrow. (See Press Release section for US press release)
