David Bowie again- why?
Well other than Alice Cooper, KISS, or even Screamin' Jay Hawkins, there's no other Rock performer who epitomises Halloween 'dress-up', and in his case literally as well as figuratively.
Ever c-c-changing, ever mercurial- after all, oh by jingo, he was on Mercury Records before his RCA adventures in sound -and he went from different guises and personnas as fast or as often you could change a, well, Halloween costume.
And a lot of his outfits were in retrospectacle (and a tip of the noggin to T. Dolby for that one) Halloween costumes let's see:
he went through being a R & B rocker, influenced in no doubt by the early 'Stones, a Music Hall/Caberet faux Anthony Newley, a 'Flour Power' Folkie, a Major 'Lost In Space', and this incarnation, a cross-dressing singer/songwriter that Ed Wood would have an affinity with-and all this is before his magnum opus 'Ziggy Stardust' which kept morphing and mutating itself into the the Lon Chaney, Junior-like transition of Diamond Dogs' one-eyed 'Halloween Jack' into the hokey cokey 'Thin White Duke'.
"...sake and strange Divine (real name Glenn Milstead- or is it Glenda Milstead?), wait for a lad insane..."
Grainy photo like grains of Martian sand.
HUNKY DORY was his fourth release sallying forth further where no one has gone before, recorded April 1971 at Trident Studios, London, just a year or so after The Beatles 'official' breakup, and released December 17, 1971:
Changes - This album is full of my changes and those of some of my friends.
Pretty - The reaction of me to my wife being pregnant was archetypal daddy -
Oh he's gonna be another Elvis.
This song is all that plus a dash of sci-fi.
Oh he's gonna be another Elvis.
This song is all that plus a dash of sci-fi.
Eight - The city is a kind of high-life wart on the backside of the prairie.
Life On Mars - This is a sensitive young girls reaction to the media.
Kooks - The baby was born and it looked like me and it looked like Angie
and the song came out like - if you're gonna stay with us you're gonna grow up
Bananas.
and the song came out like - if you're gonna stay with us you're gonna grow up
Bananas.
Quicksand - The chain reaction of moving around through out the bliss and
then the calamity of America produced this epic of confusion - Anyway, with
my esoteric problems I could have written it in Plainview - or Dulwich.
then the calamity of America produced this epic of confusion - Anyway, with
my esoteric problems I could have written it in Plainview - or Dulwich.
There is a time and space level just before you go to sleep when all about you
are losing theirs and whoosh void gets you with its cacophony of thought - that's
when I like to write my songs.
are losing theirs and whoosh void gets you with its cacophony of thought - that's
when I like to write my songs.
Fill - Biff Rose song.
Andy - A man of media and anti-message, with a kind of cute style.
Bob - This is how some see B.D.
Queen - A song on a Velvet Underground-Lou Reed framework s'about London sometimes.
Bewlay - Another in the series of David Bowie confessions - Star-Treck in a leather jacket
Bowie's next phase was probably his "Sgt. Pepper's" in that it shares some commonalities with the iconic Beatles LP from five years earlier, as the personas and identities presented are elaborate masquerades for the artists to hide behind making commentary as their 'altar-egos' ("...the church of man, love, is such a holy place to be.") make pronouncements equivalent to benedictions for the faithful flock almost religious in their fervor and zeal.
And just as theatrical, because "Sgt. Pepper's" Beatles and "Ziggy Stardust" Bowie are almost Pentecostal in their presentation(s), mixed with the roar of the greasepaint (Bowie wanted to be Newley once), the smell of the crowd (as the opening number and the reprise of same on The Beatles album demonstrates), music-hall tunes mixed with Rock, fantasy and larger-than-life reality.
Notable too is that David Bowie's first album, the eponymous DAVID BOWIE had the unfortunate distinction of being released in the UK the very same day as SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND which certainly didn't help sales much, even though it as a debut effort it was as good as it can get from a 20 year old wunderkind, and his "Rubber Band" 45 r.p.m. single predated the much better known famous song and 'concept' album by about a little more than half a year, December 2, 1966.
Most interesting is that both Bowie LPs include references to Mars, and have Bowie posing in pictures that immediately (at least to me) evoke the (in)famous "Face on Mars" photograph taken in the Cydonia region by the Viking 1 orbiter (orbital insertion June 19, 1976) released by NASA/JPL on July 25, 1976.
'Coincidence' or...?
As most know the name 'David Bowie' was about as real as 'Ringo Starr'- Richard Starkey became the stellar cowboy, possibly outlaw, 'Ringo', whereas David Jones became 'Bowie', so as to avoid confusion and mis-identification with/as in the musical show 'Oliver'- 'The Artful Dodger' -the lil' chap who was also on 'The Ed Sullivan Show' that fateful historic night the Beatles first appeared, February 9, 1964, and later of the 'Faux Four'- Monkee Davy Jones.
↑The other David sans leather jacket↑
'David (Jones) Bowie' in a leather jacket w/ Star Trek: The Next Generation holodeck detective 'Dixon Hill' who for some reason or another resembles esteemed Beat author & junkie
William S. Burroughs.
And just as theatrical, because "Sgt. Pepper's" Beatles and "Ziggy Stardust" Bowie are almost Pentecostal in their presentation(s), mixed with the roar of the greasepaint (Bowie wanted to be Newley once), the smell of the crowd (as the opening number and the reprise of same on The Beatles album demonstrates), music-hall tunes mixed with Rock, fantasy and larger-than-life reality.
Notable too is that David Bowie's first album, the eponymous DAVID BOWIE had the unfortunate distinction of being released in the UK the very same day as SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND which certainly didn't help sales much, even though it as a debut effort it was as good as it can get from a 20 year old wunderkind, and his "Rubber Band" 45 r.p.m. single predated the much better known famous song and 'concept' album by about a little more than half a year, December 2, 1966.
Most interesting is that both Bowie LPs include references to Mars, and have Bowie posing in pictures that immediately (at least to me) evoke the (in)famous "Face on Mars" photograph taken in the Cydonia region by the Viking 1 orbiter (orbital insertion June 19, 1976) released by NASA/JPL on July 25, 1976.
'Coincidence' or...?
As most know the name 'David Bowie' was about as real as 'Ringo Starr'- Richard Starkey became the stellar cowboy, possibly outlaw, 'Ringo', whereas David Jones became 'Bowie', so as to avoid confusion and mis-identification with/as in the musical show 'Oliver'- 'The Artful Dodger' -the lil' chap who was also on 'The Ed Sullivan Show' that fateful historic night the Beatles first appeared, February 9, 1964, and later of the 'Faux Four'- Monkee Davy Jones.
↑The other David sans leather jacket↑
'David (Jones) Bowie' in a leather jacket w/ Star Trek: The Next Generation holodeck detective 'Dixon Hill' who for some reason or another resembles esteemed Beat author & junkieWilliam S. Burroughs.
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