David Bowie - R.I.P.

In truth I was largely ambivalent with regard to his music - a couple of things Heroes and Drive-in Saturday are masterpieces - but his legacy is massive RIP.

Saint David has given us so many musical and visual miracles. May his legacy last forever.

With his battle against cancer being so successfully hidden from public view, news of his death comes as a shock. I loved his early work, especially Ziggy and Hunky Dorky, and still do today.  He seemed to have something very special. 

rodwsmith posted:

 

What a testament to him that he spent some/most of his last months on earth making new music for us. 

Think making music was his passion, the thing he has loverd and I assume it was manly a requiem for him self. 

Mrs. Hook and I watched the Bowie episode of "Storytellers" on VH1 two nights ago.  It was from 1999, and he looked and sounded great. Following the episode, the music channel showed a couple of videos from Blackstar.  Mrs. Hook commented on how he looked -- said he must be ill.  No, I said - he's 69 today (it was January 8th, his birthday) - everyone gets old. No, she said, I think he's ill, very ill.  I hate that she was so right in this instance. 

Saw him live twice (1976 - Thin White Duke, and 1983 - Serious Moonlight).  Both were fantastic shows.  He wrote a lot of great songs and was, above all, a consummate entertainer.  Am glad I have almost all his albums, and will be ordering Blackstar today.  Truly a huge loss for the world of popular music. So very, very sad...

Hook

That one really hurts.

Some lovely tributes here and yes it's really sad to hear of David Bowie passing away. 

My first memory of hearing his music was during the power cuts around 1973 and it was 'Star Man' coming from a Hacker Sovereign radio my Grandfather had set up connected to a car battery when the lights went out. My Sisters made a Moon out of cardboard with Foil and little Stars too. My oldest Sister who was around 14 at the time was really into DB at that time and sadly she passed away too at 56 only a few weeks ago so great memories tinged with real sadness today. 

R.I.P. Star Man & Big Sis xx

Very nice tweet by a young man named Dean Podestá:

"If you're ever sad, just remember the world is 4.543 billion years old and you somehow managed to exist at the same time as David Bowie."

Being of the age, I have always heard a lot of his music and liked quite a lot. I have copies of quite a few but have never been a completist. I was going to buy a copy of the latest but it now doesn't seem right somehow. It just seems like the ultimate publicity stunt.

Nice Spotify Bowie playlist with 50 tracks totaling 3 hours 45 minutes of highlights

Should have said he was brilliant at Live Aid.  

The Strat (Fender) posted:

Should have said he was brilliant at Live Aid.  

Agreed.....one of the highlights!

Listening to his singles collection right now and will listen to the 2nd CD after this.

R.I.P

R.I.P. Duca Bianco!I'll miss you.

Planet Earth Is Blue...

How strange to learn of the sad news about his passing. It's almost like saying goodbye to an old friend or a part of you? David Bowie has in a way always been there ever since I first listened to his "The Rise and fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders from Mars". I was nine and played my fathers cassette on his Tandberg stereo system. Always been fond of his music and his music really has that timeless quality.

I was never what might be called a 'fan' of David Bowie, despite owning four of his albums, but today I feel particularly sad at his passing. I don't know why, but I do. I can recall so clearly the first time I heard Hunky Dory; I remember the location and even the record player, as well as the girl who was playing it for me. I guess that's etched into my musical development and my growing up. Maybe that's it: I grew up with Bowie; he was always there, his music was all around even as my own tastes led me in other directions.

Curiously, I was streaming some favourite Bowie tracks on Tidal on Saturday morning. Why on Saturday, I don't know, I haven't played any Bowie for years.

This evening I have just streamed Blackstar. We are lucky that he has left us such a wealth of great songs.

Very sad news indeed. I had the pleasure of meeting him when I was sixteen in June 1972 when he played at the Pavilion Theatre in Torquay at the start of the Ziggy Stardust tour.  I was working at the venue and the atmosphere was so relaxed. He was a really charming man, as was Mick Ronson. He wasn't a big name then but I became a huge fan after hearing him play. When he returned a year later to play the Town Hall on the Aladdin Sane tour he picked me out whilst singing 'Watch That Man'. Although a bit embarrassed I earned a lot of kudos with my girlfriend and my mates.

RIP David.

RIP Mr Bowie..

My small meeting with Bowie was back in 1985 at a Bruce Springsteen gig at Wembley Stadium when my sister had got me backstage VIP tickets. I saw Bowie stood all alone in the VIP area as if the other rock celebs had cleared a space for him. He looked so small and slim but dressed immaculately and oh so cool.

Much to my own surprise I wondered up and said hi and that I came from Driffield, where half his Spiders came from and played my local youth club when I was Mod and knew Woody's sister. He was very polite, smiled and nodded his head as he looked at me. I felt he was about to say something or maybe shake my hand when someone else wondered up and distract him. He gracefully lifted his had to say sorry and the moment had gone and I drifted off.

Richard

I didn't see this news coming.  Almost scared to think about it.  Such a major presence in our lives for so many years.  Says alot that he kept at his music right to the end.  One of the very brightest stars has gone out.  Feels like not many left.  RIP.

Peter

I think Bowie was important for a huge number of people - in the 1970s especially - because he demonstrated that you coud be different, that it was allowed, even desirable. He added a splash of colour to the often grim early 70s.

I remember as a spotty, weedy, dyspraxic kid, uninterested in sport (except football) or physical exercise but massively into movies and music, having a pic of Bowie in The Man Who Fell To Earth ripped from a magazine on my bedroom wall. I use to stare at that picture - Bowie was rail-thin, naked from the waist up, pale and had orange floppy hair - for hours on end, just wishing I could be like that.

I guess when we are growing up, we have a series of musical epiphanies, that (generally) set us up on our musical journey through life. In the mid-to-late 1970s, mine were "Led Zeppelin II", "Wish You Were Here", "Autobahn", "Horses", "Unknown Pleasures" and Bowie's "Low". I remember at school all the fans who'd picked on "Ziggy"/"Aladdin Sane" eras, or the plastic soul of "Young Americans" felt betrayed by this chilly and terse album, with its fragmentary, barely-there songs and austere instrumentals, but I loved it and it led me on a path towards the outré and the avant-garde (Penderecki, Eno, Suicide, TG, Velvets, Scott Walker, Human League, Neu!, etc).

I think that, along with John Peel, Bowie played a critical role as a musical educator/guide for an entire generation of British kids. I don't think his influence and importance can be underestimated. Sure, his 80s/early 90s work was mostly dire, "Let's Dance" a commercially successful mis-step that has dated badly, but the 70s stuff and "Scary Monsters", as well as individual moments of brilliance on "Heathen", "Hours", "Reality", "Earthling" are wonderful, making up a virtually unrivalled body of work. The two most recent records will grow in stature, I think (especially "Blackstar") and join the 1970s masterpieces.

He also never stuck with one musical style, look or mood, moving on constantly, something that was very exciting if you were of a certain mindset. This led of course to charges of dilletantism but it meant that he never - until the 80s anyway - played it safe. If you look at, say, the 1973 to 1977 run of albums ("Aladdin Sane", "Diamond Dogs", "Young Americans", "Station To Station" and "Low"), that's a pretty amazing body of work in itself. Each album is completely different from the one before or after it, and yet is very identifiably David Bowie.

Many years ago - in 1999, I think - I had the pleasure of interviewing him for a magazine and he was affable, intelligent and generous with his time and of his spirit. We talked about art and films more than we did music (DB was very knowledgeable on both) and drank a lot of very strong black coffee, a couple of glasses of Japanese whisky and smoked like demons. Bowie was a famously heavy smoker, puffing away at 60 a day, and even I couldn't keep up with him.

I don't think any celebrity death has affected me quite as this one today. I simply haven't been able to do very much except think about Bowie, listen to Bowie's music, talk to people about Bowie, and look at pictures of and films about Bowie.

Bowie sounds great on anything, didn't matter if it was a rare 200gm pressing from wherever or an 8 track cassette in a car traveling up the coast. It just sounds right.

The Beatles taught me to listen to music Bowie taught me to explore music.  He opened my mind and millions of others, we are the richer for that.

His been a constant in and on my cassette player, turntable and CD player forever (or whatever format in the future) and that won't change.

Worked on a couple of dates on his Station to Station tour. Never got to meet him but his musical legacy is mind blowing. 

Ricky Dasler posted:

Planet Earth Is Blue...

And there's nothing I can do... but remember