David Bowie (1947-2016) — to hear the angels sing

davidbowie

 

It’s a god-awful small affair
To the girl with the mousy hair
But her mummy is yelling “No”
And her daddy has told her to go
But her friend is nowhere to be seen
Now she walks through her sunken dream
To the seat with the clearest view
And she’s hooked to the silver screen
But the film is a saddening bore
‘Cause she’s lived it ten times or more
She could spit in the eyes of fools
As they ask her to focus on
Sailors fighting in the dance hall
Oh man! Look at those cavemen go
It’s the freakiest show
Take a look at the Lawman
Beating up the wrong guy
Oh man! Wonder if he’ll ever know
He’s in the best selling show
Is there life on Mars?
It’s on Amerika’s tortured brow
That Mickey Mouse has grown up a cow
Now the workers have struck for fame
‘Cause Lennon’s on sale again
See the mice in their million hordes
From Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads
Rule Britannia is out of bounds
To my mother, my dog, and clowns
But the film is a saddening bore
‘Cause I wrote it ten times or more
It’s about to be writ again
As I ask you to focus on
Sailors fighting in the dance hall
Oh man! Look at those cavemen go
It’s the freakiest show
Take a look at the Lawman
Beating up the wrong guy
Oh man! Wonder if he’ll ever know
He’s in the best selling show
Is there life on Mars?

Writer: DAVIS, SCOTT/KETRON, JEFF/GRIMMITT, ERIC/COOPER, ANTHONY, DAVID BOWIE
Lyrics © EMI Music Publishing, CHRYSALIS MUSIC GROUP, TINTORETTO MUSIC

Mr. Bowie wrote songs, above all, about being an outsider: an alien, a misfit, a sexual adventurer, a faraway astronaut. His music was always a mutable blend: rock, cabaret, jazz and what he called “plastic soul,” but it was suffused with genuine soul. He also captured the drama and longing of everyday life, enough to give him No.1 pop hits like “Let’s Dance.”

If he had an anthem, it was “Changes,” from his 1971 album “Hunky Dory,” which proclaimed:

“Turn and face the strange / Ch-ch-changes / Oh look out now you rock and rollers / Pretty soon now you’re gonna get older.”

Mr. Bowie earned admiration and emulation across the musical spectrum: from rockers, balladeers, punks, hip-hop acts, creators of pop spectacles and even classical composers like Philip Glass, who based two symphonies on Mr. Bowie’s albums “Low” and “ ‘Heroes’.”

David Bowie, Pop Star Who Transcended Music, Art and Fashion, Has Died at 69: New York Times

Subscribe to Podcast

9 Comments

  1. January 11, 2016

    🙁 🙁 🙁

  2. WJM
    January 11, 2016

    Btw, from her book I don’t recall the two ever met in person, but by/through Amanda Lear he was also ‘connected’ to Dali, and by that probably also influenced The Master somewho, if only just a tiny tiny bit.
    (she had a (short?) affaire with Bowie, but a rather long one with Dali (menage a trois with Gala), and good friends until his death)
    (the otherway around, Dali affecting Bowie, seems less likely?)

    If anyone feels inspired, read Amanda Lear’s ‘My life with Dali’ (=15 years).
    (yours truely is too lazy too read it againg for just that purpose/detail….;))

    (perhaps there are Dali connaisseurs here too, who could confirm/deny this aspectfrom his side as well)

  3. WJM
    January 11, 2016

    Btw, for the afficionado’s of The Spanish Master, a must-read about Dali, even though Bowie is only mentioned passingly:

    http://listverse.com/2014/03/28/10-bizarre-facts-about-salvador-dali/

    Read a lot about Dali in the past, but many of this is new to me.
    Love that caleidoscopic freak & genius.

    Thank you Mr Bowie of bringing both of you guys alive again….

  4. iolacontessa
    January 11, 2016

    I just saw on INSTAGRAM from FLORENCE that he had died………..HOW?

  5. BEAUTYCALYPSE
    January 11, 2016

    I couldn’t believe the news. Devastated beyond words.

  6. Heather in Arles
    January 11, 2016

    Deeply sad. A true star, a true Hero, gone.

  7. George Kaplan
    January 13, 2016

    David Bowie, the Greatest Most Complete Rock Pop Performer Ever? Yes. Their are several great Rock Pop Icons, some of whom are still alive, but David Robert Jones transcends them because he transcended Rock Pop while being part of it. He created Art that was Pop and Pop that was Art and he could make the seemingly silly serious and vice versa. Whilst some conservative commentators (the same smug troglodytes who likely sobbed into their Lucky Charms over the natural demise of certain prime ministers, presidents, and businesspeople when a more sensible response would probably be a shrug – or in some cases a party!) have in their usual enervated, emotionally-void way bemoaned the “hysteria” over Mr Bowie’s death yet he deserves such a reaction more than any other such figure of the past three decades or more. His music, his ideas, his assimilation and Bowieization of ideas from everywhere, his freedom from anxiety over influence (genius steals, dear boy!), his matchless ability to confound and excite, his mixture of the down to Earth and the idiosyncratically unknowable and alien and…and…and… All of these things and more exemplify his reach and explain the grief that many feel at his death. We didn’t know him but that is not the point. We knew and profoundly affected by what he did and by the effect he had and will continue to *have*. He had his flaws, he had his low artistic low points (Never Let Me Down!) but he always came back and regenerated, that despite struggling with an arse of a disease he left on a high, undiminished, is only right and proper. Bowie, gone but never gone. Immortal.

Comments are closed.