And this one:
And this one, in full sneer:
And this one, in full despair:
I'm sure you have your favorites, too. RIP, David.
Monday, January 11, 2016
RIP, David Bowie
Very sad news -- he had just turned 69 years old. A major figure in the history of rock and roll. It's difficult to know where to begin with his recorded legacy, because he wrote and performed so many great songs. A few pop into my mind this morning:
And this one:
And this one, in full sneer:
And this one, in full despair:
I'm sure you have your favorites, too. RIP, David.
And this one:
And this one, in full sneer:
And this one, in full despair:
I'm sure you have your favorites, too. RIP, David.
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5 comments:
in tears, really in tears...
i may blog again and blame it on Bowie...
if i can see past these tears...
these tears... wow...
there is shit that yall dont know about me... leaving it ... tears for Bowie.
I was thinking that I wasn't terribly into Bowie, but then I kept being reminded of all the songs that are his, and each time I find myself saying, "oh, that's a great song!" So in some ways I think that's a real testament to the power of someone's art, in that it transcends their personal "brand" and just becomes thoroughly integrated into our cultural consciousness.
Also, "Under Pressure" (which he co-wrote with Queen) is, in my opinion, one of the absolute best rock songs ever.
I loved him in Labyrinth.
So I was, like, 13 or 14 and digging on staying up til midnight or later on the weekend while my parents were out, and I was watching - I don't know, Kirschner or Midnight Special - and barely staying awake and this weird dude in a leotard comes on and is singing about spiders from Mars and it is totally weird. So weird, like, when I woke up in the morning I was thinking, "did that dude really say "spiders from Mars?" Naw, I must have been spacing. And then I was at school on Monday and some kid was talking about Ziggy Stardust and the spiders from Mars, and I was like, MANNNNNN - I saw that!"
So that was the first time I knew anything about David Bowie. "Space Oddity" was along about that time, but nothing was as surreal as that live performance of ZS - though just about everything surreal that came into my life seemed to come from Bowie. "John, I'm Only Dancing" seemed to be at every party I went to for awhile, and I still flash on seeing Bowie come out like a chess piece or something on SNL to sing "The Man Who Sold the World." Generally I'd tell folks that Bowie was too weird for me, yet I like so many of his songs; "Young Americans" was great, and "Heroes" grew on me though I didn't care much for it at first.
Just thinking now of what music would have looked or sounded like without him. A lot of what he did seemed to be taking older, familiar forms and melodies and subverting them into something new. Would there be an Annie Lennox without him? Probably, but he first pressed the grass down on the path she walked. Looking back, I think of him not as a pop or rock star, or even a musician; he's what I think you'd truly call "an artist" - spanning all media and being.
"Labyrinth" was the first reference my youngest daughter made this morning on hearing the news and I said, "Labyrinth? Labyrinth was such a teeny, tiny piece of what he did!" She just shrugged and I've noticed that Labyrinth is what several of her friends have mentioned on Facebook today as well. You just never know.
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