|
The cliché about David Bowie says he's a musical chameleon, adapting himself
according to fashion and trends. While such a criticism is too glib, there's no
denying that Bowie demonstrated remarkable skill for perceiving musical trends
at his peak in the '70s. After spending several years in the late '60s as a mod
and as an all-around music-hall entertainer, Bowie reinvented himself as a
hippie singer/songwriter. Prior to his breakthrough in 1972, he recorded a
proto-metal record and a pop/rock album, eventually redefining glam rock with
his ambiguously sexy Ziggy Stardust persona. Ziggy made Bowie an international
star, yet he wasn't content to continue to churn out glitter rock. By the
mid-'70s, he developed an effete, sophisticated version of Philly soul that he
dubbed "plastic soul," which eventually morphed into the eerie avant-pop of
1976's Station to Station. Shortly afterward, he relocated to Berlin, where he
recorded three experimental electronic albums with Brian Eno. At the dawn of the
'80s, Bowie was still at the height of his powers, yet following his blockbuster
dance-pop album Let's Dance in 1983, he slowly sank into mediocrity before
salvaging his career in the early '90s. Even when he was out of fashion in the
'80s and '90s, it was clear that Bowie was one of the most influential musicians
in rock, for better and for worse. Each one of his phases in the '70s sparked a
number of subgenres, including punk, new wave, goth rock, the new romantics, and
electronica. Few rockers ever had such lasting impact.
David Jones began performing music when he was 13 years old, learning the
saxophone while he was at Bromley Technical High School; another pivotal event
happened at the school, when his left pupil became permanently dilated in a
schoolyard fight. Following his graduation at 16, he worked as a commercial
artist while playing saxophone in a number of mod bands, including the King
Bees, the Manish Boys (which also featured Jimmy Page as a session man), and
Davey Jones & the Lower Third. All three of those bands released singles, which
were generally ignored, yet he continued performing, changing his name to David
Bowie in 1966 after the Monkees' Davy Jones became an international star. Over
the course of 1966, he released three mod singles on Pye Records, which were all
ignored. The following year, he signed with Deram, releasing the music hall,
Anthony Newley-styled David Bowie that year. Upon completing the record, he
spent several weeks in a Scottish Buddhist monastery. Once he left the
monastery, he studied with Lindsay Kemp's mime troupe, forming his own mime
company, the Feathers, in 1969. The Feathers were short-lived, and he formed the
experimental art group Beckenham Arts Lab in 1969.
Bowie needed to finance the Arts Lab, so he signed with Mercury Records that
year and released Man of Words, Man of Music, a trippy singer/songwriter album
featuring "Space Oddity." The song was released as a single and became a major
hit in the U.K., convincing Bowie to concentrate on music. Hooking up with his
old friend Marc Bolan, he began miming at some of Bolan's T. Rex concerts,
eventually touring with Bolan, bassist/producer Tony Visconti, guitarist Mick
Ronson, and drummer Cambridge as Hype. The band quickly fell apart, yet Bowie
and Ronson remained close, working on the material that formed Bowie's next
album, The Man Who Sold the World, as well as recruiting Michael "Woody"
Woodmansey as their drummer. Produced by Tony Visconti, who also played bass,
The Man Who Sold the World was a heavy guitar rock album that failed to gain
much attention. Bowie followed the album in late 1971 with the pop/rock Hunky
Dory, an album that featured Ronson and keyboardist Rick Wakeman.
Following the release of Hunky Dory, Bowie began to develop his most famous
incarnation, Ziggy Stardust: an androgynous, bisexual rock star from another
planet. Before he unveiled Ziggy, Bowie claimed in a January 1972 interview with
the Melody Maker that he was gay, helping to stir interest in his forthcoming
album. Taking cues from Bolan's stylish glam rock, Bowie dyed his hair orange
and began wearing women's clothing. He began calling himself Ziggy Stardust, and
his backing band -- Ronson, Woodmansey, and bassist Trevor Bolder -- were the
Spiders from Mars. The Rise & Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars
was released with much fanfare in England in late 1972. The album and its
lavish, theatrical concerts became a sensation throughout England, and it helped
him become the only glam rocker to carve out a niche in America. Ziggy Stardust
became a word-of-mouth hit in the U.S., and the re-released "Space Oddity" --
which was now also the title of the re-released Man of Words, Man of Music --
reached the American Top 20. Bowie quickly followed Ziggy with Aladdin Sane
later in 1973. Not only did he record a new album that year, but he also
produced Lou Reed's Transformer, the Stooges' Raw Power, and Mott the Hoople's
comeback All the Young Dudes, for which he also wrote the title track.
Given the amount of work Bowie packed into 1972 and 1973, it wasn't surprising
that his relentless schedule began to catch up with him. After recording the
all-covers Pin-Ups with the Spiders from Mars, he unexpectedly announced the
band's breakup, as well as his retirement from live performances, during the
group's final show that year. He retreated from the spotlight to work on a
musical adaptation of George Orwell's 1984, but once he was denied the rights to
the novel, he transformed the work into Diamond Dogs. The album was released to
generally poor reviews in 1974, yet it generated the hit single "Rebel Rebel,"
and he supported the album with an elaborate and expensive American tour. As the
tour progressed, Bowie became fascinated with soul music, eventually redesigning
the entire show to reflect his new "plastic soul." Hiring guitarist Carlos
Alomar as the band's leader, Bowie refashioned his group into a Philly soul band
and recostumed himself in sophisticated, stylish fashions. The change took fans
by surprise, as did the double-album David Live, which featured material
recorded on the 1974 tour.
Young Americans, released in 1975, was the culmination of Bowie's soul
obsession, and it became his first major crossover hit, peaking in the American
Top Ten and generating his first U.S. number one hit in "Fame," a song he
co-wrote with John Lennon and Alomar. Bowie relocated to Los Angeles, where he
earned his first movie role in Nicolas Roeg's The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976).
While in L.A., he recorded Station to Station, which took the plastic soul of
Young Americans into darker, avant-garde-tinged directions, yet was also a huge
hit, generating the Top Ten single "Golden Years." The album inaugurated Bowie's
persona of the elegant "Thin White Duke," and it reflected Bowie's growing
cocaine-fueled paranoia. Soon, he decided Los Angeles was too boring and
returned to England; shortly after arriving back in London, he gave the awaiting
crowd a Nazi salute, a signal of his growing, drug-addled detachment from
reality. The incident caused enormous controversy, and Bowie left the country to
settle in Berlin, where he lived and worked with Brian Eno.
Once in Berlin, Bowie sobered up and began painting, as well as studying art. He
also developed a fascination with German electronic music, which Eno helped him
fulfill on their first album together, Low. Released early in 1977, Low was a
startling mixture of electronics, pop, and avant-garde technique. While it was
greeted with mixed reviews at the time, it proved to be one of the most
influential albums of the late '70s, as did its follow-up, Heroes, which
followed that year. Not only did Bowie record two solo albums in 1977, but he
also helmed Iggy Pop's comeback records The Idiot and Lust for Life, and toured
anonymously as Pop's keyboardist. He resumed his acting career in 1977,
appearing in Just A Gigolo with Marlene Dietrich and Kim Novak, as well as
narrating Eugene Ormandy's version of Peter and the Wolf. Bowie returned to the
stage in 1978, launching an international tour that was captured on the
double-album Stage. During 1979, Bowie and Eno recorded Lodger in New York,
Switzerland, and Berlin, releasing the album at the end of the year. Lodger was
supported with several innovative videos, as was 1980's Scary Monsters, and
these videos -- "DJ," "Fashion," "Ashes to Ashes" -- became staples on early
MTV.
Scary Monsters was Bowie's last album for RCA, and it wrapped up his most
innovative, productive period. Later in 1980, he performed the title role in
stage production of The Elephant Man, including several shows on Broadway. Over
the next two years, he took an extended break from recording, appearing in
Christine F (1982) and the vampire movie The Hunger (1982), returning to the
studio only for his 1981 collaboration with Queen, "Under Pressure," and the
theme for Paul Schrader's remake of Cat People. In 1983, he signed an expensive
contract with EMI Records and released Let's Dance. Bowie had recruited Chic
guitarist Nile Rodgers to produce the album, giving the record a sleek, funky
foundation, and hired the unknown Stevie Ray Vaughan as lead guitarist. Let's
Dance became his most successful record, thanks to stylish, innovative videos
for "Let's Dance" and "China Girl," which turned both songs into Top Ten hits.
Bowie supported the record with the sold-out arena tour Serious Moonlight.
Greeted with massive success for the first time, Bowie wasn't quite sure how to
react, and he eventually decided to replicate Let's Dance with 1984's Tonight.
While the album sold well, producing the Top Ten hit "Blue Jean," it received
poor reviews and ultimately was a commercial disappointment. He stalled in 1985,
recording a duet of Martha & the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" with Mick
Jagger for Live Aid. He also spent more time jet-setting, appearing at celebrity
events across the globe, and appeared in several movies -- Into the Night
(1985), Absolute Beginners (1986), Labyrinth (1986) -- that turned out to be
bombs. Bowie returned to recording in 1987 with the widely panned Never Let Me
Down, supporting the album with the Glass Spider tour, which also received poor
reviews. In 1989, he remastered his RCA catalog with Rykodisc for CD release,
kicking off the series with the three-disc box Sound + Vision. Bowie supported
the discs with an accompanying tour of the same name, claming that he was
retiring all of his older characters from performance following the tour. Sound
+ Vision was successful, and Ziggy Stardust re-charted amidst the hoopla.
Sound + Vision may have been a success, but Bowie's next project was perhaps his
most unsuccessful. Picking up on the abrasive, dissonant rock of Sonic Youth and
the Pixies, Bowie formed his own guitar rock combo, Tin Machine, with guitarist
Reeves Gabrels, bassist Hunt Sales, and his drummer brother Tony, who had
previously worked on Iggy Pop's Lust for Life with Bowie. Tin Machine released
an eponymous album to poor reviews that summer and supported it with a club
tour, which was only moderately successful. Despite the poor reviews, Tin
Machine released a second album, the appropriately titled Tin Machine II, in
1991, and it was completely ignored.
Bowie returned to a solo career in 1993 with the sophisticated, soulful Black
Tie White Noise, recording the album with Nile Rodgers and his now-permanent
collaborator, Reeves Gabrels. The album was released on Savage, a subsidiary of
RCA, and received positive reviews, but his new label went bankrupt shortly
after its release, and the album disappeared. Black Tie White Noise was the
first indication that Bowie was trying hard to resuscitate his career, as was
the largely instrumental 1994 soundtrack The Buddha of Suburbia. In 1995, he
reunited with Brian Eno for the wildly hyped, industrial rock-tinged Outside.
Several critics hailed the album as a comeback, and Bowie supported it with a
co-headlining tour with Nine Inch Nails in order to snag a younger, alternative
audience, but his gambit failed; audiences left before Bowie's performance and
Outside disappeared. He quickly returned to the studio in 1996, recording
Earthling, an album heavily influenced by techno and drum'n'bass. Upon its early
1997 release, Earthling received generally positive reviews, yet the album
failed to gain an audience, and many techno purists criticized Bowie for
allegedly exploiting their subculture. hours... followed in 1999. For 2002,
Bowie reunited with producerToni Visconti and released Heathen to very positive
reviews. He continued on with Visconti for Reality in 2003.
Source:
icebergradio.com
|
