Strange what you think about when your mind wanders. I was watching some vintage footage of David Bowie on TV last night, Space Odditty as it happens, released just before the Moonlanding. I was singing along. Missus Moonbase said 'Wow, you know all the words!'. I do. I'd forgotten I did and how important Bowie was to me when I was 11 right up to being 16. His Ziggy alien persona really struck a chord as, like most young teeneagers, I felt like a sick martian on a planet full of stiff grown-ups!
I continued to watch the TV show about his early career and found I knew all the words to every song! Starman, The Man Who Sold The World, Ziggy Stardust, Rebel Rebel. Such great tunes. But I suppose the soundtrack of our youth is always going to be super special isn't it. I had every album: Hunky Dory, Aladdin Sane, Pin Ups and so on. So many great LP's including the double gatefold 'Images' containing all his early stuff like 'There Is A Happy Land', which were also on the Music For Pleasure gem 'The World of David Bowie'. I could relate to all of his characters: the martian Ziggy, the Cracked Actor, the Rebel, the Man Who Sold The World. Aliens all like the young ones listening to them, out of kilter with the world.
I stopped buying new Bowie albums round 1975 with 'Diamond Dogs'. Everything after that I don't know a single word from unless I've picked bits up from mates or the radio since. I wish I'd have carried on back then. I'd already got into Lou Reed's 'Transformer' and 'Berlin' albums' so I'd have enjoyed Bowie's three Berlin albums, 'Heroes, Low and Lodger' at the time I imagine. My young buddy George loved them but I'd filled my head with rock and the new gods were Budgie, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Rush. I know all their songs too I reckon!
There's a Starman waiting in the sky, he'd like to come and meet us but he thinks he'd blow our minds! [and I didn't look!]
Who were the musical heroes of your youth?
Fascinating stuff!
ReplyDeleteWhen I was young, it was the Beatles all the way with me -- thanks in part to the television cartoon introducing me to the fact they existed, and then the profound formative experience of seeing Yellow Submarine at age six. And when I was a teen, the Who were the first band I needed to hear everything by, no matter how obscure or hard to find.
I always liked Bowie singles, but didn't start digging into his albums until the end of my teen years, when I took up with a girl who was a major fan of his. So naturally I had to prove my worth by becoming a student of his work, right? But I ended up becoming an admirer in my own right and stuck with his work, which was the best thing I got out of that relationship. I still remember the sense of betrayal I felt later when I heard she'd given up listening to Bowie because her new guy hated him...!