STACK NZ Summer #70

MUSIC REVIEWS

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GOODBYE SPACEBOY Graham Reid looks back on a career unlike any other

He was a scene- borrowing chameleon in his early years as a young Mod, or playing that generically English take on black rhythm and blues. But he didn’t stand out until “ground control to Major Tom” (on the same album as some pretty ordinary hippie-dippy stuff). He found his confidence and soon was referencing

D avid Bowie frequently changed his musical colours, but to call him a chameleon — as many have done since his unexpected death just days after the release of his stunning new album Blackstar — is wrong. A chameleon blends into the colours of the background, Bowie took the colours and used them to stand out. In the early 70s he leapt past Marc Bolan of T. Rex to become the glam-rock Ziggy star; three years later he adopted the sounds of Philadelphia for cocaine-fueled soul on Young Americans which he took to chic nightclubs and the top of the charts; he relocated to austere Berlin and assimilated German electronic landscapes for the groundbreaking Low/Heroes/ Lodger trilogy . . . But in every incarnation he made “David Bowie music”, and for decades it was a hallmark of quality. Even when presenting challenging music as on Low and Heroes he

Andy Warhol and Bob Dylan, and writing, “Oh you pretty things, you’re drivin’ your mamas and papas insane . . .” (on Hunky Dory ). Suddenly Bowie – then Ziggy – connected with his audience and, despite some lesser selling albums (like Dylan, Lou Reed and others he often sold fewer records than his influence might suggest), he took his followers on the journey.

• Blackstar by David Bowie is out now via Sony

1.Outside (1995) with Brian Eno which sprung The Heart’s Filthy Lesson and Hallo Spaceboy (remixed by the Pet Shop Boys). Over disconcerting sonic beds from Tin Machine guitarist Reeves Gabriel, jazz drummer Joey Barron and others, Bowie declaims a cyberworld in decline. For his overlooked Earthling (1997) he embraced drum’n’bass, jungle and industrial sounds (Trent Reznor on hand for I’m Afraid of Americans ) but most people only remember the distressed Union Jack(et) he wore on the cover. By the patchy Hours (1999) many fans had moved on so missed the excellent Heathen (2002) which included the fascinatingly melancholy Everyone Says “Hi” . That album and the uneven Reality (2003) reunited him with producer Tony Visconti who also got the call for the spiky The Next Day in 2013 and the unexpectedly different Blackstar . Now the changeling — a more appropriate description than chameleon — that was David Bowie is no longer with us. But – as he sings on Lazarus on Blackstar — “Look up, I’m in Heaven”.

MUSIC

could toss out hit singles ( Sound and Vision, Beauty and the Beast, Heroes ) which didn’t compromise art to get on the charts. Bowie’s career was multi- faceted and enticingly textured. The expansive David Bowie Is exhibition — an art gallery overview full of photos, artwork, films, fashion, videos and much more — proved you could remove the music component and still be in the presence of a unique artist who brought together mime, stage presentation, gender-bending style, elegance, costumes, sophistication, gritty clips, oddball films, painting . . . introduce himself to the world, and you might say music was the same for Bowie. But it took a while for him to find the persona and vehicle to do it. Muhammad Ali once said boxing was just the way to

He picked up the gay, straight and androgynous; could appear on Soul Train for a black audience up dancing and take Heroes to earnest Europeans in the shadow of the Cold War; referenced himself with style ( Ashes to Ashes ) and filmed Let’s Dance in the Outback. He sometimes seemed a bit lost (Tin Machine seems unlikely to undergo any major reconsideration) but was always interesting. He brought together high art and low culture, and wrapped them in songs which imprinted themselves on people across almost five decades. He left on a high with Blackstar and its sheer difference drives you into his last 20 years for hints that this might have come. There’s nothing. But a search allows a rediscovery of the underrated

For more reviews, interviews and overviews by Graham Reid: www.elsewhere.co.nz

SUMMER EDITION 2016

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