David Bowie R.I.P

Oops, sorry, not wizard, *magician*

"This is possibly ghoulish and grotesque but one angle that is really weird to think about is that Angie Bowie is on Celebrity Big Brother at the moment, and won't know."

im sure they will let her know - would prob be good for the drama

His debut is maybe the worst album I've heard from '67, no joke. To not only come back from that but to have a subsequent decade of nigh-unimpeachable albums, several of which are unquestionably among the greatest of all-time, is an astounding feat. After that, the dude got a lifetime Stevie Wonder/Francis Ford Coppola pass to do whatever he wanted after bringing it so hard. So many amazing songs that hold up to listen after listen. 'Five Years' seriously makes me teary pretty much every time I hear it. Don't know if I can hear it today.

I'm really devastated and keep crying at work. I'm sort of surprised by how hard this has hit me because it's not like I've ever identified as the #1 Bowie fan or anything but my God if he wasn't a phenomenally talented powerhouse of a magical person. It's so sad. Surely he should be immortal. RIP.

was not at all expecting to wake up to this, what an awful shock

RIP

He and Lemmy in the same year is surreal. Rock isn't dead, but we are certainly in a different era.

Technically not in the same year but yeah - we're on the cusp of a wave of boomer-era rock 'n roll deaths.

"All the Young Dudes" is too much right now.

im sure they will let her know - would prob be good for the drama

They're going to tell her in private, off camera. Even Channel 5 has limits. I'm not an Angie fan, but this sounds like an unbelievable situation. Although my thoughts are much more with Iman and his two children.

His debut is maybe the worst album I've heard from '67.

It certainly isn't.

fuck

couldn't believe it, rip

I dare say Angie will leave the show.

I'd been having a heavy Bowie phase for a few weeks, & was shocked & bummed when I woke up and heard. Was maudlin on the train in to work, but then was walked up from Charing Cross, listening to 'Station to Station", & by the time I'd hit "It's not the side effects of the cocaine…" and it's galloping along, I was just thinking what a thing to have made, what a great life, just what an amazing way to have spent 70 years in the world. RIP, thank you.

i've had bowie-fever for the last several weeks as well, this latest bout kicked off by the amazing blackstar video.
RIP David Bowie. :(

dont even know what to say. people at work saying "I can't even name a single David Bowie song"...where the hell have they been?

oh man, what a thing to wake up to.

I just went to the record store to buy Blackstar yesterday, they were out of the CD.

RIP genius

xpost Depending on their age and general interest in music, I guess I can believe it. I was mostly only aware of him as the dude from Labyrinth who had some hits in the '80s until I actively sought his stuff out. Classic rock stations seem to have always unfairly slighted his work.

i would guess they would recognize several of his songs but just don't know they're Bowie - hell I was a fan of him for a while and didn't know "Golden Years" was him

i routinely confused him with billy idol until my mind was blown by station to station sometime after i went to college

I first heard him as a kid, because "Let's Dance" was a big pop hit at the time, and I can distinctly remember the video for "Dancing in the Streets". In high school, listening to classic rock radio, they really only played a handful of songs ("Space Odyssey", "Changes", "Fame" off the top of my head) -- he occupied this weird space where I always knew who he was, but he was somehow still "underground".

What would the average (American) person on the street know of his '70s work? 'Space Oddity' definitely, 'Changes' probably, 'Heroes' maybe. I'd be inclined to say something from Ziggy Stardust but I don't actually know how culturally ubiquitous those songs are. The riffs are probably more recognizable than the songs. 'All The Young Dudes' seems likely.

Honestly, I remember when I was a teenager (in the early to mid 90s), the general consensus (among teenagers) seemed to be that David Bowie was a washed up wannabe (old dude trying to be hip by touring with nine inch nails, etc.). It was only when I got into my 20s that I started buying his older albums that I got into his music.

I occasionally meet people my age who still have this mid 90s image of him.

Anyway R.I.P., one of the greats of all time.

devasted.
I think for a lot of people he was a beacon, especially for people who felt different or outcast. which i can't say was ever really true for me, and the bowie i first knew was the "let's dance" era, in his more corporate pop phase and well done at that.
but as someone who had such a desire to consume music as much of as i could, i can't think of anyone else outside of maybe zeppelin who made albums that suggested more possibilities in music, and in albums i could buy in the cornfields at Musicland. in the 80s and 90s in the midwest stick, the non-pop stuff on, say, "Heroes" was like a transmission from another galaxy, in an age when me even hearing about or being able to get a Harmonia album would have been literally impossible. just so much of it, the ryko reissues of ziggy and changesone, and diamond dogs and then the germanic dreadful soul of station to station, like i grew on ROCK BANDS like ac/dc and CCR and the stones and anything i listen to now that is remotely avant garde i heard an echo of in Bowie, even though he was able to make it accessible to me and make it something that i could understand but that weird "otherness" around the edges of his best work was a gateway to so many thing and i thank him for it.

Like, I bet a lot of people would say both 'oh I know recognize this song, cool riff' and 'what the hell is a 'Queen Bitch'?'.

"the general consensus (among teenagers) seemed to be that David Bowie was a washed up wannabe (old dude trying to be hip by touring with nine inch nails, etc.)"

this would have been around outside. that may have been the impression among some narrow age group but I was in college then and it clearly was not the impression of anyone else.

What would the average (American) person on the street know of his '70s work? 'Space Oddity' definitely, 'Changes' probably, 'Heroes' maybe. I'd be inclined to say something from Ziggy Stardust but I don't actually know how culturally ubiquitous those songs are. The riffs are probably more recognizable than the songs. 'All The Young Dudes' seems likely.

"Fame"

i know the song "heroes" has almost been killed by overexposure but i still remember hearing it and the whole thing seemed to just GLOW all those swirling synth and fripp textures, how could something from the past seem more futuristic than like guns n roses or nirvana that i was listening to?

and "Young Americans" for that matter xp

bowie became my guide as i traced his own connections and obsessions: lou reed/VU, iggy pop/stooges, t rex, kraftwerk, brian eno, cluster/harmonia from the 60s and 70s alone. my life just would have been totally different without bowie, and i'm sure the same is true for many others.

That's pretty much eperience. I knew him as the Labyrinth dude and from the Mick Jagger duet which I saw when they rerun Live Aid for its 10th anniversary. If I hadn't made friends with some glam rockers in the mid-90s, I doubt I'd know that much more about him, and even now I don't think I can name more than 5 tunes by him.

But he seemed like decent bloke, I like his movies that I've seen, and the Major Tom song inspired one of my favourite electro tunes of all time. So RIP, you weren't for me but you meant a lot for some friends of mine, thanks for helping them through hard times.

http://youtu.be/87yi3yb1saw

This is really fucking me up, and not in the way I expected.

I keep thinking about Bowie's phenomenal career and how much he was able to accomplish and the indelible mark he has left on rock music and how much his music has meant to so many people, and then I wonder what the world would have been like if a police officer had shot him when he was twelve years old, and then I just want to hug my sons.

i always thought of him as a beautiful humanoid creature-king, not a person who could die. feeling genuinely bereft.

Forget his own albums for the moment. Dude worked on Raw Power and Transformer and The Idiot and Lust For Life. That's a hell of a legacy unto itself.

and All the Young Dudes as well

(several xposts)

Quicksand, and all it's magic, is hitting a bit harder this a.m. RIP Bowie - truly a powerful musical force in my life, and I'm so thankful.

i always thought of him as a beautiful humanoid creature-king, not a person who could die. feeling genuinely bereft.

otm

dont even know what to say. people at work saying "I can't even name a single David Bowie song"...where the hell have they been?

― frogbs, Monday, 11 January 2016 14:30 (33 minutes ago) Permalink

In my office (in the U.S., fwiw) I overheard "the guy from Labyrinth died."

Why Bowie is Better Than God:

We know for certain that David exists.
David has cooler clothes; God's billowing robes are just so passe.
David is less prone to smiting sinners (a definite plus).
If you hear God's voice in your head, you're probably crazy.
If you hear Bowie's voice in your head, you may be crazy, but at least you have something to sing along to.
David looks better naked than God does. (Conclusion based on appearances in "The Man Who Fell To Earth" and the uncensored "China Girl" video)
God couldn't tease his hair that high, even during the 80's.
God can't play the guitar.
David has better shoes.
David is richer.
David is still attractive.
God probably looks like Mick Jagger or Keith Richards by now.
Going to a Bowie concert is a lot more fun than church.
God doesn't paint his toenails.
God's too uptight.
People don't corner you at malls to tell you that "Bowie loves you."
David looks better in a dress.

When I heard that James Brown died, I was not able to process it: how can someone like James Brown die? How is that physically possible?

Feeling the same way about Bowie right now. In a certain way, I don't think I really believe it (or I'm not allowing myself to believe it).

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CYbYsUPW8AAo87t.jpg

People grieve in different ways, some just prefer to tweet pictures of themselves

Stay classy Madge

And I guess to be fair, that's all I knew of him until my late teens/early twenties. I knew he was a musician, but probably couldn't name any songs back then.

I can distinctly remember the video for "Dancing in the Streets".

This was my first exposure to both Bowie and the Stones, and consequently why put off listening to either of them for a very, very long time.

Madonna ✔ @Madonna
So lucky to have met you!!!! Hot Tramp I love you So! ❤️ #rebelheart
4:06 AM - 11 Jan 2016
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CYbYsUPW8AAo87t.jpg

RIP

"We can be heroes, just for one day"

#rebelheart

liked this post from Momus very much: http://mrstsk.tumblr.com/post/137085985233

Not having much luck at work today. I've been less upset about the deaths of people I've actually known.

I'm sorry but can someone please explain to me why Madonna's post is so objectionable in a way that other artists making fannish posts talking about meeting Bowie or being hugely influenced by him are somehow not?

Actually, on second thought, just don't.