WEBVTT - Chapter Twelve: Heathen (1987-2004) 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:02.360 Off. The record was a production of I Heart Radio. 0:00:05.559 --> 0:00:07.920 David Bowie was in the middle of performing his song 0:00:08.039 --> 0:00:11.159 Reality when he first felt it, a sharp pain in 0:00:11.200 --> 0:00:15.720 his shoulder. He was June two four and he was 0:00:15.760 --> 0:00:19.280 playing a show at the Prague. The venue was sweltering, 0:00:19.520 --> 0:00:23.120 he was dripping with sweat. Besides that, he looked as 0:00:23.120 --> 0:00:26.960 good as ever, fit, stylish, and much sprightlier than his 0:00:27.040 --> 0:00:30.720 fifty seven years should have allowed. The thrashing rocker he 0:00:30.800 --> 0:00:34.120 sang was about staring down your own mortality, accepting it. 0:00:34.920 --> 0:00:37.880 Now my sight is fading in this twilight, he sang. 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:42.200 Then the pain hit. Suddenly. He couldn't catch his breath. 0:00:43.080 --> 0:00:46.240 He could barely manage the next line. Now my death 0:00:46.320 --> 0:00:49.720 is more than just a sad song. Then he stopped 0:00:49.720 --> 0:00:54.880 singing entirely. His bandmates glanced over, alarmed. They saw him 0:00:54.960 --> 0:00:59.600 hunched forward, clutching his chest and shoulder, looking pale, almost translucent. 0:01:00.440 --> 0:01:04.920 His eyes were wide. He seemed scared. Even the audience 0:01:04.920 --> 0:01:08.240 could tell something was badly wrong, and their expressions changed 0:01:08.280 --> 0:01:12.040 from joy to concern. A bodyguard was summoned and let 0:01:12.120 --> 0:01:15.360 him off the stage. The band continued without him for 0:01:15.360 --> 0:01:18.319 a few numbers while David rallied in the wings. He 0:01:18.480 --> 0:01:21.520 hated to cancel shows. There were nights when he kept 0:01:21.520 --> 0:01:23.560 a bucket just out of the spotlight in case he 0:01:23.640 --> 0:01:26.640 needed to be sick. He went back out to continue. 0:01:27.720 --> 0:01:30.840 He struggled valiantly through China Girl and Modern Lover, but 0:01:31.000 --> 0:01:34.360 stumbled during the ten minute epic Station a Station excused 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:38.319 himself once more. After taking more time to recoup, he 0:01:38.360 --> 0:01:41.600 gave it one more shot, singing two more songs while 0:01:41.640 --> 0:01:44.720 seated on a stool, But then he finally gave in 0:01:44.840 --> 0:01:48.600 and took his premature bows. A doctor told him it 0:01:48.640 --> 0:01:51.760 was just a trapped nerve, nothing to worry about. He 0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:53.880 was given the go ahead to perform at a festival 0:01:53.880 --> 0:01:57.960 in Germany. Two days later. It was there on stage 0:01:57.960 --> 0:02:07.400 before people that he'd suffer a heart attack. Hello and 0:02:07.440 --> 0:02:10.239 welcome to Off the Record, the show that goes beyond 0:02:10.280 --> 0:02:12.680 the songs and into the hearts and minds of rock's 0:02:12.680 --> 0:02:17.200 greatest legends. I'm your host, Jordan Runtug. This season explores 0:02:17.280 --> 0:02:21.880 the life, or rather lives of David Bowie. Today, we're 0:02:21.880 --> 0:02:25.639 looking at Bowie, the rock and roll elder statesman. Throughout 0:02:25.680 --> 0:02:29.400 the nineties, he continued to change and challenge inspiring new 0:02:29.480 --> 0:02:32.720 generations with his work. Far be it from David to 0:02:32.800 --> 0:02:36.520 go gently into middle age, but more than ever, he 0:02:36.639 --> 0:02:40.440 enjoyed life off the stage. David had a second chance 0:02:40.480 --> 0:02:44.200 at marriage and fatherhood and was deliriously happy in both. 0:02:45.200 --> 0:02:49.400 He'd faced his demons and wonted. Now he faced his 0:02:49.440 --> 0:02:53.280 own mortality. That would be a much more difficult battle. 0:03:02.320 --> 0:03:04.800 It was a hot, hazy night in Nassau back in 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:10.040 a bar band wrapped up their set in a tiny 0:03:10.080 --> 0:03:13.520 tourist watering hole. As they started to pack up, a 0:03:13.560 --> 0:03:16.600 group of older guys sidled up. We want to play 0:03:16.600 --> 0:03:19.160 a few songs, mind if we borrow your gear? They 0:03:19.200 --> 0:03:22.520 asked for a bar band in the Bahamas. This was 0:03:22.560 --> 0:03:27.239 a fairly common request. It's always the same dudes on vacation, 0:03:27.360 --> 0:03:29.480 have a few beers and want to relive the glory 0:03:29.560 --> 0:03:33.000 days of their high school garage band. Here comes another 0:03:33.080 --> 0:03:37.520 tuneless version of Louis. Louis happens all the time. These 0:03:37.560 --> 0:03:40.160 guys looked like a yuppies, probably in town for a 0:03:40.200 --> 0:03:44.240 business conference, although one of them did look kind of familiar. 0:03:45.800 --> 0:03:49.160 The stage crashers stepped up and grabbed their respective instruments. 0:03:50.440 --> 0:03:52.960 If they bothered to introduce themselves to the forty or 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:56.720 so American travelers. It certainly didn't learn them any special attention. 0:03:57.640 --> 0:03:59.960 The name Tin Machine meant nothing to these sun burn 0:04:00.040 --> 0:04:03.520 and boozers bent over their umbrella drinks. But one by 0:04:03.560 --> 0:04:07.680 one I zeroed in on the lead singer. Is that 0:04:08.360 --> 0:04:13.680 David Bowie? No wait, I think it is no, that 0:04:13.800 --> 0:04:17.600 can't be him. He's got a beard. But it was 0:04:17.720 --> 0:04:21.359 David Bowie. And he loved every messy minute of this 0:04:21.480 --> 0:04:25.279 five song guerrilla gig. The raw excitement gave him such 0:04:25.320 --> 0:04:29.680 a buzz for years. He meticulously stage managed each one 0:04:29.680 --> 0:04:33.960 of his performances, the lighting, props, and makeup, even the 0:04:34.000 --> 0:04:37.960 slightest gestures of his hands and face. Everything was engineered 0:04:37.960 --> 0:04:42.640 from maximum theatricality. Now devoid of drama and backed by 0:04:42.680 --> 0:04:47.599 his three friends, he could just rock. That is, after all, 0:04:47.800 --> 0:04:49.840 why he come to the Bahamas in the first place. 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:53.120 He spent most days at a local studio working on 0:04:53.160 --> 0:04:56.279 a new album. But it wasn't a David Bowie record, 0:04:57.040 --> 0:05:00.480 Make no mistake. This was a band like the Beatles 0:05:00.480 --> 0:05:04.320 of the Stones. He was his latest transformation, and in 0:05:04.360 --> 0:05:07.000 a way it was his most radical. He was no 0:05:07.080 --> 0:05:11.719 longer David Bowie superstar. He was David Bowie, lead singer 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:15.000 of the band Tin Machine, just one of the guys. 0:05:16.880 --> 0:05:18.760 But of course he could never just be one of 0:05:18.760 --> 0:05:22.520 the guys. He was David Bowie backed by a bunch 0:05:22.520 --> 0:05:26.039 of guys who, regardless of their formidable musical talents, were 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:29.640 not David Bowie. At first, it all seemed rather dubious. 0:05:30.400 --> 0:05:32.360 He wasn't the first forty one year old man to 0:05:32.440 --> 0:05:35.440 start a band with a few friends. On the surface, 0:05:35.640 --> 0:05:38.960 it seemed like classic symptoms of a midlife crisis, up 0:05:38.960 --> 0:05:41.400 there with buying a sports car and getting a tattoo. 0:05:42.400 --> 0:05:46.040 It was indeed a strange move for such an unashamed individualist. 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:49.359 Back in the sixties. His tenure and a string of 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:53.039 bands would always be comically short lived. He'd storm off 0:05:53.080 --> 0:05:56.120 for one reason or another with a gleefully selfish cry 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:59.320 of numero uno mate, that's who he was looking out 0:05:59.360 --> 0:06:03.560 for number one these days, of course, he had nothing 0:06:03.600 --> 0:06:10.479 to prove. He was ready to have some fun. The 0:06:10.600 --> 0:06:13.200 endeavor was less a reaction to middle age and more 0:06:13.240 --> 0:06:17.320 of a reaction to his dismal last record, seven's Never 0:06:17.400 --> 0:06:20.920 Let Me Down. The title was amusing because the disc 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:25.000 succeeded in letting down pretty much everyone. Released just after 0:06:25.000 --> 0:06:28.400 his forty birthday, the glossy pop had been scrubbed of 0:06:28.560 --> 0:06:32.680 anything that bore even the slightest suggestion of grit or experimentation. 0:06:33.680 --> 0:06:36.440 Even the addition of his old Bromley school friend and 0:06:36.480 --> 0:06:40.640 fellow rock titan Peter Frampton failed to liven up the proceedings. 0:06:41.600 --> 0:06:45.200 Even David was horrified by the songs. It wasn't played 0:06:45.240 --> 0:06:49.040 with any conviction, He'd say, it was studiofied to such 0:06:49.080 --> 0:06:52.080 an extent that halfway through the sessions I was going 0:06:52.080 --> 0:06:54.480 out to lunch and just leaving everyone else to it. 0:06:55.279 --> 0:06:59.240 Perhaps to distract from the subpar material, David promoted never 0:06:59.320 --> 0:07:03.200 let Me Down. This most ambitious tour ever. It recalled 0:07:03.200 --> 0:07:07.279 the epic stage production of Diamond Dogs in four, but 0:07:07.600 --> 0:07:10.440 being the eighties, it was much bigger than Diamond Dogs 0:07:10.440 --> 0:07:14.560 in every sense, more of everything, more dates, more seats, 0:07:14.600 --> 0:07:17.760 more money. The set for what would become known as 0:07:17.760 --> 0:07:20.720 the Glass Spider Tour was touted as the biggest ever, 0:07:21.160 --> 0:07:25.480 costing an outrageous ten million dollars. Named for the album 0:07:25.520 --> 0:07:29.360 track about a mythological rachnid, The centerpiece of the production 0:07:29.440 --> 0:07:32.640 was a massive glass spider that loomed sixty feet over 0:07:32.680 --> 0:07:37.040 the stage. Weighing three hundred and sixty tons, It required 0:07:37.080 --> 0:07:40.240 a jaw dropping forty three trucks just to transport it. 0:07:40.880 --> 0:07:43.640 Three hundred people worked in ships for poor straight days 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:46.800 to assemble the set for its American debut in Philadelphia 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:51.080 that July. In a twist worthy of spinal tap, David 0:07:51.120 --> 0:07:54.400 discovered that the gargantuan spider was too big to fit 0:07:54.480 --> 0:07:58.440 into many indoor arenas. He hastily had a smaller junior 0:07:58.520 --> 0:08:03.920 spider build at no small cost. For David's entrance, he 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:07.760 was lowered inside a translucent spider's belly while a fleet 0:08:07.800 --> 0:08:11.080 of dancers repelled down from the scaffolding above the stage. 0:08:11.840 --> 0:08:14.080 In a bid to make this a multi media event, 0:08:14.400 --> 0:08:18.000 the elaborately choreographed songs were broken up by short films. 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:22.679 The overamped guitar duels between Frampton and Carlos Alamar often 0:08:22.680 --> 0:08:26.800 descended into a sort of headbanging parody. Songs were chosen 0:08:26.880 --> 0:08:29.400 less for their audience appeal and more to serve the 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:32.920 plots for a series of vignettes. For the big finale, 0:08:33.520 --> 0:08:36.520 David appeared on top of a radio tower wearing a 0:08:36.640 --> 0:08:39.720 gold lamat leather suit decked out with a pair of wings. 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:43.360 Then he slid down to the stage to perform his encore. 0:08:44.080 --> 0:08:49.880 It was, in a word, ridiculous. On paper, it was 0:08:49.920 --> 0:08:53.680 a success, press reports declared at the most lucrative tour 0:08:53.760 --> 0:08:58.720 of David's career, selling three million tickets. In retrospect, some 0:08:58.800 --> 0:09:01.480 would cite the show as a watershed for arena rock, 0:09:02.000 --> 0:09:04.760 paving the way for acts like You Two and Madonna 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:08.640 to mount their own theatrical productions. But the Glass Spider 0:09:08.679 --> 0:09:14.320 Tour is seldom remembered as a triumph too many It's 0:09:14.320 --> 0:09:18.240 smacked of an aging man trying too hard. Despite all 0:09:18.280 --> 0:09:22.520 of the props and flamboyance, it read as plotless and pointless, 0:09:22.559 --> 0:09:27.560 an overblown, self indulgent spectacle. David's productions had always been 0:09:27.679 --> 0:09:31.960 characterized by taste and style, even back in the low resource, 0:09:32.000 --> 0:09:34.640 ziggy Stardust days when he had to make do with 0:09:34.679 --> 0:09:38.360 homemade costumes and doing his own makeup. Yet now that 0:09:38.440 --> 0:09:44.000 money was no object, the Glass Spider set looked cheap, pathetic, 0:09:44.200 --> 0:09:48.160 observed one critic, Like an amateur theater production, said another. 0:09:49.120 --> 0:09:52.920 Though Bowie initially enjoyed the Vegas style, absurdity of it all. 0:09:53.240 --> 0:09:57.000 He quickly grew tired of the hassle and tired in general. 0:09:57.640 --> 0:10:00.319 In advance of the tour, he'd submitted himse off the 0:10:00.400 --> 0:10:04.359 twelve hour rehearsals six days a week. He also insisted 0:10:04.360 --> 0:10:08.640 on overseeing all technical aspects of the production himself. By 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:11.920 the time the tour kicked off in March, he was 0:10:11.920 --> 0:10:17.440 already exhausted. The rigorous choreography didn't exactly help. This is 0:10:17.480 --> 0:10:20.120 the most physical tour that I've ever done, he said. 0:10:20.760 --> 0:10:25.480 It's relentless, it never stops. I'm bruised as hell. I 0:10:25.520 --> 0:10:29.120 feel like a worn out rag doll. He struggled to 0:10:29.200 --> 0:10:32.360 cope with the punishing number of dates. Some nights his 0:10:32.480 --> 0:10:35.880 voice gave out, forcing Carlos Alamar to step in and 0:10:35.920 --> 0:10:39.600 cover for him. David grew cranky, and he began to 0:10:39.679 --> 0:10:42.840 lash out at the band and crew, blaming them for 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:46.560 the lukewarm reviews. When the show's wrapped in New Zealand 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:50.880 that November, he ceremoniously burnt the spiders, said in a field. 0:10:53.840 --> 0:10:57.280 Back home in Switzerland, he found himself at loose ends. 0:10:57.960 --> 0:11:00.960 He obviously wasn't gonna tour like that in anytime soon. 0:11:02.080 --> 0:11:05.319 Nothing he did seemed to be working, and his record label, 0:11:05.440 --> 0:11:07.440 E M I was always there to let him know. 0:11:08.320 --> 0:11:11.760 The conglomerate had shelled out some seventeen million dollars for 0:11:11.800 --> 0:11:15.920 a five record deal in two but since then his 0:11:16.000 --> 0:11:20.720 sales figures had taken a downward turn, marked the first 0:11:20.720 --> 0:11:23.800 time in seventeen years that Bowie's name didn't appear in 0:11:23.800 --> 0:11:27.360 the charts at all. In corporate speak, there was concern 0:11:27.440 --> 0:11:31.800 about the declining prospects of a viable product. In other words, 0:11:32.080 --> 0:11:35.560 they theority was washed up past it. I spent force. 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:39.319 David was starting to get flak about his age from 0:11:39.320 --> 0:11:43.360 all sides. During press conferences for the Glass Spider Tour, 0:11:43.800 --> 0:11:47.520 he fended off questions about arthritis and lame jokes about 0:11:47.559 --> 0:11:51.400 renaming it the Antique road Show. He managed the grin 0:11:51.440 --> 0:11:54.840 and bear it without throttling any journalists. But when Kim 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:57.760 Gordon of the ultra hip a rock band Sonic Youth 0:11:57.840 --> 0:12:01.800 described Bowie in an interview as quote old fart, it hurt. 0:12:02.400 --> 0:12:06.079 He seriously considered retiring all together and focusing on painting. 0:12:06.840 --> 0:12:08.520 I thought I should make as much money as I 0:12:08.520 --> 0:12:11.640 could and then quit. He later admit, I didn't think 0:12:11.679 --> 0:12:14.440 there was any alternative. I thought I was obviously just 0:12:14.480 --> 0:12:17.000 an empty vessel and would end up like everyone else, 0:12:17.360 --> 0:12:20.560 doing these stupid shows and singing Rebel Rebel until I 0:12:20.640 --> 0:12:26.160 fall over and bleed. David's path forward revealed itself from 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:28.520 the form of a cassette he'd received during the Glass 0:12:28.520 --> 0:12:32.360 Spider tour. His public relations officer had slipped him a 0:12:32.360 --> 0:12:36.359 tape of her husband's music. His name was Reeves Gribrels. 0:12:37.080 --> 0:12:39.920 When David got around to playing reeves tape months after 0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:43.160 the tour wrapped, he was thoroughly impressed by his unique 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:47.560 bluesy guitar. David called him up almost immediately, inviting him 0:12:47.600 --> 0:12:52.000 to his Swiss home. The collaborate. Reeves have been an 0:12:52.040 --> 0:12:55.280 avowed Bowie fan since his teenage years, but he found 0:12:55.320 --> 0:13:00.440 his hero surprisingly insecure and deeply unhappy. David can fighted 0:13:00.480 --> 0:13:02.960 that the multimillion dollar E m I deal made him 0:13:03.000 --> 0:13:06.080 feel duty bound to deliver hits, but the pressure to 0:13:06.080 --> 0:13:10.320 be commercial left him creatively stifled. The success he'd had 0:13:10.360 --> 0:13:13.320 earlier in the decade, but the global smash Let's Dance 0:13:13.400 --> 0:13:16.480 left him confused about who he was singing to. In 0:13:16.600 --> 0:13:21.840 his own words, he'd lost his vision Instead, with reeves encouragement, 0:13:22.240 --> 0:13:25.400 he put the audience aside and revisited the music that 0:13:25.440 --> 0:13:31.040 made him excited. They poured over David's favorites Hendricks, Cream, 0:13:31.160 --> 0:13:35.559 John Lee Hooker, Buddy Guy, and Junior Wells. These formative 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:38.400 influences would be the basis for the sound of David's 0:13:38.440 --> 0:13:46.160 new project, Tin Machine. A decade earlier, David had escaped 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:49.120 the crushing tyranny of the top forty life by fleeing 0:13:49.160 --> 0:13:53.840 to Berlin and his aggressively uncommercial ambient explorations with Brian Eno. 0:13:54.679 --> 0:13:57.920 Now he took a similar approach, this time fleeing into 0:13:57.960 --> 0:14:01.800 a garage band. It allowed him to deconstruct the carefully 0:14:01.800 --> 0:14:05.920 assembled musical persona that had taken over his life. Like 0:14:06.080 --> 0:14:09.600 his Glass Spider tour, it had grown bloated and overblown. 0:14:10.080 --> 0:14:12.520 Now he could get back to the basics, and the 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:16.520 results were liberating. Rather than continue to court the mass 0:14:16.520 --> 0:14:19.960 appeal heater and but Let's Dance, he'd simply stop trying 0:14:20.240 --> 0:14:23.520 and just do what he wanted. Tin Machine was David's 0:14:23.560 --> 0:14:26.040 abrupt left turn to take him away from the middle 0:14:26.040 --> 0:14:28.800 of the road. It led to a creative dead end 0:14:28.840 --> 0:14:32.040 according to most critics, but at least he enjoyed the ride. 0:14:34.160 --> 0:14:37.920 For a rhythm section, he tapped brothers Tony and Hunt Sales, 0:14:38.840 --> 0:14:42.720 sons of TV comedian Soupy Sales. They were twin dynamos 0:14:42.800 --> 0:14:45.600 who'd earned their stripes backing Iggy Pop and his lust 0:14:45.600 --> 0:14:48.920 for Life period before Iggy rudely dismissed them with the 0:14:49.040 --> 0:14:53.800 scathing line you're like heroin, I don't need you. Tales 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:58.360 of the sales excesses and bad behavior. Legendary drummer Hunt 0:14:58.440 --> 0:15:01.000 was described by one band as the kind of guy 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:04.760 who quote consumes his own body weight and dangerous substances 0:15:04.800 --> 0:15:08.760 every day bassis Tony had been involved in a nasty 0:15:08.840 --> 0:15:11.280 car crash that sent a stick shift through his chest 0:15:11.600 --> 0:15:15.080 and left him legally dead for several minutes. His memory 0:15:15.160 --> 0:15:17.560 was still a little shaky from the multi month coma, 0:15:17.800 --> 0:15:20.400 and his bandmates often had to shout the chord changes 0:15:20.440 --> 0:15:25.520 at him midsong. The brothers joined Reeves and Bowie in Switzerland, 0:15:25.720 --> 0:15:28.760 adding a dose of chaos to the sessions. It was 0:15:28.880 --> 0:15:32.640 volatile but productive. The first day yielded a new song, 0:15:33.000 --> 0:15:36.960 an unadorned retro blues called Heavens in Here. It was 0:15:37.000 --> 0:15:39.640 a sign of the fruitful partnership that would continue when 0:15:39.640 --> 0:15:44.040 recording formerly began at Compass Points Studios in the Bahamas. 0:15:44.080 --> 0:15:47.840 Some thirty five tracks coalesced in just six weeks, including 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:50.480 one rockabilly two and that would give the band its name. 0:15:51.600 --> 0:15:55.200 Most were recorded live, often in a single take. In 0:15:55.240 --> 0:15:58.520 between songs, the Sales brothers would call up their comedian 0:15:58.600 --> 0:16:02.080 father blasted the his dirty jokes through the studio p a. 0:16:02.920 --> 0:16:05.960 This set the tone for the productive, yet rowdy sessions. 0:16:06.640 --> 0:16:09.160 The Sales brothers were not the least big cowed by 0:16:09.160 --> 0:16:12.600 Bowie's reputation, and hectored him into leaving the rough edges 0:16:12.640 --> 0:16:17.640 and raw improvised words. The resulting lyrics or uncharacteristically obscenity 0:16:17.720 --> 0:16:21.200 laden and some might say unsophisticated, but they give the 0:16:21.240 --> 0:16:24.800 tracks a punkish edge in many ways, predicting the grunge 0:16:24.800 --> 0:16:29.040 explosions still a few years off to hear David tell it, 0:16:29.360 --> 0:16:32.000 the decision to make the project a true four way 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:35.000 partnership was obvious. I think this has got to be 0:16:35.040 --> 0:16:37.760 a band, David said at the end of an early session. 0:16:38.240 --> 0:16:40.760 You guys don't listen to me anyway. It was the 0:16:40.800 --> 0:16:43.480 first time he'd embraced a group banner since his days 0:16:43.520 --> 0:16:46.400 with the Spiders from Mars, and even then it was 0:16:46.520 --> 0:16:49.600 his name out front. This time it was a gang 0:16:49.600 --> 0:16:54.040 of equals, equal pay and equal attention, though in practice 0:16:54.080 --> 0:16:56.080 it was less like a democracy and more like a 0:16:56.120 --> 0:16:59.400 shouting match, with a mild mannered Reeves on one side 0:16:59.440 --> 0:17:02.760 as David deputy and the facto musical director and the 0:17:02.840 --> 0:17:09.919 rambunctious sales brothers on the other. David adored all of it, 0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:14.040 the teasing, the rough housing, the fighting, the whole sweaty 0:17:14.160 --> 0:17:17.240 four guys in a basement vibe. It was everything that 0:17:17.280 --> 0:17:19.600 had been missing from his musical life since his days 0:17:19.640 --> 0:17:22.959 in the King Bees. As a teen, a new, neatly 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:26.679 trimmed beard signaled this new image, and so did another 0:17:26.720 --> 0:17:34.520 classic rock star accessory, a much younger girlfriend, Melissa Hurley, 0:17:34.600 --> 0:17:37.000 was a twenty year old soloist with the Los Angeles 0:17:37.080 --> 0:17:41.919 Chamber Ballet. Talented, intelligent, and beautiful, she was hired as 0:17:41.960 --> 0:17:45.040 a dancer for the Glass Spider tour. Each night, she'd 0:17:45.040 --> 0:17:48.000 pose in the audience as a screaming fan, only to 0:17:48.040 --> 0:17:51.040 be dragged up on stage to dance seductively with David. 0:17:51.720 --> 0:17:55.840 Her effortless splits always managed to impress from this silly 0:17:55.840 --> 0:17:59.560 bit of stage business, their relationship blossomed. They made a 0:17:59.560 --> 0:18:03.640 cute cup bowl almost twenty years David's jr. She playfully 0:18:03.640 --> 0:18:06.479 tried to update his style with hats and scarves with 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:10.080 brightly colored eighties patterns. He'd play along for a few 0:18:10.160 --> 0:18:13.399 days before quietly losing them. She even got him to 0:18:13.440 --> 0:18:16.240 wear a thong at the beach, which led to merciless 0:18:16.240 --> 0:18:19.879 teasing from his bandmates. David loved to bring Melissa to 0:18:20.000 --> 0:18:23.600 art museums and elegant restaurants, the older man showing his 0:18:23.720 --> 0:18:28.800 love the world. David was enjoying his time as the 0:18:28.840 --> 0:18:31.560 frontman for a rock group, but the all for one, 0:18:31.720 --> 0:18:35.520 one for all charade was becoming hard to maintain. When 0:18:35.520 --> 0:18:39.360 Tim Machine released their self titled debut in May of nine, 0:18:39.840 --> 0:18:42.760 many reviewers simply ignored the whole band thing and just 0:18:42.840 --> 0:18:46.480 described it as a new David Bowie record. David tried 0:18:46.520 --> 0:18:49.640 to combat this by insisting that all interviews be conducted 0:18:49.680 --> 0:18:53.879 with the whole band. Usually their quotes were telling as 0:18:53.960 --> 0:18:56.880 hunt sales. Joked to one journalist, the thing that makes 0:18:56.960 --> 0:18:59.080 us differ from other bands is that the lead singers 0:18:59.119 --> 0:19:02.000 a millionaire, and of course he was right. Their low 0:19:02.040 --> 0:19:04.320 key club tour that summer may have looked like an 0:19:04.359 --> 0:19:07.000 old school rock and roll road show as they traveled 0:19:07.040 --> 0:19:10.640 by bus and played cards and ate it greasy spoon diners, 0:19:11.119 --> 0:19:13.200 But it was David who handed them each a thousand 0:19:13.280 --> 0:19:16.240 dollars in cash to buy product suits for their first gig. 0:19:17.119 --> 0:19:20.159 Sure they were equal, but David's wealth made him a 0:19:20.160 --> 0:19:26.199 little more equal to everyone who didn't happen to be 0:19:26.359 --> 0:19:31.119 in Tim Machine. It all seemed disingenuous, just another pretentious 0:19:31.160 --> 0:19:34.480 character from David Bowie. This time he's posing as the 0:19:34.480 --> 0:19:38.800 frontman for some obscure rock band. The records sold decently, 0:19:39.119 --> 0:19:43.240 moving some two million copies, but the critical reactions mixed. 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:47.760 Some found the raw, stripped down music exhilarating, citing it 0:19:47.800 --> 0:19:51.399 as his most exciting work in years. Others were turned 0:19:51.440 --> 0:19:55.040 off by their frattiness and phon nous. How can you 0:19:55.040 --> 0:19:58.000 build yourselves as a piste off, punky olt rock band 0:19:58.119 --> 0:20:02.359 when you have a superstar frontman and three virtuoso level musicians. 0:20:03.119 --> 0:20:06.439 David himself started to moan about the bad press. The 0:20:06.520 --> 0:20:09.680 same people who had mocked the Glass Spider tours overblown 0:20:09.720 --> 0:20:14.120 pomposity now rejected his straight ahead rock approach. I can't 0:20:14.119 --> 0:20:17.840 get anything right, David complained, I can't go big, I 0:20:17.880 --> 0:20:23.000 can't go small. Whichever way I go is wrong. At 0:20:23.000 --> 0:20:25.120 a time when he seemed more than happy to put 0:20:25.160 --> 0:20:28.240 his past behind him, David was presented with a business 0:20:28.240 --> 0:20:31.359 opportunity that was too good to pass up. At the 0:20:31.440 --> 0:20:34.399 dawn of the nineties, the transition from vinyl to c 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:38.440 D was in full swing. Legacy artists like David, we're 0:20:38.480 --> 0:20:41.600 making a killing by reissuing their classic albums on this 0:20:41.680 --> 0:20:45.720 new digital format. Most acts did so with minimal attention 0:20:45.720 --> 0:20:49.520 to detail. Even the Beatles CD rollout was a notorious 0:20:49.560 --> 0:20:54.159 calamity with poorly remixed songs and cheap looking packaging. David 0:20:54.240 --> 0:20:57.760 was determined to avoid the same trap. He only agreed 0:20:57.760 --> 0:21:00.640 to the reissue if each CD contained something of value, 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:05.680 unreleased bonus tracks or other outtakes the common practice. Now 0:21:05.840 --> 0:21:08.280 he was one of the first to do it. David 0:21:08.320 --> 0:21:10.960 took it a step further by haralding his arrival on 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:14.520 CD with a new rarities filled box set called Sound 0:21:14.560 --> 0:21:18.119 and Vision. To promote the remarketing of his life's work. 0:21:18.480 --> 0:21:22.040 He agreed to temporarily leave the dingy tim Machine clubs 0:21:22.119 --> 0:21:26.679 behind and revert back into his stadium god incarnation. He 0:21:26.760 --> 0:21:29.520 agreed to a tour, one that was unlike any he'd 0:21:29.520 --> 0:21:33.000 ever undertaken. For the first time, he didn't have an 0:21:33.040 --> 0:21:37.200 album of new material, no new guys, persona or concept 0:21:37.240 --> 0:21:40.560 to get behind the sound and vision tour was purely 0:21:40.600 --> 0:21:44.399 a celebration of past glories. For a man who hated 0:21:44.400 --> 0:21:47.440 looking backwards, the idea of the Greatest Hits tour made 0:21:47.520 --> 0:21:51.520 him uncomfortable To cope, he boldly announced that this would 0:21:51.520 --> 0:21:54.359 be the last time he'd ever performed beloved titles from 0:21:54.400 --> 0:21:58.600 his back catalog. This was to be a fond farewell 0:21:58.600 --> 0:22:02.560 before consigning title was like Ziggy Stardust, Heroes and Space 0:22:02.640 --> 0:22:06.880 Oddity to history. To make it more interactive, he introduced 0:22:06.880 --> 0:22:09.520 a phone poll and asked fans to vote on what 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:13.600 songs to include in his set. One prankish music outlets 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:16.639 started a campaign to gather votes for the Laughing Gnome 0:22:17.200 --> 0:22:23.360 David's cringeworthy sixties Novelty Number. David was amused, but ultimately 0:22:23.400 --> 0:22:26.840 declined to include the song. The trek would consist of 0:22:26.880 --> 0:22:31.000 a d eight shows in twenty seven different countries. Slightly 0:22:31.040 --> 0:22:34.720 traumatized by the negative response to the elaborate Glass Spider tour, 0:22:35.080 --> 0:22:38.719 he took a minimalist approach this time around. The stage 0:22:38.720 --> 0:22:41.440 set was dominated by a massive, state of the art 0:22:41.480 --> 0:22:46.200 digital screen. It displayed various videos of David through the years, 0:22:46.240 --> 0:22:49.600 with which the slightly older flesh and blood David would interact. 0:22:50.640 --> 0:22:53.240 Though he'd cite the tourists as most enjoyable since the 0:22:53.240 --> 0:22:56.920 early Ziggy start US dates, it felt at times forced. 0:22:57.720 --> 0:23:01.879 The experience seemed to underscore is increased LEAs schitzoid career motivation. 0:23:02.720 --> 0:23:06.680 David never truly squared his desire for both cult credibility 0:23:06.720 --> 0:23:12.080 and blockbuster mainstream income. This dichotomy was illustrated perfectly on 0:23:12.119 --> 0:23:15.320 the Sound and Vision tour when several dates included a 0:23:15.400 --> 0:23:18.440 lengthy mid show pause for a message from the sponsor 0:23:18.680 --> 0:23:22.040 a beer brand, killing the musical momentum in the process. 0:23:22.720 --> 0:23:25.240 God only knows what his Tin Machine bandmates would have 0:23:25.280 --> 0:23:31.199 said to that. So which was it? Was David a 0:23:31.280 --> 0:23:33.840 rough and ready rock or rebel, or was he an 0:23:33.840 --> 0:23:38.560 arena idol with mass appeal? For David, those two identities 0:23:38.600 --> 0:23:42.040 existed in conflict with one another. It was a problem 0:23:42.080 --> 0:23:45.600 common for his peers. The first generation of rock stars 0:23:45.640 --> 0:23:48.600 were now reaching their forties, and there was no precedent 0:23:48.640 --> 0:23:52.919 for making the transition into middle age. Like many David 0:23:52.920 --> 0:23:56.760 found themselves at a crossroads. Would he continuous attempts to 0:23:56.760 --> 0:24:00.000 break new ground, or, except that his best days were behind, 0:24:00.000 --> 0:24:04.919 find him to move forward? He risked ridicule. To look backwards, 0:24:05.400 --> 0:24:08.960 he risked becoming a parody. He pondered all this as 0:24:08.960 --> 0:24:12.520 he absolutely thumbed through a magazine on a flight between concerts. 0:24:13.280 --> 0:24:16.119 Then his eyes landed on a stunning woman who graced 0:24:16.119 --> 0:24:19.400 his page. He elbowed his seat mate to point her out. 0:24:20.280 --> 0:24:24.160 This girl's interesting, David said. Her name was a mon. 0:24:36.440 --> 0:24:38.880 David Bowie met the love of his life on October. 0:24:41.400 --> 0:24:43.720 It was just days after he'd wrapped his Sound and 0:24:43.880 --> 0:24:48.720 Vision tour. One date Farewell That was musical past. That 0:24:48.840 --> 0:24:51.840 wasn't the only goodbye on the tour. His relationship with 0:24:51.880 --> 0:24:55.119 Melissa Hurley had come to an end. Despite reports of 0:24:55.160 --> 0:24:58.119 their engagement. It was an undramatic parting of the ways. 0:24:59.000 --> 0:25:02.520 David in years her senior would say that it had 0:25:02.560 --> 0:25:06.040 become quote one of those older men younger girls situations. 0:25:06.520 --> 0:25:08.439 It became obvious to me that it just wasn't going 0:25:08.520 --> 0:25:10.760 to work out as a relationship, and for that she 0:25:10.880 --> 0:25:13.880 thanked me one of these days. He arrived in Los 0:25:13.960 --> 0:25:17.639 Angeles that fall, perfectly content in his bachelor of them, 0:25:17.680 --> 0:25:20.280 I felt that was it for me, he'd recall. I 0:25:20.320 --> 0:25:25.000 didn't want, need, or desire any more permanent relationships. Then 0:25:25.000 --> 0:25:27.320 he received an invite to a birthday party for a 0:25:27.320 --> 0:25:31.720 hairdresser friend named Teddy Anteline. David would say it was 0:25:31.840 --> 0:25:35.000