Speaker 1: Off the Record is a production of I Heart Radio. September,
Speaker 1: twenty year old David Bowie receives his very first American
Speaker 1: fan letter. It comes as quite a surprise. His career
Speaker 1: is hardly flourishing. He'd released his debut album a few
Speaker 1: months prior in June, but hardly anyone in his native
Speaker 1: England took any notice. Learning that his music and made
Speaker 1: it all the way to America was like finding out
Speaker 1: your message in a bottle made it to Antarctica. He's
Speaker 1: so shocked by the note that he immediately sits down
Speaker 1: and manager Ken Pitt's office and writes a friendly response
Speaker 1: to the fourteen year old from New Mexico named Sandra.
Speaker 1: Dear Sandra. A few moments ago, I was handed my
Speaker 1: very first American fan letter, and it was from you.
Speaker 1: I was so pleased that I had to sit down
Speaker 1: and type an immediate reply. I've been waiting for some
Speaker 1: reaction to the album from American listeners. There were, but
Speaker 1: they were by professional critics and they rarely reflect the
Speaker 1: opinions of the public. And answer to your questions. My
Speaker 1: real name is David Jones, my birthday is January eighth,
Speaker 1: and I guess I'm five ft ten. There is a
Speaker 1: fan club here in England, but if things go well
Speaker 1: on the States then we'll have one there. I suppose
Speaker 1: it's a little early to even think about it. I
Speaker 1: hope one day to get to America. My manager tells
Speaker 1: me lots about it, as he's been there many times
Speaker 1: with other acts. He manages. Thank you for being so
Speaker 1: kind as the right to me and do please write
Speaker 1: again and let me know some more about yourself. Yours, sincerely,
Speaker 1: David Bowie. January David Bowie takes his first step on
Speaker 1: US soil. He arrived solo at Dallas International Airport in Washington,
Speaker 1: d C. There's no crowd to meet him, just a
Speaker 1: lone pr rep from his record label. Despite the light reception,
Speaker 1: David is dressed like a star, specifically Lauren Bacall. He
Speaker 1: regally sasch eate off the plane, long locks spilling past
Speaker 1: his shoulders in soft golden tendrils. He's wearing a dress.
Speaker 1: Technically it was a blue maxicoat crafted by oh Koran
Speaker 1: London designer Michael Fish, topped off with a white chiffon scarf,
Speaker 1: but these finer points were lost on the American immigration officials.
Speaker 1: To them, it was just a strange man in a dress,
Speaker 1: which is always grounds for suspicion. They detained this soft spoken,
Speaker 1: exceedingly polite cross dresser for more than an hour, interrogating
Speaker 1: him about his attire and fay mannerisms. Finding nothing technically illegal,
Speaker 1: they let him go, mothering various homophobic slurs as he went.
Speaker 1: David's pr contact greased him warmly before asking about the
Speaker 1: lengthy delay. Oh, they held me on the plane, David replied,
Speaker 1: for some reason. They seemed to think I looked strange.
Speaker 1: David Bowie was certainly ready for America, but was it
Speaker 1: ready for him? Hello, and welcome to Off the Record,
Speaker 1: the show that goes beyond the songs and into the
Speaker 1: hearts and minds of rock's greatest legends. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Jordan Runt. This season explores the life, or should I
Speaker 1: say lives, of David Bowie. In this episode, we're gonna
Speaker 1: talk about Bowie at the dawn of the seventies, shedding
Speaker 1: his hippie skin for something a little rougher and more raw.
Speaker 1: The new decade saw him become the godfather of glam
Speaker 1: but also a father and a husband more than any other.
Speaker 1: It was an era of changes for David Bowie. David
Speaker 1: Bowie needed a new pad in the summer of nineteen
Speaker 1: He and his girlfriend Angie had worn out They're welcome
Speaker 1: staying with David's increasingly fed up ex girlfriend Mary. The
Speaker 1: final straw came when Angie attempted to seduce Mary, who
Speaker 1: had never signed up from Nagati. So they were out. Aggressive.
Speaker 1: Angie on a new home, and soon she found the
Speaker 1: perfect place just a short distance away in the town
Speaker 1: of Beckenham. Elvis Presley had Grace Land. David Bowie, with
Speaker 1: whom he shared a birthday, had Hadden Hall. The imposing,
Speaker 1: thirty room Victorian mansion had lost some of its grandeur
Speaker 1: since being converted into suburban apartments, but the air of
Speaker 1: faded glamor only added to the distinctly funky vibe. The
Speaker 1: red brick turrets and wrought iron weather vans loomed over
Speaker 1: a rambling English garden choked with weeds and barren trees.
Speaker 1: It looked, for all the world like a haunted house,
Speaker 1: and with good reason. Bowie and many of his housemates
Speaker 1: claimed they saw the ghost of a young woman strolling
Speaker 1: the property. Their ground floor apartment There's for just seven
Speaker 1: pounds a week included access to the cavernous formal entrance hall,
Speaker 1: featuring a massive staircase illuminated by a forty foot stained
Speaker 1: glass window. Some friends called the Gothic pile Beckenham Palace,
Speaker 1: others called a Dracula's living room. Both descriptions are apt, outrageous,
Speaker 1: and ostentatious. Hadden Hall was the ideal place for David
Speaker 1: and Angie to live out the eventful years ahead. At first,
Speaker 1: they couldn't afford much in the way of decoration, furnishing
Speaker 1: the flat with some old orange crate stolen from a
Speaker 1: local market, But with some help from Angie's parents, the
Speaker 1: young couple began to add their own touches. They painted
Speaker 1: the walls and ceilings vibrant shades of green, pink, and silver.
Speaker 1: David took a more personal approach in the bathroom, where
Speaker 1: he pasted handmade collages of nude women cut from men's magazines.
Speaker 1: Once David's space addity royalty started to roll in, the
Speaker 1: pair began frequenting local antique shops, acquiring elegant art deco
Speaker 1: lamps and a huge seven foot wide regency bed. After
Speaker 1: doing up their living quarters, David began building a workspace,
Speaker 1: He converted a small cupboard under the stairwell into a
Speaker 1: makeshift rehearsal studio with rudimentary recording equipment. There he demo
Speaker 1: many of his best known songs over the next three years,
Speaker 1: often with the help of his friend and producer Tony Bisconti,
Speaker 1: who was so taken with the place that he rented
Speaker 1: the flat next door. Hadden Hall became the center of
Speaker 1: gravity for David and his entourage, serving as a home,
Speaker 1: an office, and a creative incubator. This was where music
Speaker 1: was made, photo shoots were held, costumes were sold, journalists
Speaker 1: were wined and dined, and grand plans were conceived. David
Speaker 1: was in low spirits as summer turned to fall. The
Speaker 1: single Space Oddity had been his first bona fide success
Speaker 1: on the charts earlier that year, but the accompanying LP
Speaker 1: did dismal numbers, selling barely five thousand copies in the UK.
Speaker 1: The public who had known him for the dramatic sci
Speaker 1: fi operetta were confused by the meandering folk of Unwashed
Speaker 1: and Somewhat Slightly Dazed and the dystopian proto prog rock
Speaker 1: of Signet Committee. And then there was the full on
Speaker 1: psych freak out that concluded memory of a free festival.
Speaker 1: If he sounded lost and unfocused, it's because he was.
Speaker 1: David hoped at least for critical acclaim, yet that too
Speaker 1: eluded him. This was mostly due to a major managerial
Speaker 1: over ight. In November nine, David stage the showcase to
Speaker 1: promote his album rather loftily dubbed an Evening with David Bowie.
Speaker 1: David rose to the occasion, delivering one of his finest
Speaker 1: and most passionate performances to date, But when he arrived
Speaker 1: backstage after his triumphant set to charm the v I
Speaker 1: P S, he was told there were none. The great
Speaker 1: efforts have been made to invite friends and label reps,
Speaker 1: they had completely forgotten to invite members of the press.
Speaker 1: David's friend Calvin Mark Lee, the man who had introduced
Speaker 1: him to Angie and got them his record deal in
Speaker 1: the first place, took the heat for the snaffoo. He
Speaker 1: was duly banned from David's circle. Still, the damage was done.
Speaker 1: David felt like Major Tom, drifting further into the commercial abyss.
Speaker 1: I was in the depths of despair, he later said.
Speaker 1: I became disillusioned. I used to have periods weeks on end,
Speaker 1: when I just couldn't cope anymore, I'd slump into myself.
Speaker 1: I felt so depressed, I really felt so aimless, and
Speaker 1: this torrential feeling of what's it all? War? Anyway, Angie
Speaker 1: did what she could to lift him out of his funk.
Speaker 1: She played an increasingly active partners career, falling somewhere between
Speaker 1: an artistic collaborator and manager. Much to his actual manager,
Speaker 1: Ken Pitts chagrin, Ken viewed is an opportunistic egomaniac, leaching
Speaker 1: onto his talented client and disrupting his meticulously crafted promotional
Speaker 1: strategy with ill advised stunts. Angie viewed Ken as, in
Speaker 1: her own words, a deadweight albatross, one who's hopelessly out
Speaker 1: of touch. Supper Club tactics weren't doing her avant garde
Speaker 1: boyfriend any favors. They were both right and wrong. The
Speaker 1: degree to which Angie shaped Bowie's music and persona has
Speaker 1: has been exaggerated over the years, usually by Angie herself,
Speaker 1: but her role as an organizer and hustler is undeniable.
Speaker 1: In many ways, she inherited the advisor role formerly held
Speaker 1: by David's father, John, a one time pr executive who
Speaker 1: died of pneumonia in August nine sixty nine. David trusted
Speaker 1: his father more than anyone and valued his creative instincts
Speaker 1: and expertise. Now Angie, this big, dreaming, big talking American
Speaker 1: with little formal training, became his most vital sounding board.
Speaker 1: In addition to helping him land small gigs at local clubs,
Speaker 1: she steered David down daring and sometimes outlandish, creative avenues.
Speaker 1: There were partners, though some might say codependent ones. It
Speaker 1: was difficult to see where David ended and Angie began,
Speaker 1: and vice versa. That wasn't the only blurry line in
Speaker 1: their relationship. Gender roles and sexual identities were exchanged at will.
Speaker 1: Andie encouraged David to grow out as hippie perm into
Speaker 1: long feminine waves, while she opted for a short crew cut.
Speaker 1: She regularly bought women's clothing that she knew David would like.
Speaker 1: Sure enough, he would rate her closet and borrow one
Speaker 1: of her Mr Fish gowns. They were quite a site.
Speaker 1: Walking down Beckenham High Street, he freshly made up an address,
Speaker 1: and she with her close crop and pinstriped power suit.
Speaker 1: In the literal and metaphorical sense, Andie wore the pan
Speaker 1: in the relationship. She was prone to throwing tantrums designed
Speaker 1: to manipulate, confuse, and sometimes even seduce. They'd come on
Speaker 1: fast and sudden. David once said living with Angie was
Speaker 1: like living with a blowtorch. Many would find themselves burned.
Speaker 1: It was Angie's idea to install a phone line at
Speaker 1: Hadden Hall, the better to handle David's business. Unfortunately, the
Speaker 1: line was often jammed with pitiful calls from David's mother, Peggy.
Speaker 1: Though she'd been a cold and remote figure all throughout
Speaker 1: David's childhood, Peggy had grown increasingly needy since the death
Speaker 1: of David's father. This added to the tension between mother
Speaker 1: and son that had been brewing for years. Peggy's constant
Speaker 1: accusations that the couple were living in sin took their
Speaker 1: toll on Angie, who finally fled to her parents home
Speaker 1: on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus that November. David had
Speaker 1: been so preoccupied with his own affairs, business and otherwise
Speaker 1: that she doubted he'd even noticed her departure. Much like
Speaker 1: his mother, he always demurred when it came to outward
Speaker 1: displays of affection. He couldn't even bring himself to say
Speaker 1: the words I love you, preferring instead to whisper his
Speaker 1: own code phrase in your ear. So imagine or surprise
Speaker 1: when she received the postcard from David just before Christmas
Speaker 1: that read, this year I promise we'll marry. This was
Speaker 1: all so romantic and unlike David. Andie returned to Haddon
Speaker 1: Hall soon after. David had posed a question early on
Speaker 1: in their relationship, could she deal with the fact that
Speaker 1: he didn't love her? He warned Angie not to expect
Speaker 1: anything that even slightly resembled traditional monogamy. I'm not made
Speaker 1: like that. I do things that other people might not
Speaker 1: subscribe to. I think it's only fair that you should
Speaker 1: know that before we set out. The suited Angie just fine.
Speaker 1: She was no stranger to deviating from the sexual norm.
Speaker 1: She had, after all, been expelled from school for having
Speaker 1: an affair with a female student, Hadn't She and David
Speaker 1: first met because they were both sleeping with the same man.
Speaker 1: Clearly their relationship it was wide open from the start
Speaker 1: and that's how it continued to be. And she had
Speaker 1: no problem sharing David at first. Anyway, boys girls didn't matter.
Speaker 1: If and you could get in on it even better.
Speaker 1: That was the ethos of the age. If it feels good,
Speaker 1: do it, as long as it's not hurting anybody. They
Speaker 1: even had threesomes with David's old girlfriend, Danna Gilepsie, who
Speaker 1: described them as less like boyfriend and girlfriend and more
Speaker 1: like brother and sister and sometimes mother and son. For
Speaker 1: such a renegade, and You took a surprisingly old fashioned
Speaker 1: stance on housework, cooking and cleaning for David, and even
Speaker 1: drawing his bath. Sometimes he called her mother Ma, and
Speaker 1: even peg. And You would never fully shake the sense
Speaker 1: that David stayed with her purely for practical reasons. She
Speaker 1: was an all in one secretary, pr rep manager, creative partner,
Speaker 1: maid and lover who had the added bonus of finding
Speaker 1: him additional sex partners. Though they were obviously compatible. Immigration
Speaker 1: issues played a key role in their decision to tie
Speaker 1: the knot. Angie's visa was due to expire. A marriage
Speaker 1: would prevent her from being deported. David's no fool, She claimed.
Speaker 1: We got married because I was an American who needed
Speaker 1: to stay in London, and he was a weak brit
Speaker 1: who needed me to help break down doors and turn
Speaker 1: him into a star. I was wild and he needed
Speaker 1: me to help him be wild. It worked. Bowie himself
Speaker 1: would admit that they probably wouldn't have gotten married if
Speaker 1: it wasn't for her visa problems. Yet that didn't mean
Speaker 1: he didn't care well. The marriage ceremony never mattered much
Speaker 1: to him, Angie resolutely did. They married at the Bromley
Speaker 1: Register Office in March nineteen seventy. The bride wore a
Speaker 1: pink and purple silk dress from the nineteen twenties, purchased
Speaker 1: the day before from one of the vintage stalls at
Speaker 1: Kensington Market. The groom wore an oversize sheer ling afghan
Speaker 1: and an ascot. Instead of rings, they exchanged two Peruvian
Speaker 1: silver bracelets. They'd said farewell to single them the night
Speaker 1: before by staging an impromptu threesome with a female artist friend.
Speaker 1: As a result, they got a start that morning and
Speaker 1: nearly missed their own wedding. The trio arrived at the
Speaker 1: registry office only to find David's mother, Peggy, waiting on
Speaker 1: the steps. This was unexpected, as David hadn't invited her.
Speaker 1: There were only a handful of friends on hand to
Speaker 1: watch the couple take their vows. Manager KEM Pitt the
Speaker 1: man had been as much of a father to David
Speaker 1: over the last few years as his own dad wasn't
Speaker 1: among them. David hadn't invited him either, and you had
Speaker 1: already supplanted him as David's ultimate confidant. Now it was official,
Speaker 1: before God and law. The newlyweds posed for photos outside
Speaker 1: the registry office before heading to a nearby pub for
Speaker 1: a quick reception. It was raining, so they honeymooned at
Speaker 1: Haddon Hall in front of the TV set. A couple
Speaker 1: used their marital bed for their first ever fivesome that night,
Speaker 1: bringing the day to an eventful end. Married life clearly
Speaker 1: didn't slow them down. Shortly after their wedding, David introduced
Speaker 1: Angie to a friend by merrily proclaiming, this is my wife.
Speaker 1: She gets boys from me and I get girls for her,
Speaker 1: and we're all very happy. You'll notice David's music hasn't
Speaker 1: received much attention thus far. Between the death of his father,
Speaker 1: the move to Hadden Hall, and the promotional responsibilities for
Speaker 1: the Space Oddity album, David didn't have much time to
Speaker 1: write during the tail end of nineteen sixty nine. One
Speaker 1: of the only songs he completed in this period was
Speaker 1: called The Prettiest Star. He'd written it for Angie while
Speaker 1: she was away in Cyprus and played it to her
Speaker 1: through the phone as part of his proposal. Recorded on
Speaker 1: January event, his twenty third birthday, it was the first
Speaker 1: song he released in the seventies, the decade. He'd grow
Speaker 1: to dominate you and I will rise up all the
Speaker 1: way he sang on the track. Though The Prettiest Star
Speaker 1: sold a dismal eight hundred copies, he'd make good on
Speaker 1: the lyrical promise. An explosion of glam rock shook the
Speaker 1: English music scene in the early seventies, and he was
Speaker 1: David Bowie who lit the fuse. The Big Bang occurred
Speaker 1: on February twenty, nineteen seventy, at London's Roundhouse Theater, where
Speaker 1: David was playing with this new band Hype. The other
Speaker 1: acts on the bill epitomized the earthy root seed back
Speaker 1: to the land hippie sensibility that permeated the rock escape
Speaker 1: as the sixties drew to a close. It was all
Speaker 1: about being real man Jeans and buckskin were the official
Speaker 1: musician uniform. Performers were indistinguishable from their audience. Nobody was
Speaker 1: a star. They were just on stage doing their thing.
Speaker 1: This egalitarian ideal was shattered when David and his fellow
Speaker 1: hype man appeared on stage dressed as literal superheroes. Bowie
Speaker 1: took center stage as rainbow Man, decked out and multicolored
Speaker 1: spandex thigh high boots and a flashy silver jacket. Tony
Speaker 1: Wisconsin handled bass duties dressed in a white leotard, silver
Speaker 1: crochet briefs and a green cape. A gold suited gangster
Speaker 1: and a cartoonish lee gaudy cowboy completed the unusual lineup
Speaker 1: homemade costumes. So with love, if not tremendous fell by
Speaker 1: Angie went a long way and separating David, the sci
Speaker 1: fi folky of space Oddity, from his latest guys as
Speaker 1: a rock and roll frontman. But more than just putting
Speaker 1: his past behind him, the sensationalist personas were a stand
Speaker 1: against the snoozy status quo. David had spent the sixties
Speaker 1: spotting trends and chasing them. Now he was determined to
Speaker 1: subvert them. Hype was an exercise and rebellion, pure and simple.
Speaker 1: You want a self serious poet, will get a load
Speaker 1: of us. We're superheroes, all in good fun, of course.
Speaker 1: Hype weren't the first band to bring a touch of theatricality,
Speaker 1: and the rock and roll groups like Johnny Kidd and
Speaker 1: the Pirates and Paul Revere and the Raiders had incorporated
Speaker 1: elaborate period costumes into their acts back in nearly sixties,
Speaker 1: self style horror rockers Screaming Lord such when even further,
Speaker 1: opening each show by emerging from an oversized coffin and
Speaker 1: toying with props, skulls and daggers. And then there was
Speaker 1: Arthur Brown, who kicked off performer of his ninety eight
Speaker 1: hit Fire by setting his head dress ablaze and draw
Speaker 1: Jenny also seemed to be embedded in rocks DNA, stretching
Speaker 1: back to the thick lashings of mascara worn by David's
Speaker 1: HERA Little Richard, The Beatles Long Hair garnered an untold
Speaker 1: number of column inches, and even the rebellious Rolling Stones
Speaker 1: don Drag on the sleeve for their nineteen sixty six
Speaker 1: single have You Seen Your Mother Baby Standing in the Shadows.
Speaker 1: Such camp was generally viewed as a gimmick meant to
Speaker 1: mask lack of talent, lack of sex appeal, or some
Speaker 1: combination of the two. To engage in such silliness while
Speaker 1: retaining artistic credibility. Now that was the new frontier. With Hype,
Speaker 1: David sought to present obvious artifice with a straight face,
Speaker 1: performed so skillfully that you can't help but be impressed.
Speaker 1: That attitude became the spirit of glam rock. Even the
Speaker 1: band's name was the war Hollian Nods, the thin veneer
Speaker 1: of glitz that separated mere human beings from stars. Hype
Speaker 1: was almost provocatively on the nose, an averted mission of
Speaker 1: phoniness that resolved David of so many show business sins.
Speaker 1: I deliberately chose the name, he would say, because now
Speaker 1: no one could say they were being conned. He could
Speaker 1: be plastic, he could be disposable, He could be anyone
Speaker 1: he wanted, although in the short term he didn't want
Speaker 1: to be rainbow Man. Hype disintegrated a short time after
Speaker 1: that day at the Roundhouse. The band endured vicious homophobic
Speaker 1: heckels from the crowd, but there was at least one
Speaker 1: person who enjoyed their set. It was Mark Bolan, David's
Speaker 1: friend and sometimes friend of me. Their rivalry stretched back
Speaker 1: to the R and B boom of the mid sixties,
Speaker 1: and Mark was definitely winning the fame race. Heat earned
Speaker 1: middling success with his band Tyrannosaurus Rex. Within months of
Speaker 1: David's Roundhouse show, Mark had given himself a glam makeover,
Speaker 1: launching himself to the top of the pop heap in
Speaker 1: the UK, rivaling even the Beatles for mass adoration and
Speaker 1: selling a hundred thousand copies of his single and one day.
Speaker 1: He became the public face of glam Rock, which pisted
Speaker 1: David off to no end, leading to one of the
Speaker 1: many TIFFs between the pair, Telling Lee. Mark would later
Speaker 1: deny that he ever attended David's Roundhouse gig. Whether he
Speaker 1: simply forgot or had a guilty conscience is up for debate.
Speaker 1: In addition to kick starting the glam Rock revolution, the
Speaker 1: Roundhouse Show is notable for another reason. It marked the
Speaker 1: first time David ever shared a stage with his new guitarist,
Speaker 1: Mick Ronson. Just weeks earlier, Ronson was working as a
Speaker 1: gardener in his hometown of Hull, England, not the best
Speaker 1: use of his formidable musical talents. Ronson was a classically
Speaker 1: trained pianist who also took up violin, cello and finally
Speaker 1: guitar as a boy. As a teen Ronson idolized Jeff
Speaker 1: Beck and moved to London in the mid sixties to
Speaker 1: try his hand as a blues player, but he was
Speaker 1: quickly reduced to living on tins of beans and returned
Speaker 1: to Hall a short time later with his tail between
Speaker 1: his legs. Ronson's route to Bowie is windy filled with
Speaker 1: several fortuitous connections. Bowie had begun playing with Ronson's former bandmate,
Speaker 1: drummer John Cambridge. When a heavy duty guitarist was required
Speaker 1: for Bowie's hype project. Cambridge was sent up to haul
Speaker 1: the recruit Ronson. They found them working for the Hull
Speaker 1: City Council painting lines for a rugby field. Commenced his
Speaker 1: musical career was over. Ronson was persuaded to call on
Speaker 1: David and Angie at Hadden Hall, where they jammed in
Speaker 1: the early morning hours. David invited him to play on
Speaker 1: an upcoming BBC radio session two days later, on February fifth,
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy. Ronson's high octane guitar lines added extra muscle
Speaker 1: to David's music, making the songs rougher, roarer and sexier.
Speaker 1: David was entranced, describing Ronson as Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton
Speaker 1: and Jimmie Hendrix all rolled in the one person in Rono,
Speaker 1: as he was forever known, David had found his secret
Speaker 1: weapon and his musical soul brother, the first true partner
Speaker 1: he'd ever had. Soon, Ronson moved into Haddon Hall, where he,
Speaker 1: Bowie and Tony Visconti worked in their makeshift studio, the
Speaker 1: old wine cellar under the stairwell. The homemade soundproofing made
Speaker 1: from egg christ did little to muffle the noise, making
Speaker 1: them less than popular with their neighbors. A new album began,
Speaker 1: the Coalesce. Inspired by the creative spirit of the Beatles
Speaker 1: at their most daring, they wanted to craft a studio
Speaker 1: production with sounds that could only exist on tape. It
Speaker 1: was to be David's personal sergeant Pepper, his pet sounds,
Speaker 1: his magnum opus, but the result, called The Man Who
Speaker 1: Sold the World, didn't quite turn out like that. David's
Speaker 1: mood had plummeted by the time he and his hatt
Speaker 1: In Hall cohorts convened in the studio in April of ninete.
Speaker 1: The small amount of buzz that space Oddity afforded him
Speaker 1: had died down, and as follow up, the Prettiest star
Speaker 1: had flopped. The band itself was an upheaval as Ronson
Speaker 1: engineered the arrival of a new drummer, Mick woodman Z,
Speaker 1: known to all Is Woody. They all camped at Haddon Hall,
Speaker 1: bringing their financial fears and other anxieties literally to David's door.
Speaker 1: Everyone was broke and this album was make or break.
Speaker 1: For the first time, the hyper ambitious David began to
Speaker 1: shrink from the challenge. In Visconti's words, this man would
Speaker 1: just knock it out of bed and write a song.
Speaker 1: The producers spent much of the sessions trying to retrieve
Speaker 1: David from the studio hallway, where he and Angie could
Speaker 1: be found holding hands and cooing at one another. With
Speaker 1: David indisposed, Visconti and Ronson played an oversized role in
Speaker 1: shaping the sound of the record. Ronson, the young buck guitarist,
Speaker 1: was eager to emulate his heroes Jeff Beck and Eric
Speaker 1: Clapton with his cranked up les Paul and towering stack
Speaker 1: of marshal lamps. As a result, many of the songs
Speaker 1: were significantly louder and harder than anything that bore Bowie's
Speaker 1: name to date. Forged from the same fire that would
Speaker 1: yield heavy metal beatles were Dead Long, Live led Zeppelin,
Speaker 1: and Black Sabbath. She Shook Me Cold. There's more than
Speaker 1: a passing similarity to Beck's cover of Muddy Waters. You
Speaker 1: Shook Me Black Country Rock is an overt homage to
Speaker 1: t Rex and the quavering vocal stylings of David's friend
Speaker 1: of me, Mark Boland. The Width of the Circles an
Speaker 1: eight minute tour to Force with Ronson's guitar pyrotechnics as
Speaker 1: the main event. Many of these instrumentals were assembled by
Speaker 1: Visconti and Ronson, who all but begged their nominal leader
Speaker 1: David to put pen to paper and write lyrics. Visconti
Speaker 1: was not a fan of David's new writing process, defined
Speaker 1: as I can't be bothered until I have to. David's
Speaker 1: procrastination was so extreme that he was still recording vocals
Speaker 1: on the last day of album mixing, writing lyrics in
Speaker 1: the studio lobby, while Visconti and Ronson waited impatiently at
Speaker 1: the mixing desk. When David finally did decide to write,
Speaker 1: the words were often dark, unsettled, and deeply disturbing. The
Speaker 1: record company had given him a shoe string budget, necessitating
Speaker 1: weekend sessions done on the graveyards shift This darkness permeated
Speaker 1: his output. David would remember the sessions for The Man
Speaker 1: Who Sold the World as quote a nightmare, and characterized
Speaker 1: the record as the most drug oriented album I've ever made.
Speaker 1: Few in this period recalled David is lost in any
Speaker 1: sort of drug haze, but it was clear that he
Speaker 1: was engulfed by some form of black cloud. In the
Speaker 1: last year, he'd lost his father and slipped away from
Speaker 1: his manager and mentor, Ken Pitt. The utopian hippie dream
Speaker 1: of the Arts Lab had crumbled to nothing, and his
Speaker 1: first taste of fame had turned sour. And what would
Speaker 1: become something of a theme David acted out as personal
Speaker 1: traumas through science fiction tales. Violence, alienation, confusion, and madness
Speaker 1: are recurring themes throughout the songs, obvious indicators of his
Speaker 1: haunted and paranoid state. The width of a Circle describes
Speaker 1: a sexual encounter in the depths of Hell, though it's
Speaker 1: unclear whether the figure is God out of the Devil
Speaker 1: after all, features a nod defamed Satanist Alistair Crowley. The
Speaker 1: Superman is an apocalyptic Nietzschean Tale and Running Gun Blues
Speaker 1: alluded to the Milai massacre and Vietnam told from the
Speaker 1: point of view of an unhinged veteran. The most potent
Speaker 1: track was All the Madmen, one of the first songs
Speaker 1: recorded for the sessions. It's rooted in David's own personal nightmare,
Speaker 1: the mental deterioration of his elder half brother, Terry. David
Speaker 1: had worshiped Terry as a young boy, looking to him
Speaker 1: as the sole source of emotional warmth in their otherwise
Speaker 1: frigid family home. Later, as a teen, it was Terry
Speaker 1: who turned David onto free jazz and beat poetry, which
Speaker 1: became crucial pillars of his creative identity. Terry encouraged his individuality,
Speaker 1: fostering David's unrivaled single mindedness. Most importantly, they cared for
Speaker 1: one another. It was the only uncomplicatedly loving relation and
Speaker 1: ship in young David's life. But then Terry's moods became
Speaker 1: more erratic, leading to terrifying hallucinations, lengthy disappearances, and horrific breakdowns.
Speaker 1: Schizophrenia had ripped Terry's reality to shreds, just as it
Speaker 1: had done to so many in David's family. By the
Speaker 1: late sixties, Terry was living at Cane Hill Hospital, the
Speaker 1: notorious Gothic asylum south of London, where patients were once
Speaker 1: confined to padded rooms, doused with ice water, and brutalized
Speaker 1: with an arcane form of electro shock therapy. Terry endured
Speaker 1: slightly less abuse during his stay, but life behind the
Speaker 1: imposing gates was undoubtedly disconcerning and tinged with fear. Because
Speaker 1: Terry was a voluntary patient, he could come and go
Speaker 1: as he pleased. Often he'd visited David Crashing at Haddon
Speaker 1: Hall for sometimes weeks on end. Terry had responded well
Speaker 1: to his treatment, and, like many patients on the men,
Speaker 1: decided he didn't need to take his medication anymore. This
Speaker 1: wrought havoc on his neural chemistry. David usually tried to
Speaker 1: keep things light, steering the conversation to topical things like soccer,
Speaker 1: but while they shared the same roof, they rarely shared
Speaker 1: the same reality. Whenever Terry would leave Haddon Hall, David
Speaker 1: was flooded with relief, followed by an immense wave of guilt.
Speaker 1: Why couldn't he help his brother? Why this happened to Terry?
Speaker 1: It could have just as easily happened to him? Could
Speaker 1: it still? David lived in constant fear of the madness
Speaker 1: that he felt coursing through his veins. He could feel
Speaker 1: it bubbling up whenever he got drunk or high. His
Speaker 1: mental stability was fragile. His art was his salvation. Among
Speaker 1: his first songs to confront this phobia head on was
Speaker 1: All the mad Men, an empathetic look at Terry and
Speaker 1: the trials he endured. It contained lyrical references to lobotomies, librium,
Speaker 1: and electroshock therapy. Most poignantly, the reef Frank quotes Jack
Speaker 1: Caro Wax on the Road. Terry had given the book
Speaker 1: to David as a young boy. Now he repurposed Caro
Speaker 1: wax words and tribute to his stricken brother. The only
Speaker 1: people for me are the mad ones, David sings, the
Speaker 1: ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn,
Speaker 1: like fabulous yellow Roman candles. Terry had encouraged David to
Speaker 1: embrace his inner madness, that wildfire that burned within. Now
Speaker 1: Terry was paying the price. David couldn't help, But wonder
Speaker 1: was he next? He wrestled with this question on the
Speaker 1: album's title track, The Man Who Sold the World as
Speaker 1: vexed fans for decades. With its dense lyrics that obliquely
Speaker 1: hint at David's worsening identity crisis. It speaks to the
Speaker 1: devils and angels inside of him. In the song, the
Speaker 1: narrator has an encounter with a ghostly doppelganger on a stairwell.
Speaker 1: Is it a past self, a future self, a potent
Speaker 1: entual self that he'd never become? It's unclear. I thought
Speaker 1: you died alone a long, long time ago, he says
Speaker 1: to the figure in the song. Oh no, the double replies,
Speaker 1: not me. I never lost control. Control was a word
Speaker 1: that comes up again and again in the life of
Speaker 1: David Bowie. Control was a necessary part of his survival
Speaker 1: the fragile border between reality and madness. David struggled to
Speaker 1: define himself as a parent in his search for a
Speaker 1: cover for the Man Who Sold the World. Initially, he
Speaker 1: commissioned a painting by his old Beckenham Arts lab friend
Speaker 1: Mike Weller. The foreboding music inspired Weller to paint and
Speaker 1: illustration of a rifle wielding cowboy standing at the entrance
Speaker 1: of of all places, Cane Hill Hospital. The choice was
Speaker 1: pure chance. Weller had no idea of David's connection to
Speaker 1: the place. The coincidence was not lost on David, who
Speaker 1: loved the cartoonish pop our style cover design at first
Speaker 1: at least, but soon he changed his mind in favor
Speaker 1: of an image that would showcase himself in a more
Speaker 1: domestic environment. A photo shoot duly took place in the
Speaker 1: living room at Hadden Hall. The final shot is striking,
Speaker 1: resembling a pre Raphaelite painting more than a rock album cover. David,
Speaker 1: surrounded by rich red drapes and his growing assortment of antiques,
Speaker 1: is seen reclining in an elegant chase lounge, fingering his long,
Speaker 1: elegantly styled blonde curls with one hand while casually spilling
Speaker 1: a deck of playing cards with the other. He provocatively
Speaker 1: stares down the lens in a cream and blue satin dress.
Speaker 1: It is, as he would explain numerous times, a man's
Speaker 1: dress purchased from cutting edge designer Michael Fish's Savoreau boutique.
Speaker 1: But as David would soon learn on his American arrival,
Speaker 1: a man's dress is still dress too many His androgynous
Speaker 1: attire flirted uncomfortably close to drag and not the can't
Speaker 1: be silly except double kind of drag, which had long
Speaker 1: been a staple of British comedy. Transvestites were fine if
Speaker 1: they're there to be laughed at, after all, but Bowie
Speaker 1: demanded respect. He was used to challenging gender norms back
Speaker 1: in the mid sixties. His shockingly long mop top hair
Speaker 1: got him threatened and spat at. This cover image took
Speaker 1: it even further, daring or even welcoming outrage. Leave it
Speaker 1: to David Bowie to court controversy just by lounging in
Speaker 1: his living room. As with the rest of his albums
Speaker 1: to date, the Man Who Sold the World failed to sell.
Speaker 1: Relations between David and Tony Visconti grew strained during the
Speaker 1: difficult sessions, and it will be years before the pair
Speaker 1: would work together again. But the troubled recording saw David
Speaker 1: split more permanently from another intimate, his manager, Ken Pitt.
Speaker 1: Their four year relationship had been monumental but hard to define.
Speaker 1: Ken guided David's career with class and skill. At times
Speaker 1: he also did David's laundry. The old man had been
Speaker 1: like a surrogate father to David, welcoming him into his
Speaker 1: elegant London flat after David moved out of his family
Speaker 1: home for the first time. Like any good show business figure,
Speaker 1: he introduced David to entertainment luminaries and industry titans. He
Speaker 1: also introduced David the classic literature, fine art in the theater.
Speaker 1: There was indeed a lot of love between the men,
Speaker 1: though Ken's intentions seemed more amorous than David's. It's not
Speaker 1: quite fair to add lover to the lengthy list of
Speaker 1: words that applied to their relationship, but there was an
Speaker 1: intensity that transcended the usual manager client bond Angie clocked
Speaker 1: this from the start. To her, Ken was enemy number one.
Speaker 1: He was the only other person David listened to. She
Speaker 1: didn't need the competition and was eager to get him
Speaker 1: out of the picture. Andrew regarded Ken as a show
Speaker 1: business dinosaur, a holdover from the old school style of management.
Speaker 1: Ken would take the heat for David's stalled career, as
Speaker 1: many over the years accused him of trying to steer
Speaker 1: as unly talented client down the stagy supper club and
Speaker 1: cabaret route. This is both unfair and untrue. Ken may
Speaker 1: have been lost amid the hippie dippy world of mimes
Speaker 1: and arts labs, but he believed in David's more avant
Speaker 1: garde work, even financing sessions for Space Oddity out of
Speaker 1: his own pocket when David was without a label. In
Speaker 1: the end, Ken's extensive experience was his undoing. He was
Speaker 1: used to doing business the way it had always been done.
Speaker 1: David had no interest in doing anything the way it
Speaker 1: had always been done. As time went on, David grew
Speaker 1: emboldened by the achievements that Ken had a major role
Speaker 1: in engineering. He became stubborn and contrarian, disregarding Ken's well
Speaker 1: considered advice. He complained to friends that he was drowning
Speaker 1: with Ken, who he no longer related to. Creatively, during
Speaker 1: sessions for The Man Who Sold the World, David decided
Speaker 1: that he'd had enough. He tearfully sought advice from the
Speaker 1: head of his record label, telling him that he wanted
Speaker 1: out of his management deal. The label chief didn't want
Speaker 1: to get involved breaking such contracts was seen as ungentlemanly
Speaker 1: and also a conflict of interest, but he recommended a
Speaker 1: legal firm who could do the dirty work for him.
Speaker 1: So in April, David sent Can a letter informing him
Speaker 1: that their professional relationship was over. The following week, David
Speaker 1: arrived at the apartment they used to share for what
Speaker 1: amounted to a farewell meeting. David's counsel, bullish litigation clerk
Speaker 1: named Tony Defreese, did most of the talking. David himself
Speaker 1: sat quietly on the chase lounge, looking frail and deeply sad.
Speaker 1: Pitt was equally devastated, not to mention shocked, but ever
Speaker 1: the gentleman who refused to stand in David's way and
Speaker 1: agreed to step aside. When the meeting was over and
Speaker 1: the dust settled, they shook hands. David offered a simple
Speaker 1: with sad, thank you, Ken. Then he disappeared down the
Speaker 1: street with the frieze. Ken. Pitt or in fifteen thousand
Speaker 1: pounds from the split, but his role in his client's
Speaker 1: development is incalculable. David maintained a warmth for Ken as
Speaker 1: the years went by, sending him rare books for his
Speaker 1: formidable collection. In three, during the height of the Ziggy
Speaker 1: Stardust craze, he invited Ken the one of his gigs
Speaker 1: with a note that read, come and see what your
Speaker 1: boys doing. Now. Without a manager, David looked to Tony
Speaker 1: DeFries for career guidance. He'd been won over by the
Speaker 1: freeze magical ability to extract him from contracts, which is
Speaker 1: the wave of his pen. David initially wanted him only
Speaker 1: to handle his finances, but the Frieze had his sight
Speaker 1: set on something bigger. He believed David Bowie could be
Speaker 1: the biggest rock act in the world, and he was
Speaker 1: just the guy to help him do it. David obviously
Speaker 1: appreciated the sentiment de Freeze drive matched those own sizeable ambition,
Speaker 1: and together the pair hashed the plan for world domination.
Speaker 1: In many ways, they were similar, captivating, charismatic, and gregarious
Speaker 1: in public. Behind closed doors, they were calm, focused and
Speaker 1: very shrewd. So. Barely three years older than David, Tony
Speaker 1: spoke with a measured tone that led you to believe
Speaker 1: that all was well and your life was about to
Speaker 1: get better. For David, this was indeed true. All of
Speaker 1: the Freeze gambles would pay off handsomely in the short term,
Speaker 1: at least. Tony's fast and loose management style and ethically
Speaker 1: questionable financial dealings with so the seeds for much of
Speaker 1: the insanity that would plague Bowie's professional life in the
Speaker 1: years to come. Angi Bowie would describe Tony Defreese as
Speaker 1: a thief and a gangster. But if he was something done,
Speaker 1: who do you hire in David hired Tony Defrees to
Speaker 1: make him a star, and he would. But first David
Speaker 1: had to go to America. David bow he had dreamed
Speaker 1: of going to America since he was a little boy,
Speaker 1: but the fantasy never included a full body search. That
Speaker 1: was the welcome he received after touching down at Dulles
Speaker 1: International Airport in Washington, d c. America in ninety one
Speaker 1: could be an uptight place, and immigration officials weren't accustomed
Speaker 1: to men arriving on their shore dressed in women's clothing. Eventually,
Speaker 1: David was released to the care of Ron Oberman, a
Speaker 1: publicist that has labeled Mercury Records. The purpose of the
Speaker 1: trip was to try to up the abysmal sales figures
Speaker 1: for The Man Who Sold the World, which had moved
Speaker 1: only a thousand copies in the months since its release.
Speaker 1: The label hoped that an in person visit would convey
Speaker 1: the singular magnetism of their unusual artist and America would
Speaker 1: fall under the spell of Bowiemania. Things didn't quite work
Speaker 1: out like that. A paperwork snaffoo with the American Musicians Union,
Speaker 1: many was barred from performing. David's visit was restricted to
Speaker 1: interviews in general glad handing with local DJs across the country.
Speaker 1: The first interview David gave was to Ron Oberman's brother Michael,
Speaker 1: in the living room with their parents all American ranch
Speaker 1: house in Silver Springs, Maryland. A photograph preserved the surreal moment.
Speaker 1: It looks like a bizarre TV special. Bowie meets the Bradys.
Speaker 1: Wearing pink crushed velvet pants and a mob turtleneck. He
Speaker 1: sits on an avocado green couch in front of him
Speaker 1: as a TV tray, perfect for eating a frozen dinner
Speaker 1: while catching an episode of The Beverly Hillbillies. David had
Speaker 1: wanted to see the real America. Just hours after arriving
Speaker 1: on us soil, he'd found it. When the interview was complete,
Speaker 1: the Oberman's middle aged parents treated everyone to dinner at
Speaker 1: a local steakhouse. The other diners were so freaked out
Speaker 1: by David's long hair and loud attire that a waitress
Speaker 1: stuck them in the back room and closed the curtain
Speaker 1: on their booth. After the meal, the Oberman brothers took
Speaker 1: David the Michael's Pad, where some friends from a local
Speaker 1: rock group had come to hang out. David's first night
Speaker 1: in the US marked another first first time he ever
Speaker 1: saw a bomb American man. Far out from d C,
Speaker 1: David headed north to New York, where Mercury booked him
Speaker 1: into the Holiday Inn at Times Square, the urban epicenter
Speaker 1: of sleeves and smut, where the porn theater marquees glowed
Speaker 1: just as bright as the grotesquely oversized billboards. Times Square
Speaker 1: in the seventies was a shimmering sea of peep shows,
Speaker 1: sex shops, and nudy mag stalls, and their contents spilled
Speaker 1: out into the dirty street. The cold January air was
Speaker 1: thick with car exhaust, subway steam and trash. David warded
Speaker 1: off the winter chill with the French beret, cuffed boots
Speaker 1: and a huge fur coat, drawing stairs from the hawkers
Speaker 1: and the hookers. David stared right back. He couldn't get enough.
Speaker 1: I couldn't believe the country could be so free, so intoxicating,
Speaker 1: and so dangerous, he remembered. It was filthy, but it
Speaker 1: was fun, like a velvet underground song come to life.
Speaker 1: It inspired Dvid to take a trip downtown and see
Speaker 1: the Velvets in the Flesh at the Electric Circus on St. Mark's.
Speaker 1: For years, they've been David's favorite American band, and the
Speaker 1: experience of watching them perform new songs like Sweet Jane
Speaker 1: at close range left him mesmerized. After the show was over,
Speaker 1: an uncharacteristically star struck David talked his way backstage and
Speaker 1: cornered the man he thought was lou Reid. He spoke
Speaker 1: breathlessly about what Reid's work had meant to him, and
Speaker 1: let it slip that he used to cover waiting for
Speaker 1: the man himself. It was only later that Bowie realized
Speaker 1: that lou Reid had left The Velvet Underground several months earlier,
Speaker 1: and the man he gushed too had been a new member,
Speaker 1: Doug Yule. Rather than being heartbroken, David found the humor
Speaker 1: in the situation. An idea started to coalesce in his mind.
Speaker 1: Maybe he could also impersonate someone on stage, not an actual, living, breathing,
Speaker 1: famous person, but someone else entirely, a character of his
Speaker 1: own creation. He mold the idea over as he strolled
Speaker 1: and hattan, shamelessly playing the tourist he visited the enormous
Speaker 1: met Museum, and the many record shops stocked with rare
Speaker 1: jazz LPs. He even spent time with Moondog, the blind
Speaker 1: eccentric street artists who stalked fifty two Street in full
Speaker 1: Viking regalia. Moondog was a familiar sight around Midtown, but
Speaker 1: David and his androgynous clothes were definitely not. People were
Speaker 1: fascinated by this strange, elegantly dressed young man. Strangers approached
Speaker 1: him with classic New Yorker aggression, striking up conversations and
Speaker 1: even touching him as if he was some sort of
Speaker 1: a zoo animal. One elderly lady stopped him on the
Speaker 1: street and asked David what animal had been used to
Speaker 1: make his oversized fur coat. David replied, teddy bear. The
Speaker 1: locals were less amused as his press tour took him
Speaker 1: through Texas, where a man apparently pulled out a gun
Speaker 1: and unleashed a torrent of homophobic slurs. David tone things
Speaker 1: down a bit as he made his way through Chicago
Speaker 1: and the Midwest, but the man dresses were back in
Speaker 1: full force as he touched down in Los Angeles. His
Speaker 1: welcome committee took the form of Rodney Bingenheimer, the legendary
Speaker 1: l a scenemaker and so called mayor of the Sunset Strip.
Speaker 1: A dedicated anglophile, he played host to Elton, John kat
Speaker 1: Stevens Rod Stewart, another British artist beginning to break through
Speaker 1: in the States, but none prepared him for the sight
Speaker 1: of David Bowie, who looked more like a silver screen
Speaker 1: starlet than a rising rock star in his long dress,
Speaker 1: floppy hat, and bright blonde hair. As they strolled past
Speaker 1: Hollywood high on Sunset, the teens at recess went wild
Speaker 1: when they caught a glimpse of David. They had no
Speaker 1: idea who he was, but obviously he was someone. Rodney
Speaker 1: Bigenheimer took note. This was definitely different than taking Rod
Speaker 1: Stewart around. Rodney became David's social secretary, taking him to
Speaker 1: all the right places and introducing him to all the
Speaker 1: right people. Fellow ex pad Elton John, Marlon Brando, even
Speaker 1: rough and ready fifties rock or gene Vincent Dave It
Speaker 1: was thrilled to meet the man behind beef Appolula, and
Speaker 1: together they jammed on a pair of David's new songs,
Speaker 1: Hang Onto Yourself and moon Age day Dream. During the
Speaker 1: day Rodney shuttled David around to local radio stations, where
Speaker 1: he freaked out at least one DJ by touching up
Speaker 1: his makeup during a commercial break. One night, Rodney threw
Speaker 1: a party in David's honor, bringing the hip scene to him.
Speaker 1: David held court in the middle of the room, sitting
Speaker 1: cross legged on the floor in his exotic man dress,
Speaker 1: quietly playing half completed songs and his acoustic guitar. Guests
Speaker 1: found them enchanting and funny, but also shy, wide eyed,
Speaker 1: and extremely polite, even asking permission to go to the bathroom.
Speaker 1: Between songs, David scribbled lyrics and ideas on a stack
Speaker 1: of notebooks and holiday in napkins. A new concept was
Speaker 1: slowly beginning to take shape in his imagination. America had
Speaker 1: awoken David to the possibilities of reinventing yourself. It was
Speaker 1: classic Hollywood. You could be whoever you like. He began
Speaker 1: talking more and more about an alter ego from Mars.
Speaker 1: The party guests weren't totally sure what David was on about,
Speaker 1: but it sounded far out. David outlined the concept to
Speaker 1: journalist John Mendelssohn, who profiled David in l A for
Speaker 1: his first Rolling Stone feature. My performances have got to
Speaker 1: be theatrical experiences for me as well as the audience.
Speaker 1: He said. I don't want to climb out of my
Speaker 1: fantasies in order to go up on stage. I want
Speaker 1: to take them on stage with me. What the music
Speaker 1: says maybe serious, but as a medium it should not
Speaker 1: be questioned, analyzed or taken too seriously. I think it
Speaker 1: should be tarted up, made into a prostitute, a parody
Speaker 1: of itself. It should be the clown, the piro medium.
Speaker 1: The music is the mask, the message wears music is
Speaker 1: the pirou, and I the performer and the message. David
Speaker 1: had combined the mime teachings of Lindsay Kemp with the
Speaker 1: meta artistic awareness of Andy Warhol and Marshall McLuhan's theories
Speaker 1: of communication. The result was a Frankenstein's Monster, or rather
Speaker 1: Martian of his own design. Ziggy start Us was conceived,
Speaker 1: but his birth was still a little ways off. Not
Speaker 1: long after David returned home to Haddon Hall, he experienced
Speaker 1: a different kind of birth. On May thirtieth, nineteen seventy one,
Speaker 1: he and Angie became parents. They named their son Duncan
Speaker 1: Zoey Heywood Jones Heywood after David's late father, and Zoe
Speaker 1: after the Greek word for the life. The delivery was
Speaker 1: rough on Angie, who suffered a cracked pelvis, blood loss
Speaker 1: and exhaustion. Weeks after Zoe's birth, She took a trip
Speaker 1: to her parents villa in Italy to recuperate. David said
Speaker 1: he didn't mind Angie's vacation and wished her well, but later,
Speaker 1: after the relationship had disintegrated, she couldn't help but wonder
Speaker 1: if that was the moment it had all gone wrong
Speaker 1: that David viewed her getaway as an abandonment of their
Speaker 1: new family. She was, by her own admission, not the
Speaker 1: maternal type, but the Bowie set about child proofing Hadden
Speaker 1: Hall as much as they could. Little Zoe slept in
Speaker 1: a crib with blue stars painted above it. When work intervened,
Speaker 1: friends and neighbors took turns nannying the baby, and David's
Speaker 1: play was fool As he geared up to record a
Speaker 1: new album, he moved the piano into the room. Tony
Speaker 1: Visconti had recently vacated a bright space that overlooked the
Speaker 1: back garden of Hadden Hall. It was David's first time
Speaker 1: that he seriously composed on the instrument, previously preferring the guitar.
Speaker 1: The battered out of tune upright sounded more like an
Speaker 1: old honky tonk pub piano than a Steinway, but it
Speaker 1: opened up a whole new world of harmonic potential. He
Speaker 1: would sit there for hours in the spring of while
Speaker 1: his fingers searched for the right melodies. I forced myself
Speaker 1: to become a good songwriter, he said at the time.
Speaker 1: And I became a good songwriter, but I had no
Speaker 1: natural talents whatsoever. I made a job of working at
Speaker 1: getting good. He worked feverishly, producing demos at an impressive clip,
Speaker 1: and the music was unlike anything he'd ever written in
Speaker 1: the past. Many of his songs could be derivative, if
Speaker 1: not contrived, engineered with an eye towards trends and the charts.
Speaker 1: Now his music came from pure inspiration, deep in his subconscious.
Speaker 1: One day, he was awoken in the pre dawn hours
Speaker 1: by a tune. He was calling out to him, Wake up,
Speaker 1: you sleepyhead, put on some clothes, get out of bed.
Speaker 1: He ran to the piano to play it out of
Speaker 1: him so he could go back to sleep. It started
Speaker 1: off as a rather off colored did he called I'd
Speaker 1: Like a Big Girl with a couple of melons, before
Speaker 1: morphing into something a bit more serious. The lyrics fused
Speaker 1: an impressive blend of sci fi influences wells or Well Crowley,
Speaker 1: iron Rand, but the refrain oh you pretty things, that
Speaker 1: was pure Bowie. The tune for Life on Mars came
Speaker 1: to David while he was on a bus heading into
Speaker 1: town to buy some shoes. Feeling inspiration coming on, he
Speaker 1: got off with the next stop and ran home. It
Speaker 1: was piano. He finished the song that afternoon with chords
Speaker 1: borrowed from an unlikely place. Back in the sixties, Ken
Speaker 1: Pitt persuaded David to write English lyrics to a French
Speaker 1: song called Come Debbutude. David complied, but his efforts were
Speaker 1: unceremoniously rejected. Singer Paul Anka had better luck, rewriting the
Speaker 1: tune as My Way, which became a smash for Frank
Speaker 1: Sinatra and an instant pop standard. Still smarting from the rejection,
Speaker 1: David initially wrote Life on Mars as a takeoff of
Speaker 1: the Mawkish ballad Not unlike Space Oddity and It's playful
Speaker 1: nod to the Kubrick film. Yet Life on Mars packs
Speaker 1: more emotion than a mere parody. It's a plea for escape,
Speaker 1: freedom and transcendence. David would admit that his songs were
Speaker 1: like talking to a psychoanalyst. My act, he said, is
Speaker 1: my couch. The music helped him process the tumult of
Speaker 1: the last few years. Everything seemed influx and impermanent. Life
Speaker 1: was scary and chaotic. Despite the uncertainty, David seemed happier
Speaker 1: and more optimistic than ever. The birth of his son
Speaker 1: and his trip to America reignited his sense of the possible.
Speaker 1: He felt good, he was okay. The feeling was reflected
Speaker 1: in the title he chose for this new collection of songs,
Speaker 1: Hunky Dory. He was almost ready to record, but first
Speaker 1: he needed a band. David had been inactive on stage
Speaker 1: and in the studio since completing The Man Who Sold
Speaker 1: the World nearly a year earlier. Without their front man,
Speaker 1: Hype began to wither, and both Mick Ronson and Woody
Speaker 1: Woodman's left London for cheaper lodgings in their hometown of
Speaker 1: Hall In May one. David tracked them down and persuaded
Speaker 1: them to return to the fold. For a bassist, they
Speaker 1: enlisted Trevor Bolder to replace Tony Visconti. To produce, David
Speaker 1: asked Ken Scott, the engineer on his last two albums.
Speaker 1: Scott hadn't been impressed with David's work so far, but
Speaker 1: when he listened to his new demo, he was floored.
Speaker 1: Scott had spent the last few years working with the Beatles.
Speaker 1: Now he was getting that feeling again. This guy, he thought,
Speaker 1: he's gonna be massive. Recording began in June one at
Speaker 1: Trident Studios in central London. David's demos had included guitar
Speaker 1: driven songs like moon Age, day Dream, Lady, Stardust and Star,
Speaker 1: but they decided to hold them back in favor of
Speaker 1: the piano oriented sounds born in the Haddon Hall Music Room.
Speaker 1: They hired Rick Wakeman, a veteran of the Space Oddity
Speaker 1: Session and future member of the band Yes Dad Is Broke.
Speaker 1: Keyboard Flourishes played on the same Beckstein piano Paul McCartney
Speaker 1: had used to record Hey Jude. Mick Ronson resumed his
Speaker 1: role as unofficial musical director, crafting the orchestrations for Life
Speaker 1: on Mars, Fill Your Heart and quicksand around Wakeman's or
Speaker 1: Nate piano parts. David could sometimes be a hard task master,
Speaker 1: once shouting just play the songwright during a fumbled take
Speaker 1: of song for Bob Dylan, but by and large he
Speaker 1: was a benevolent dictator with a knack for motivating his
Speaker 1: talented bandmate. Go On, do it, Boy would say, after
Speaker 1: hearing what of Ronson's more out their ideas. If it
Speaker 1: doesn't work out, it doesn't work out, but have a go.
Speaker 1: More often than not it worked out. The album was
Speaker 1: a breakthrough. David Bowie made the music he heard in
Speaker 1: his head, an exotic gumbo of as many influences modern
Speaker 1: jazz and British music, hall avant garde and radio friendly pop,
Speaker 1: folk rock and the velvet underground. He quite literally found
Speaker 1: his voice, not Anthony Newley's, not Lou Reid's, not Bob Dylan's,
Speaker 1: but his own, a cockney tinged baritone that, when provoked,
Speaker 1: could rise to a crazed, wailing falsetto. For the first time,
Speaker 1: he'd achieved transcendence on record. For the first time, he
Speaker 1: wasn't trying to please anyone except himself. An early version
Speaker 1: of the Hunky Dory cover featured David in full Egyptian
Speaker 1: pharaoh regalia, a play on the media buzz around the
Speaker 1: new King Tut exhibit that had taken London by storm.
Speaker 1: But rather than go for easy hype, David looked inward.
Speaker 1: The final image, taken by photographer Brian Ward, is how
Speaker 1: he saw himself. It's a tribute to Hollywood glamour. The
Speaker 1: ever Androgynus Bowie plays both Bogart and Bacall on a
Speaker 1: fluffy blouse, pulling his long locks off his gorgeous face
Speaker 1: and staring wistfully into the distance, like Norma Desmond awaiting
Speaker 1: her close up. David's time on the spotlight would come
Speaker 1: soon enough, but first there was some business to attend to.
Speaker 1: David wanted out of his record contract with Mercury. Tony
Speaker 1: de Friese believed he could get more money elsewhere. A
Speaker 1: label executive flew all the way from Chicago to London
Speaker 1: the proudly offered David a slightly better deal. De Frieze
Speaker 1: would hear none of it. David will never record for
Speaker 1: you again, he dramatically informed the jet Lag exact, and
Speaker 1: if you insist on it, we will deliver the biggest
Speaker 1: piece of crap you've ever heard. Though Mercury could have
Speaker 1: easily unleashed a legal tornado on David and his haughty manager,
Speaker 1: they chose not to press the point. David walked De
Speaker 1: Freeze went right to our Cia, which had once been
Speaker 1: the biggest record company in the world. Hell it was
Speaker 1: Elvis's label. De Frieze wasn't star struck in the least.
Speaker 1: You've had nothing since the fifties and you missed out
Speaker 1: on the sixties, he told our c a brass but
Speaker 1: you can own the seventies because David Bowie is going
Speaker 1: to remake the decade, just like the Beatles did in
Speaker 1: the sixties. The bully approach worked, but it would take
Speaker 1: some time to iron out the finer points, delaying the
Speaker 1: release of Hunky Dorry until the end of the year.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, David played a handful of gigs, his
Speaker 1: first real shows in nearly a year. The first, a
Speaker 1: BBC Radio session in June, allowed him to test out
Speaker 1: his new band, who would soon be dubbed The Spiders
Speaker 1: from Mars. David played without them a few weeks later
Speaker 1: on June for the first official Glastonbury Festival. This wasn't
Speaker 1: a festival in the modern sense, but a hippie approximation
Speaker 1: of a medieval fair with music, dance, poetry, theater, lights,
Speaker 1: and other more spontaneous entertain Tickets were free, and so
Speaker 1: were the revelers. Some ten thousand and number many splayed
Speaker 1: out in the nude across the farm pasture to catch
Speaker 1: acts like traffic and Fairport Convention perform atop a giant
Speaker 1: sheet metal pyramid, a one tenth replica of the Great
Speaker 1: Pyramids of Giza. David Angie and a small entourage had
Speaker 1: traveled south from London by train, intending to walk the
Speaker 1: last few miles to the venue, but their journey was
Speaker 1: impeded by David's less than practical choice of outfit ultra
Speaker 1: baggy Oxford pants, square heeled boots, a blue magician's cloak,
Speaker 1: and a floppy brimmed Three Musketeers style hat that kind
Speaker 1: of set the tone for the whole experience. He'd been
Speaker 1: due to perform in the evening, but the show was
Speaker 1: running over time. Instead, he climbed the top the wobbly
Speaker 1: pyramid stage at the very un rock and roll hour
Speaker 1: of five am. He started playing for the muddy crowds
Speaker 1: slumbering in their tents alternating between acoustic guitar and electric
Speaker 1: key board, David played ten songs, many from his work
Speaker 1: in progress, Hunky Dory. He was accompanied by Mick Ronson
Speaker 1: and briefly a random Scandinavian woman who, in the spirit
Speaker 1: of the time, had gotten too high and watered onto
Speaker 1: the stage to sing with him. The sun began the
Speaker 1: rise over the hill, warming the cold and groggy festival
Speaker 1: goers and bathing David and glorious Dawn rays God does
Speaker 1: a hell of a light show. As David sang songs
Speaker 1: like the Superman, Quicksand and Kooks, the audience assembled in
Speaker 1: larger numbers, swaying in time to the music like a great,
Speaker 1: long haired ocean. David felt the seed change. Even at
Speaker 1: this unholy hour, people were listening, and they liked it.
Speaker 1: He addressed the captivated crowd with touching sincerity. I'll try
Speaker 1: and be serious for a second, he said. I just
Speaker 1: want to say that you've given me more pleasure than
Speaker 1: I've had in a good few months of working. It's
Speaker 1: really nice to have somebody appreciate me for a change.
Speaker 1: David debuted a new song that day, Change Ages, who
Speaker 1: had written just a short time before. It was a
Speaker 1: song that seemed to define David in the summer of nine.
Speaker 1: It was a time of constant transition. He had experienced
Speaker 1: his first taste of fame, followed by his rapid return
Speaker 1: to obscurity, the death of his father and the mental
Speaker 1: decline of his half brother, changes in his band and
Speaker 1: his management. He'd become a husband and a father, but
Speaker 1: there were more changes to come. David Bowie was about
Speaker 1: to become Ziggy Stardust Off. The Record is a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio. The executive producers are Noel Brown
Speaker 1: and shan Ty Tone. The supervising producers are Taylor Shikoin
Speaker 1: and Tristan McNeil. The show was written and hosted by
Speaker 1: me Jordan run Tug and edited, scored and sound designed
Speaker 1: by Tristan McNeil. If you liked what you heard, please
Speaker 1: subscribe and leave us a review. For more podcasts from
Speaker 1: my Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple podcast,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.