On Sunday the 10th I went to bed early, after listening to the radio. Possibly I missed the news that Bowie had passed by just seconds. That's why last week's Music Monday went up as it did, because I didn't get the news until my phone started buzzing with texts from East Coast friends, asking if I'd heard the news. I'm writing this on January 11th but you won't read it until the 18th, and by then, everybody and their mother will have heard the Bowie recaps to death. So I'm not going to do his history or life anything. Instead, I'm going to to be thinking about me and my Bowie experience. I encourage you to do the same inside, if you care to.
Of course I knew Let's Dance (it was a Number One song for God's sake) and Labyrinth but the first time I really heard David Bowie was on a car trip with my family. I had on my Walkman and was tuning out the world, and a commercial for the Rykodisc reissues came on, talking about how important Ziggy Stardust was to the world. Then the DJ agreed, and played this song. And that was that, I went out and bought the album as soon as I was home. And I was hooked. I was just sad I couldn't afford everything. He had a ton, and I was just a broke kid!
About a year or so later, I checked out the bargain table at my local record store, and found ALL the Ryko albums on cassette, for just a dollar each. I bought half of them. Then I went back a week later and bought the rest. I listened to them in order, one at a time, and then listened again. And then I read the liner notes, possibly the first time I had ever done such a thing. And then, all of a sudden, I knew all these brand new names and brand new artists and brand new references. And they were all impossibly great. There's no WAY a kid from North Carolina would have learned about Chris Burden or complex '70s art without David Bowie's help. And it took me years to track down all his musical references, there are still some times I'll hear a little jazz bit or some '70's German electronica and say "Hey! That's what Bowie must have heard!
David Bowie - Strangers When We Meet
It felt like the height of cool to have turned around one day to see this album on the shelf. This was the first "new" Bowie album I ever bought (all the rest were things I discovered after they'd been out for a while) and I still treasure it. Bowie even redid the song for Outside though that version has never sounded right to me. It's about two people falling in love over the Internet. In 1993. Yeah.
(ADDENDUM: For the longest time I would tell people this was my favorite Bowie record and only in researching that paragraph above did I find out he thought the same. Today of all days I find that touching, like a little message just for me.)
David Bowie & Trent Reznor - Reptile
You'll likely have figured out by now that the 1990s were my big Bowie period. I was the right age and Bowie was having his Sinatra moment, birthing a cool old guy from the radical young artist. I was front and center (literally, I won tickets from a radio station) for this tour and I'm so thankful to have memories of seeing Bowie live. Also having to push a car up a hill because my friend forgot to get gas before coming to pick me up. But we made it to the show in time, so all was forgiven. Oh, and hey, a half-decade before it belonged to Johnny Cash, Hurt was a Bowie song.
David Bowie - The Next Day (nsfw video)
But even though I discovered him when I did, I didn't let go. Omikron? I still have a copy. Tin Machine? I tried (and failed) to make people at college care. I even have a soft spot for the lovely almost-ready Never Let Me Down. I never met Bowie the man (although weirdly enough, I have slept on the couch of one of his former assistants!) but I'm going to miss the persona and the artist so very very very much. But as someone who works for a deal website knows, eventually everything must go. And at a reduced price, too.
Let us just remind you: some images come from the corresponding Wikipedia page and are here under fair use. Rest in peace, Mr. Jones. See the rest of you next week.