Bowiesongs

"Pushing Ahead of the Dame" (http://bowiesongs.wordpress.com) "Rebel Rebel," a big Bowie book, is available now. (https://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/book/)

[bowiesongs]

I would throw one Robert Fripp quote from when he was wrangling record label lawsuits at you, but oddly he's always been OK with how "Heroes" turned out, despite the fact he contributed as much to (& should have gotten songwriting royalties from) the song as Bowie & Eno.

i guess i don’t get why you’re so fixated on this. Bowie and Eno apparently wrote the song—the chords, the melodies, the lyrics, i.e “composition”. Fripp comes in and plays over it. does he contribute to the song? of course yes. Does he deserve songwriting royalties? I fucking don’t know. but he was a professional and knew, when he came to the session, that unless he offered some composition he’d previously written or if he’d suggested changing the chords in a way that would completely alter the song, that he was being paid to play lead guitar on it and that was it. Why isn’t Bill Bruford credited on “One More Red Nightmare?”

[bowiesongs]

What are your personal feelings on DB effectively making his session musicians do the bulk of songwriting but rarely letting them share in the royalties/credit?

i think it’s a presumption to say they did “the bulk” of the songwriting, really. If you write the song’s chord progressions, top melodies and lyric, as DB usually did, you’re pretty much the primary songwriter.

Part of it’s record industry standards--as one musician once told me, whoever’s paying the studio bills usually gets the songwriting (it’s true for a lot of jazz, too---Miles Davis is credited as the sole composer of “So What,” despite the fact that Gil Evans wrote the intro, Bill Evans devised the piano chord voicings and Coltrane/Addlerley’s improvised solos are a good chunk of it)

in DB’s case, he seems to have played somewhat fair after the Ziggy period---Davis and Murray evidently wrote much of “Breaking Glass,” as they’re credited; Alomar has a good share of credits, and Gabrels was basically a co-composer for years (with the noted-by-RG exception of “Hallo Spaceboy”)

[bowiesongs]

Hi! Really enjoying the book and would love to support you in the best way possible. Does it make a difference for you if readers buy your book on Kindle vs. a physical copy?

thanks! not really: whatever works best for you.

[bowiesongs]

Hi, dig the book,. FYI Alomar bought an Alembic guitar ( see Stanley Clarke, Grateful Dead, etc) , not an Olympic. I have the apple version of the book so maybe an error on their part.

if so, the error didn’t originate with me: it’s called “Olympic” in a 2012 Mojo interview with Alomar:  http://www.trynka.net/archive/Low.html.  perhaps a mishearing during the interview. & it sounds like CA says “Olympic” in a WNYC interview from 2010 too but again, they’re similar sounding words.

[bowiesongs]

True or false: "Sunday in the Park with George" is Sondheim's "Low."

good christ, what a question. but possibly true. Outside is up there for parallels, too. “Company” has the same despairing sense of broken connection as Low but it’s the former is more public a work---SS’ Young Americans, I guess.

[bowiesongs]

What were the factors that led you to cover all the post-'76 happenings as one book instead of splitting it in two?

we thought about it but it just didn’t work as two volumes, both in terms of sales and in narrative. starting with Idiot/Low and ending with Blackstar was, in retrospect, the only way it could have been done. I think it was worth the relatively minor edits to old blog entries get everything into one (long) volume.

[bowiesongs]

Do you know if Tony Kaye has ever talking about his time as DB's touring keyboardist, or vice-versa? Its seemingly impossible to find any info on how that connection came about. He's no household name, but he has given out tons of interviews due to Yes & its odd that Isolar never comes up.

this 2011 interview explains it:  he met DB’s tour manager at a party in early January 1976 and got recruited on the spot. it’s possible he and DB knew each other from the 60s, as they were both Marquee Club regulars     http://music-illuminati.com/interview-tony-kaye/

[mayanhandballcourt]

Photographer Geoff MacCormack

[bowiesongs]

Just wanted to tell you how much your blog means to me. It was the first website I came across when I found DB just over three years ago- it was full of interesting information that I devoured, references to authors, directors, and musicians I soon delved headfirst into, and love for this fascinating man. When he died it was comforting to read the entries and comments, seeing how much other people also loved him. To this day I read an entry whenever I can, and I can't wait to buy Ashes to Ashes!

thanks so much. this is *the only thing* i ever wanted from that site---to give people a launching point to go elsewhere.

[bowiesongs]

Its all ending in a week so may as well ask this now: What do find to be DB at his sexiest (or, at the very least, what of him made you go "ooh, I think I Get It")?

early ‘80s, pre-bleach blonding for Mr Lawrence/Let’s Dance  (think “Fashion” video). that goes beyond the usual “yeah, he’s a good looking dude” to “dang”

[lady-stardust-rv]

[bowiesongs]

Do you think we'll ever get to hear the "wonderful" demo of "Loving the Alien"?

either at some point the estate will shift into “Beatles Anthology” dylan Bootleg Series mode and we’ll hear tons of this sort of thing, or most Bowie outtakes/demos will never be heard in our lifetimes

[bowiesongs]

Will the blog stay online after the book release?

of course!  and another thing will start up in 2019.

[bowiesongs]

Will the book go in more detail with regards to David Richards' hand on what he worked on? For someone who worked on 3 of DB's biggest post-Scary Monsters albums he's barely a presence on the blog (Hugh Padgham gets more wordage & he's barely there).

a bit but the thing is no one ever talked about him, in any interview. and he’s dead, so it wasn’t like i could get his side of the story. he’s always just the guy in the room, who DB liked/relied on for a long while–he’s the counterpart to Erdal Kizilcay, who certainly was more colorful a presence. i was told some interesting gossip about how/why they fell out in the mid-90s but I didn’t feel was verified enough to put in the book.

[bowiesongs]

Did Atlantis Squarepantis (or any of his other acting appearances) and the Spongebob version of No Control make it into the book?

no; (a couple); got a sentence

[sesiondemadrugada]

Suspiria (Dario Argento, 1977).

[bowiesongs]

Oh yeah, should ask too: will a Chapter Ends happen once you post the final Blackstar/Lazarus entries on the blog or would you rather not make a top-at-the-minimum-10 out of (technically) 17 years' worth of music? [if yes, rooting for (She Can) Do That to make it]

i don’t know if i will post the final entries on the blog yet. certainly not in the near term---i may start up a patreon early next year that, for a pittance like $2 a month, you could see them along with a bunch of other things that i’ll be working on in 2019 as a way to move towards the next, insane project (if I have the heart/stamina for it)

again w/the chapter ends---man, to be honest those were just garbage entries i put up to buy time to write other stuff. my picks for best songs were rather arbitrary, reflecting how i felt that week, honestly. i obviously gave up on doing them after the 90s entries.