We continue our look back at the music of 50 years ago….
For many American kids…it was a revelation when they saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan. How many thousands of kids picked up guitars the next day. For a confused, disenfranchized collection of British kids, a similar moment happened on July 6th 1972, when the straight-laced British TV show “Top of The Pops” had David Bowie and the Spiders From Mars lip-synching “Starman”. He wasn’t “David Bowie” yet. He was an English poet-folksinger that had scored a surprise hit with Space Oddity and released a critically acclaimed LP in Hunky Dory that most (especially in America) had ignored. Bono once told an interviewer that”the first time I saw him was singing Starman on TV. It was like a creature falling from the sky”
The album “Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars” was released on June 16th and the “concept” of the album centered around an alien rock star with an ego the size of Big Ben…telling the kids that it was ok to be different. He had visited those themes before but now, he looked and played the part completely. And the Spiders joined him. Mick Ronson’s look and guitar work were a big part of the tale. As was the work of Trevor Bolder on bass and Mick Woodmansey on drums.
I’m not going to dive into the meanings behind the songs and the lyrics that turned on a generation of kids to be Bowie fans for life. Lets just listen.
The songs were strong. “Five Years”, “Star”, “Hang On To Yourself” the title track, “Starman, “Moonage Dream”, “Lady Stardust”, “Rock & Roll Suicide” all shine….and “Suffragette City” kicks all kinds of ass.
The ensuing tour of America was a mixed bag….some cities were just not buying what he was selling…but others joined the Bowie army and the tour became a spectacle…which Bowie played for all it was worth…and then…in order to not be pigeon-holed by the character…announced his retirement after the last show. It was, of course, the retirement of the character as Ziggy morphed into Aladdin Sane the following year.
Here is the entire show which was broadcast as a radio special. Incredible!
I wasnt’ a member of the Bowie army but I understood that we were seeing something very different. This wasn’t “your brothers Beatles & Stones”. This was glam…this was other worldly…this was ‘Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders from Mars”
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