Tony Visconti: A Life in Music London show

“What made my life so wonderful?”

Sky Arts and Serious presents: Tony Visconti: A Life in Music

Tony Visconti hosts a night celebrating 50 years in the music business. The concert will feature music from throughout Tony’s extraordinary production career including classics from David Bowie, T-Rex, Thin Lizzy and more.

Tony and a star cast will be joined on stage by some brilliant unsigned musicians from across the UK and Ireland.

With musical director Nitin Sawhney and special guests including Stewart Copeland, Bob Geldof, Holy Holy (featuring Glenn Gregory, Tony Visconti and Woody Woodmansey)

The evening will be filmed and will air as a 90 minute TV special on Sky Arts. By buying a ticket you consent to being filmed. This concert is produced by Serious for Somethin’ Else.

Tickets on sale from Friday June 2nd at 10am (UK time) here.

Union Chapel, London
Mon, Jul 24, 2017
Doors Open: 6:30 PM
Entry Requirements: Under 16s accompanied by an adult.

#TVALifeInMusic

Happy Birthday Duncan and Glass Spider

“So where were the spiders”

Thirty years ago today, on Duncan Jones’s 16th birthday (Happy 46th, Duncan), David Bowie kicked off his Glass Spider World Tour at the Feyenoord Stadium, in Rotterdam. On the day, Duncan was introduced to the audience for an enthusiastic 60,000-strong singalong of Happy Birthday.

Launched in support of the Never Let Me Down album, neither the tour nor the album are remembered fondly in some quarters.

However, both have plenty of fans and though he wasn’t too kind about either at various points, David Bowie did come to the defence of the tour in 1997, arguing that it worked better in smaller indoor venues:

“I’d designed it to be an all-enveloping kind of spectacular, inasmuch as it was a bit three-ring circus, there were always three or four events happening at the same time on stage...Individually there were some incredibly good ideas on that stage, and in a small environment it really worked well...but when you're a thousand rows back it just becomes this huge mass of confusion.”

The tour’s set was spectacular by any standards. Described at the time as “the largest touring set ever,” it was designed to look like a giant spider. It was 60 feet (18.3m) high, 64 feet (19.5m) wide and included giant vacuumed tube legs that were lit from the inside with 20,000 feet (6,096m) of colour-changing lights.

The setlist consisted of much from the 80s’ Bowie canon and regular live favourites, but it also included a few surprises with the likes of All The Madmen, Big Brother, Chant Of The Ever Circling Skeletal Family, Sons Of The Silent Age (with vocal contributions from guitarist and school friend, Peter Frampton), Time and occasionally, Iggy and The Stooges’ I Wanna Be Your Dog.

If you’ve never seen this show, it’s certainly worth tracking down the DVD to make up your own mind about it.

#GlassSpiderTour #GlassSpider

Anderson channels Bowie in American Gods

“God is an American”

No, not Brett Anderson of Suede, that wouldn’t be as surprising as Gillian Anderson’s transformation into David Bowie in the next episode of the @STARZ show, American Gods.

STARZ has released footage of the actress (who plays New God, Media), confronting Technical Boy (Bruce Langley) for his past misdeeds, in a sneak peek of Sunday night’s show: Lemon Scented You. (May 28)

In the scene, Media references several different Bowie songs...can you spot them?

As you can see, Anderson fairly convincingly channels Bowie as he appeared in Mick Rock’s iconoc 1973 video, for the hit single, Life On Mars?

According to STARZ: “Media assumes whatever form will deliver her message most effectively and is often personified by iconic celebrities”.

In her first appearance she emulated Lucille Ball and apparently she will also play Marilyn Monroe and Judy Garland, along with the depiction of Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust persona. (Some might argue that the character was actually Aladdin Sane, by this point)

You can watch the teaser here on YouTube, but be warned, Technical Boy is a bit potty-mouthed.

#AmericanGods #LifeOnMars #MickRockBowie #BowieTASCHEN

5th London Bowie fan charity event on sale

“Mars happy nation, sit on my karma...”

Tickets for the 5th Annual Bowie fan event at Surya in London on July 1st 2017, are now officially on sale.

All proceeds will once again go to TERRENCE HIGGINS TRUST. Last year, the evening raised a very impressive £11,620, which was donated to Cancer Research UK.

Tickets cost the same as last year, £25, and this price includes entry into the wristband raffle, which gives everybody an equal chance to win a very desirable signed-by-Bowie item.

Check out the FB event page for more info and to purchase tickets.

Please take proper care to follow payment instructions and stay tuned to that same event page for updates on some of the incredible auction items and raffle prizes.

We are duty-bound to point out that this is not an official promotion. However, it is the same event that Bowie would send a message to and donate signed items to every year.

FOOTNOTE: The Little Wonder theme of our montage is to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the release of the single and Earthling album.

#LondonBowieFanEvent

Hunky Dory gold vinyl UK release date change

“Torn apart in the UK, In the dribble of May”

We recently announced the release next month of two limited edition gold vinyl retail exclusive albums, The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars and Hunky Dory.

The albums are being released worldwide via Parlophone on June 16th 2017, the 45th anniversary of the original release of Bowie’s classic 1972 Ziggy Stardust album.

However, the UK will now get Hunky Dory three weeks earlier on May 26th.

As previously stated, both albums will only be available as a strictly limited edition one-off run in ‘bricks and mortar’ stores and their online storefronts, but will not be available from online only retailers.

#HunkyZiggyGold #BowieVinyl

Five days till DB Is in Barcelona launch party

“You asked for the latest party”

The next leg of the record-breaking David Bowie Is exhibition at Museu Del Disseny De Barcelona (http://smarturl.it/DBisBarcelona), kicks off with a rather special launch party.

Exhibition Opening Party. Razzmataz 2
May 25th: Official Exhibition Opening Party at Razzmatazz 2 with live concerts and Dj sets.

Go here for more information and to purchase tickets.

Read more about the exclusive limited edition red vinyl of I’m Afraid Of Americans, released exclusively at the exhibition venue only on the same day.

#DavidBowieIs #DavidBowieIsBCN #BowieIAOA #BowieVinyl

Bowie declared most popular artist of 2016

“Music is sublime”

Hot on the heels of David Bowie being celebrated as the most successful star in Record Store Day's 10-year history in the UK, the BPI has announced today that he has also beaten the likes of Adele and Drake to be named the UK's most popular artist of 2016.

Bowie clocked up 1.65m album equivalent sales, a measurement developed by UK music industry body the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) that combines physical and digital sales of CDs and albums (along with streams), to give the overall sales popularity of an artist. This success was driven by almost 1.5m physical and digital albums sales, 510,000 tracks downloaded and 127m streamed.

The sales were led by purchases of ★, which also helped drive vinyl record sales to a 25-year high. The next most-consumed Bowie recordings were his compilations Best of Bowie, Nothing Has Changed and Legacy, ahead of The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars.

In a piece by Mark Sweney in today’s Guardian, Boyd Hilton, entertainment editor at Heat magazine said this of Bowie’s sales surge following his passing last year: “Bowie suddenly got loads more airplay and the ★ album, videos and artwork were so extraordinary anyway that they captured the public’s imagination even more than a regular new Bowie album might. There has also been an undoubted resurgence in pop and rock nostalgia, you can see it in things like the increase in vinyl sales, perhaps due to the homogeneity of so much of the mainstream music scene. This has meant a perfect storm of interest in the great man and his music.”

The BPI said: “Bowie was by far the most popular recording artist last year when sales and streams of all his iconic work are taken into account. Fans young and old paid fulsome tribute to David's legacy by reacquainting themselves with his classic songs and albums or by discovering them for the first time. ★ would have featured in the year’s best-seller lists in any event, but Bowie’s passing led to a surge in sales and streams that saw it become the year’s sixth-most popular recording of 2016 across all formats and the biggest-selling title on vinyl.”

Thanks to everybody who had a part in this success, particularly to you, the fans, who created these astonishing figures.

#BowieBlackstar #Blackstar #HelenGreenArtBowie #BowieBPI #BowieOCC

The Long Way Home: Bowie and MacCormack

“I'm stuck with a valuable friend”

A signed collection of Geoff MacCormack’s David Bowie photographs are to be offered as part of Bonhams Entertainment Memorabilia sale on June 28th, the month which marks the 50th anniversary of the release of Bowie’s debut album, David Bowie. The prints are thought to be among the last items Bowie signed.

Geoff (David’s close friend and travelling companion), shot the images whilst on a worldwide tour with the star in 1973 and while on set for the shooting of The Man Who Fell To Earth. MacCormack was a singer, percussionist, dancer and mime on the Bowie tours of 1973/74.

The journey took in New York, LA, San Francisco, Hawaii, Canada, Japan and a voyage on the Trans-Siberian express, which provides the backdrop to several of the photographs. The images show Bowie at his most relaxed and informal, a world away from the glamorous and outlandish personae he regularly adopted on stage.

Speaking of his friend, Geoff said: ‘For me, these images, which David loved, almost feel as if they belong in a family album. They capture the sense of two mates – one of whom just happened to have become a rock star – having the time of their lives.’

This carefree revelry is perfectly captured in one of the photographs, which depicts a slightly worse for wear Bowie asleep in their train berth aboard the Trans-Siberian Express. MacCormack explained: ‘We had drunk cheap Riesling and beer with a bunch of soldiers we’d met the night before. They were friendly and inquisitive as to what life was like in the West. In the image, you can just make out the bleak Siberian landscape through the window.’

The images will be on view at Bonhams Knightsbridge saleroom, Montpelier Street, from June 25th till the sale on the 28th, accompanied by a never–before–seen film of the journey from Japan to Moscow, for the ‘May Day Parade’, shot by Bowie himself and seen through his eyes, interspersed with MacCormack’s photographs. Called: ‘The Long Way Home, a film by David Bowie’, the short will be screened exclusively at the sale preview in Knightsbridge.

For more examples of Geoff MacCormack’s work, visit his website.

Also, check out this piece by Holly Bruce posted today over on GQ.

#TheLongWayHome #GeoffMacBowie

BOWIEONTAPE site is live now

“(Ears tell me) turn it around...”

You may have seen John Carroll and Leo Rodia’s Facebook page regarding that most undervalued of Bowie collector formats, the humble cassette tape. They’ve been teasing their new site on the page and at last, it’s ready to view.

The cassette had fallen from favour since being usurped by the CD, but, like vinyl, it’s a format that is coming back into vogue. After all, as John and Leo point out, Tony Visconti reckons “A well-recorded chrome cassette sounds better than a compressed digital format”.

The BOWIEONTAPE site joins several other collector sites covering the other formats available to the collector, more of which, next week.

Meanwhile, here's a bit from the boys...

In late 2016 we talked about the lack of information from the usual Bowie sites concerning cassettes, in general we thought it was a shame to snub cassettes as they have played a very big part in creating the Bowie audio legacy. For many years it was the number one choice for many a penniless youngster! So in late October (2016) we decided to take the matter into our own hands and create a site for everybody, from the casual fan to the digital only downloader and the hard core collector of everything, with one main theme in mind: DAVID BOWIE ON TAPE.
We have spent many hours making this project possible, we really hope you enjoy it and find it useful. We will try our best to keep it updated and always relevant.
John Carroll & Leo Rodia

So go have a poke around and get involved. If you’re having trouble navigating, check out the help section.

Gerald Fearnley’s Bowie Unseen due July

“Takes me right back...when you were young”

As we look ahead to the 50th anniversary of the debut David Bowie album, the man responsible for the images that graced the cover has a book of the sessions released via ACC Editions on July 14th.

Here’s an exclusive edited excerpt from Bowie Unseen. Take it away Gerald...

“My brother, Derek, known as ‘Dek’, was a musician. He always had his bass guitar with him and played gigs up until he passed away in 2008. But in the 1960s, we were all just starting out with our lives. Dek would often use my place to stay before or after gigs. He would often bring by a fellow musician into our home. No one knew that one of the musicians would turn out to be David Bowie.”
“They were a good bunch of lads. David, especially, seemed very serious about what he was doing, he seemed trustworthy. He and my brother would often be in the kitchen writing. He used to play with the children, games of Monopoly or teaching them how to play the penny whistle*. David was great with the kids, very pleasant, always polite.”
“I had a studio in town, down near Oxford Street, and Dek and his musician friends would come up from time to time. I remember once I was walking either to or from the studio and I heard somebody shout my name from across the street. I looked up and it was David! He had this great big leather coat on, all the way to his ankles.”
When it came time for the young singer to release his first album, he turned to Fearnley for a series of portraits to be used for publicity. “I don’t remember why I took those photos, probably because I was the only one he knew with a studio and camera. I was as much of a professional photographer as he probably knew back then.”
The portraits Gerald Fearnley took of the young musician certainly portray a controlled studio atmosphere. The young Bowie would foreshadow future characters and future directions, as he painted clown-like teardrops on his face. The poses he would strike in Fearnley’s studio would also give insight into his study of the art of mime. At that time, he was enrolled in classes at the Dance Centre in Covent Garden, taught by Lindsay Kemp. Kemp’s classes focused on improvisation, mime, and avant-garde theatre. Viewing the complete series of images today, 50 years after Gerald worked with Bowie, they show the artist at the very beginnings of understanding how to create striking images, the art of posing—useful techniques that would serve the future icon well.

* One of the tunes David taught Gerald’s children on the penny whistle was the theme song from the television show, The Killing Stones. That tune was actually Tom Hark by Elias And His Zig-Zag Jive Flutes.

Bowie Unseen - Portraits of an Artist as a Young Man by Gerald Fearnley
Hardcover: 80 pages
Publisher: ACC Art Books (14 July 2017)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1851498648
ISBN-13: 978-1851498642

#UnseenBowie #BowieFearnley

Rare Davy Jones picture unearthed

“I’d like to blow on your horn”

A wonderful picture of Davy Jones playing his white Grafton saxophone with the first line-up of The Kon-rads has surfaced.

The young Jones (later to become a solo singer in his own right under the name of David Bowie), is pictured next to George Underwood (later to become a solo singer in his own right under the name of Calvin James), who took vocal duties on this occasion.

In his early teens Bowie became keen on the jazz of John Coltrane. For Christmas 1961 his father bought him this white acrylic Grafton alto sax. It used new plastics technology, and cost £55, about half the cost of a brass instrument.

Bowie later told the BBC that he asked his father to lend him money to buy himself a saxophone. His father bought him the saxophone but made David agree to pay him back with the money he made from his part time job.

The picture is up for auction over at The Saleroom (LOT 61) where you can view a larger version.

#TheKonrads #BowieSax

Cracked Actor CD and hi-res download

“For you’re dancing where the dogs decay”

Along with aforementioned gold vinyl releases, 16th June 2017‪ also sees the release on CD and download of the best-selling vinyl album of last month’s Record Store Day (RSD) 2017, David Bowie Cracked Actor - Live Los Angeles '74. This follows public demand for formats of the album alongside the triple vinyl.

‪Cracked Actor will now be made available as a limited edition 2CD digipak, with a twelve page booklet featuring notes from the original LA Amphitheatre show programme and a piece about the LA ‘Philly Dogs’ shows by Rolling Stone’s Richard Cromelin, from 10th October, 1974. Neither of these were featured in the vinyl package.

‪Cracked Actor will also be available as a hi-res 96/24 download, a standard download and Mastered For iTunes (MFiT). A standard jewel case 2CD with twelve page booklet will then replace the limited digipak. The vinyl edition will not be re-pressed or re-released.

‪David Bowie Cracked Actor - Live Los Angeles '74 will be released via Parlophone on 16th June, 2017.

#CrackedActor #DBCA74

Hunky Dory and Ziggy Stardust gold vinyl due

“Sound of thunder, sound of gold”

Next month‪ sees the release of two very strictly limited edition gold vinyl retail exclusive albums, The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars and Hunky Dory.

The albums are being released via Parlophone on 16th June 2017, the 45th anniversary of the original release of Bowie’s classic 1972 Ziggy Stardust album.

They will only be available as a strictly limited edition one-off run in ‘bricks and mortar’ stores and their online storefronts, but will not be available from online only retailers.

#ZiggyStardust45 #HunkyZiggyGold #BowieVinyl

David Bowie: Glamour fanzine - get involved

“Me, I’m fresh on your pages”

Many of you will have already been enjoying Issue #1 of Andy Jones and Nick Smart’s David Bowie: Glamour fanzine*, with its striking Helen Green cover based on one of Sukita’s delicious 1973 Bowie portraits.

The fanzine is beautifully designed by Milky Cereal and the equally delightful Issue #2, is due any day now.

The publication boasts exclusive and original content contributed by Bowie fans and collaborators...

ISSUE 1: Contributors include:
Carlos Alomar, Sophia Anne Caruso, Mike Garson, Mark Paytress, Suzi Ronson, Martin Samuel, James Stevenson, George Underwood, Alex Walton and Woody Woodmansey.
ISSUE 2: Contributors include:
Carlos Alomar, Philippe Auliac, Dylan Jones, Liz Kershaw, Jessica Lee Morgan, Terry O’Neill, Nicholas Pegg and Tony Visconti.

Each edition includes an A3 poster of Helen Green’s cover art and features contributions from Bowie fans, and this is where you come in.

Visit the David Bowie: Glamour fanzine site to submit contributions for Issue #3 and much more.

*We are duty-bound to point out that David Bowie: Glamour is not an official publication.

#DavidBowieGlamourFanzine

Barcelona exclusive vinyl due

“Johnny looks up at the stars”

To celebrate the next leg of the record-breaking David Bowie Is exhibition at Museu Del Disseny De Barcelona, a limited edition red vinyl of I’m Afraid Of Americans will be making its 7” debut exclusively at the venue only, on May 25th.

The Trent Reznor remixed V1 edit of the track is the A-side, while the AA-side is an acoustic version of "Heroes", recorded live at The Bridge School Benefit in 1996, where DB was backed by Reeves Gabrels and Gail Ann Dorsey.

The artwork for the single features two photographs by renowned Mexican photographer, Fernando Aceves, who took a series of beautiful shots of David while he was in Mexico City during the Earthling tour in October 1997.

20 years on from their first release, both tracks and the sleeve imagery have a renewed resonance in 2017.

I'M AFRAID OF AMERICANS 7" RED VINYL DAVID BOWIE IS - BARCELONA EXHIBITION EXCLUSIVE
A-Side I’M AFRAID OF AMERICANS (V1 edit)
(Bowie/Eno)
Originally produced by David Bowie.
Reproduced by Nine Inch Nails.
Production & additional performances by Nine Inch Nails: Trent Reznor, Charlie Clouser, Keith Hillebrandt, Dave "Rave" Ogilvie, Danny Lohner.
Mixed by Dave "Rave" Ogilvie. Engineered by Brian Pollack at Nothing Studios, New Orleans.

AA- Side "HEROES" (live at The Bridge School ’96)
(Bowie/Eno)
Produced by John Hanlon
Mixed by John Hanlon at Redwood Digital, Woodside, California
This acoustic version of "Heroes" was recorded at the Shoreline Amphitheatre, Mountain View, California on 20th October 1996.

Bet you were expecting, Al Alba, the title of the Spanish language version of Day In, Day Out.

#DavidBowieIs #DavidBowieIsBCN #BowieIAOA #BowieVinyl

Be My Wife 40th anniversary picture disc

“Sometimes you get so lonely”

For those that follow these releases, it will be no surprise that Be My Wife is the latest in Parlophone’s series of 40th-anniversary Bowie 7" picture discs.

Originally released in the UK on June 17th 1977, Be My Wife was the 2nd and final single from the ground-breaking album Low, the first of the so-called Berlin Trilogy. Despite a promotional video, the single didn’t chart, not helped by the fact that it was almost impossible to view it anywhere in the UK back in 1977.

With echoes of Life On Mars?, the Stanley Dorfman-directed promo was shot in an empty white room, with Bowie using a red Fender Stratocaster as a prop, while half-heartedly miming the guitar part. He somehow manages to appear nonchalant and anguished at the same time, in this bizarre plea for marital union.

The image used on the A Side is from the Be My Wife video shoot, while the AA side was taken during a visit to the studio of Victor Vasarely. Both photos are by Christian Simonpietri and were taken in Paris in June 1977.

Be My Wife is backed with a previously unreleased live version of the Low instrumental, Art Decade, recorded in Perth, Australia in 1978 during the ISOLAR II tour.

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BE MY WIFE LIMITED EDITION 40th ANNIVERSARY 7" PICTURE DISC
A-Side BE MY WIFE (2017 remaster)
(David Bowie)
Produced by David Bowie and Tony Visconti
Mixed by Tony Visconti at Hansa by the Wall
AA-Side ART DECADE (Live Perth ‘78)
(David Bowie)
Produced by David Bowie
Recorded live at Perth Entertainment Centre, Perth, Australia 15th November 1978
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Be My Wife will be released via Parlophone on June 16th 2017.

FOOTNOTE: Victor Vasarely is the artist responsible for the 1968 artwork: CTA 25 NÉGATIF. The image was used as the background for the front cover of the 1969 Philips album, David Bowie, aka Space Oddity.

#DBBMW40 #BowieVinyl #BowieVasarely