It's 1969 kids!

This fortnights album is ‘David Bowie’, the second album by (wait for it…) David Bowie. It was released in 1969, but what else was going on that year hmmm? Well, seeing as you asked so nicely:






In January Richard Milhous Nixon became 37th President of “those there” United States. The Vietnam war went progressively downhill and in October hundreds of thousands of people took part in National Moratorium antiwar demonstrations across the United States.
It was the year that British troops were deployed in Northern Ireland. It took a further 25 years to agree a cease fire.




The Beatles gave an impromptu concert on the roof of Apple Records. It was broken up by police and turned out to be their last public performance. This year they also released Abbey Road. John Lennon got so upset about the war in Vietnam that he stayed in bed all week, recorded ‘All we are saying is give peace a chance’ and sent his MBE back to the Queen. Hilarity ensued.

1969 was also the year that the first HIV strain is believed to have reached the USA.





In July NASA landed 2 blokes on the moon. In November they did it again.

The Mariner 7 probe made its closest fly-by of Mars (3,524 kilometres). But (ahem) was there life?

Oh, and the jumbo jet made it’s public debut.

Bowie vs Bolan ROUND 2

Last time I shard my distaste for Marc Bolan’s work with John’s Children in 1967 (Psychedelia-by-numbers and a naff lead singer to boot! Arrg Take it away!).
So Bowie stomped home an easy victory with a whole album and some tunes you could hum all released in the same year. Mind you, neither of 'em charted with anything.

So going into 1968 it’s Bowie 1 – Bolan 0.

Right off the bat it’s pretty easy to see who’s gonna' score big this year.
In 1968 Marc Bolan formed acoustic ‘pixie folk’ duo Tyrannosaurs Rex and released 2 (yep 2) studio albums. The first one even charted (no 15 in the UK) where as the Bowster was still yet to have a hit.









To my ears these first two Tyrannosaurs Rex albums are quite patchey and haven’t dated well. But there are some fairly decent songs in amongst the hippy mumbling, so it all compares quite favourably to David Bowie in 1968. Especially as he released…


…. nothin’. Not a sausage.
At least no albums anyway.

He did do this though......



That’s the promo for the original version of ‘Space Oddity’.
It was part of a 30 min film called “Love you Till Tuesday” which (depending on who you talk to) was either recorded in 1968 or ’69 but was so flippin’ awful that no TV stations wanted to touch it. So it stayed on a dusty shelf until the home video boom in 1984. Here’s the cover of the DVD:




Nice huh.

So all things considered, this round goes to Marc Bolan. Bringing the score to 1 all.

Everything could change in 1969!

1967's David Bowie by David Bowie: MBJ's opinion

I really liked this album. I’m under no illusions about it being a timeless rock classic, a musical mile stone or among Bowie’s best work. But still, I like it. Some how it’s got a naive charm all of it’s own. It’s not quite like any other record I’ve heard.



The best moments: ‘There is a Happy Land’ is my favorite song. The melancholy brass and piano put me in mind of Dog Man Star (the classic 1994 album by Suede). The vocal performance is brilliant, especially the gear change between the chorus and the verse. I like the lyrics and the feel of the song which is about longing for a happy place where kids can get on with being kids and are left alone to enjoy themselves. I’m a Christian and this song put me in mind of the deep inner yearning for a better place to be, which the Psalmists express so perfectly, so I found it quite an inspirational song.

‘She’s got Medals’ and ‘Uncle Arthur’ are great little numbers, full of wit and charm and from the same lyrical camp as Pink Floyds ‘Arnold Layne’ and ‘I’ve got a Bike’ (also released in 1967).

‘Come and Buy My Toys’ and ‘Maid of Bond Street’ are my other favorites. These are breezy little songs that whip by in seconds and leave me skipping back to hear them again.



The worst moments:
‘We are Hungry Men’ just stinks. I hate the way the ‘humorous’ spoken monolog comes in immediately after ‘There is a Happy Land’ and totally destroys the feeling the album had built up over the last 5 songs. The problem with this song is that it’s a short joke about saving the world from over population via infanticide and cannibalism, which ain’t that funny Dave. Maybe it could have worked if the tune was something you could hum, no such luck sadly.

‘Join the Gang’ suffers a similar fate. It’s an overlong joke about being part of ‘the scene’. Again it’s not that funny in the first place, the tune isn’t strong enough to carry it and the arrangement (including a mental sitar) is U.G.L.Y!

On the evidence here it seems the Bow-Dowg was still figuring out the craft of lyric writing back in ‘67. The words seem to be the focus of the album but he drops some terrible clangers. ‘The Little Bombardier’ has a good tune and a nice little story at it’s heart but is killed stone dead by the rhyme
“We’ve had blokes like you in the station before,
The hand of authority said “no more”,
To the Little Bombardier.”
A talking hand? Talk about mixing your metaphors more like!
A cappella closing track ‘Please Mr Grave Digger’ has equally forced rhymns. Early on it sounds like it could be something interesting with an rain sound effects accompanying Dave-o’s vocal. But it folds under the weight of the repeated terrible rhymes (locket/pocket, etc) and the story doesn’t really go anyway. The song ends before we understand what the protagonist is trying to say. (He’s killed a little girl, he’s about to kill a grave-digger. I assume Dave-o couldn’t find an easy rhyme for his motives coz he doesn’t bother with ‘em).


How many good songs? 9 out of 14
How many terrible songs? only 2 or 3, depends how I feel
Bowie-o-meter: 70 Ziggys

It may be cheesy, but I like it.

Bowie vs Bolan

To add a bit of extra educational spice I’m hoping to listen to what Marc Bolan was up to at the same time as our B-boy. Mind you, I’m not fond of Bolan’s solo stuff so I might get bored and jack it in. But in the mean time,
here’s Bowie vs Bolan: 1967!




















Whilst the Bow-ster was failing to chart with his first solo album,
Marc Bolan was busy also failing to chart with his chums in the band John’s Children.


And just as Bowie was ruining good tunes with clunky rhymes while he got the hang of lyric writing,
who should be up to the same tricks but Marcy-Boy Bolan!

Check out this Bolan lyric from Desdemona:
“Just because Toulouse Lautrec
Painted some chick in the rude
Doesn't give you the right
To steal my night
And leave me naked in the nude”

Naked in the nude? What!!!



As far as I can tell, in 1967 Bolan wrote 4 songs for John’s Children (Desdemona, Midsummer Nights Scene, Sarah Crazy Child and Go-Go Girl), a couple of which are OK.
All of which feature him giving a crackin’ backin’ vocal under dull performances from lead singer Andy Ellison.
All of which are shallow affairs about gettin’ it on with ladies and freakin’ out on drugs.
And all of which sound like cod Psychedelia-by-numbers.
We’re talking ‘Listen to the flower people’ era Spinal Tap folks!



I doubt I will ever listen to John's Children again so I do declare David Bowie the winner of 1967! Yay Bowie!









I don’t fancy his chances in 1968 though….

Oh! You Pretty Things

Well, they are, aren't they. Here in the photo are 19 of the CD's that have arrived in the past few days, from an increasingly annoyed looking postman. The first album is not pictured as it is in my car and I couldn't be bothered to get it, 3 are still on the way, 1 is missing somewhere (my wife has "tidied it"), and 4 exist only in Mp3 form.

All the same, they do look rather lovely don't they. And whose that nestling at the front. Why, its Tin Machine II, which I managed to finally get for a knock down price of £4.20. Thats going straight on Ebay come October....

A little story my father told me

On Tuesday my brother and I had coffee with my Dad and told him about ‘the project’ (you know, David Bowie, 28 albums, 52 weeks, do try to keep up). His eyes went glassy as he was mentally transported back to 1967 and he told us of the day he bought his very first David Bowie album.

He was just a wee teen and he went up to Church Street Market with his dear old Dad. Apparently it was a ‘proper cockney market then, not like now!’ (citation need, as they say at Wikipedia).
And he bought 1967’s David Bowie from a proper cockney at a proper cockney record stall. It cost him the princely sum of 75 pence. Dad couldn’t afford it so his Dad had to help him pay. As it turned out, Granddad quite enjoyed the album’s novelty music hall flavour.
All of which means I am the 3rd generation of Mahbenjah to like Rubber Band.

Mind you, Dad agrees that ‘We are the Hungry Men’ is rubbish.

This town aint big enough....

They've obviously caught the buzz. Sparks, clearly inspired by this project, have a little one of their own. Over the course of 21 nights they will be performing each of their albums in turn, in its entirety, culminating in a performance of their brand new album. Really, this is hugely ambitious - it means hiring a touring band capable of learning up to 250 songs, remembering all those words, and I assume fleshing out the gigs with relevant b-sides and other tracks.

Other considerations - its an interesting exercise in 'fandom' - I am sure the place will be rammed for Kimono My House, but it would take a serious fan to turn up on a school night for one for the many 80's and 90's albums that failed to prick the public mind. If Bowie did a similar event, we'd all want to be there for Ziggy but how many would make the trip for Tonight? Not me mister.

Anyway, this is brilliant.

First day impressions

Well here we are on the offical day 1 of 2000 and Bowie.

I gave David Bowie a spin (the self titled album by a young lad from Bromley who previously shot to fame for setting up the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Men with Long Hair, (or SPOCTMWLH as it's known in Wales).
And so far I'm rather enjoying it.

PuDanny (my real life flesh and blood brother) was over during the first play and he gave me a sound verbal thrashing for some rather uncharitable remarks I made during Uncle Arthur (track no' 1).


Me: Can you believe this came out on the same day as Sgt Pepper. It's hardly the future of Rock n Roll is it!

PuDan: Yeah but 40 years later who is cooler, David Bowie or Paul McCartney?!

Touche!



A man in his 60's























David Bowie

MBJ's last goodbye

Following from the Rueb's lead,
here is my favourite bit of Bowster on youtube.
For the last time 'till 11th August when it gets 'released' under the rules.

Achtung, achtung, these are your orders

So, as it all starts tomorrow, its only right that today we lay down a few ground rules, to make it incredibly clear what we are doing.

The plan is to listen to David Bowie's career in microcosm, over the space of a year. This means that as from tomorrow morning, in the mind of myself and Ben the music of David Bowie never existed. Basically, tomorrow sees the release of a brand new album from an exciting new artist, and hey, he's named that album after himself. Lucky for us, the follow-up album Space Oddity comes out on the 21st January, thats neat.

So once Space Oddity is in my possession, I can go back and listen to tracks from David Bowie if I wish. But I can't go "hey, I really fancy giving Fame a spin", because in our new world that song doesn't exist yet. Or rather, does not exist until around about July when it is "released".

Through this, we will see his musical career slowly unwind in front of our ears. We can't listen to a new album until its fortnight comes up. We must listen to it at least three times to really let it sink in. And we can look back at Bowie, but never forward.

So in preparation for these rather Nazi-lite rules, I have just listened to Hallo Spaceboy twice, Ziggy Stardust whilst doing the washing up and watched this clip - possibly my favourite Bowie clip on the whole of Youtube, an amazing rendition of Ashes to Ashes performed for the BBC in a show originally broadcast in 2000. ENJOY!

In the year 1967….

…. the Bow’-Dawg was busy promoting his self titled debut album to hardly any attention at all, meanwhile other stuff was happening in the world. Stuff like this:

Interstellar!




Tragically U.S. astronauts Gus Grissom, Edward Higgins White, and Roger Chaffee were killed in a fire inside Apollo 1 whilst it was still on the launch pad.

The USA, USSR and UK signed the Outer Space Treaty which bars the placing of WMDs on the moon, on any celestial body or orbiting the earth. The treaty’s still going with 98 counties in on it now.






Black Holes were duly named by Professor John Archibald Wheeler. You’d think he could have come up with a better name then that after all those years at college. I expect he was a big disappointment to his parents.





Music too my ears!
The B-boy didn’t have much success that year, but plenty of other people did.








Aretha Franklin released Respect. CHOON!


The ‘Summer of Love’ introduced a new generation to STDs.

Elvis Presley and Priscilla Beaulieu got married in Vegas.






The Beatles release Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Gimme Pet Sounds anyday) and they were parodied in The Jungle Book (the last film Walt Disney personally over saw).
Pink Floyd releases their debut album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn.
The Doors released their debut album and upset middle America by singing the word “higher” on telly (not exactly the birth of punk was it).









Tony Blackburn got BBC Radio 1 off to a flying start by spinning ‘Flowers in the Rain’ by the Move.



Mr and Mrs Cobain were proud to announce the arrival of bouncing baby Kurt.






Let’s get Technological!







China got their H-bomb groove on.













BBC 2 started broadcasting colour telly. Nice.













The Concorde was shown off for the first time in Toulouse, France. Although super sonic passenger jets never caught on, this was a culturally significant moment as 35 years later the air craft would inspire the worlds 4th best novelty folk band.

Like Tigers on Vaseline...

Well hello to you all, I am the other half of this equation, as we surge head on into 2008 picking up Bowie albums along the way, reaching for the prize. Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Simon Rueben, and all being well I am using a different font to Benjamin. Here is a short resume of how all this came about.

So I was musing at work how brilliant David Bowie is. I think quite a few things are brilliant - New Order for example, I think they are great. If I had to go on Mastermind I would make them my specialist subject. I would consider - by virtue of owning all of their albums - that I am a fan.

At work I listened to Ziggy Stardust, and when it finished, flicked on my Ipod to find more Bowie. I soon realised that I had very little to choose from, very little indeed. And, as Ben has previously noted, a quick visit to Wikipedia reveal a career spanning 28 studio albums. I owned 4 of those albums. One album in seven. Clearly something needed to be done to address this imbalance.

And so I have spent most of this week trying to purchase these albums,with a view to listening to them throughout this year (or 2000andBOWIE as I prefer to call it). Most of them have been easy - Play.com have the majority of them for between £3.99 and £4.99. Others I have found on Ebay for wonderful prices. Ben found Black Tie White Noise in a charity shop, the little tinker. Others are proving harder. The Buddha of Suburbia has been the dearest so far, setting me back an alarming £7 on Ebay. And as for Tin Machine II, this is looking like being the golden fleece of this project, as it stands as the only Bowie album to currently be deleted.

But we will not let trifling matters such as this cause us to drop our chins. We must look onwards and upwards. There is a long year ahead, and we will start on Monday with his 1966 debut, before soaring on into the much more agreeable Space Oddity. There is something very exciting about holding an album by an artist you adore, only to look at the track list and see that you hardly know any of the songs. All very inspirational I'm sure you'll agree. Bye for now.

Everybody has to start some where

The quest starts on Monday with the our first fortnight dedicated to 1967's self titled debut album.

But to get us in the mood for what we are about to recieve, here's some vintage examples of dodgy men's fashions.

Come on.... it'll only take 10 minutes.



These first 3 videos are all from Love you Till Tuesday, a 30 min promo made in 1969 that stayed on a dusty shelf until 1984 when 'The Bowiester's international stardom and the home video market were equally chunky.



Urk what an aweful video, and I really liked that song too. At least Dave-oh flouncing around in his suit over the opening credits was fun.

Still I suppose it's quite ahead of it's time, play some Spandau or ABC over this video and see who spots the difference.
Unlike our next video, which is at least as 60's as ITV 1's The Royal and Heart Beat.



According to Wikipedia, Dave-oh is wearing a wig through out this promo after he had his hair cut short for an audition for the film Virgin Soliders.

And now for a 17 year old D-boy, apparently not wearing a wig and complaining about being called 'Darling' on national TV.

OH NO!

Rueben just had a scary thought….what if David Bowie releases a new studio album (or albums) in the next 12 months?

You never know, it could happen.

And if it does it’ll scupper the whole timetable!
29 albums in 26 fortnights?

It can’t be done!

I’ve had to take drastic measures and emailed Columbia Records.



Here’s the text of my email:

Dear Sir or Madam,

I believe that David Bowie is currently signed to your label following the Sony BMG buy out of the Iso record company.
As such I would like to urge you to use your influence to discourage Mr Bowie from releasing any new studio album or albums in 2008.

A friend and I are planning to work our way through his entire back catalogue of 28 (studio) albums this year. In order to do so we have worked out a rigorous listening regime for the next 12 months.
To our mutual horror, we realised that if Mr Bowie were to release a new album this year our plans would be up the swany.

It is for this reason that we would appreciate your co-operation in our respectful request for no new David Bowie studio albums over the next 12 months. And that goes for Tin Machine too.

Your sincerely… etc,

You can email them too:
columbia@trinitystreetdirect.com

Join the quest!

Album no 1: David Bowie (1967)

Here we go then,
Dave-oh's very first album, which didn't even chart.
Poor fella, just look at his little face!



You can’t get a proper CD of this album, but all the tracks are available on this:


The Deram Anthology 1966-1968

So we’ll just have to listen to that and use our imaginations.

The fortnights listening shall commence from midnight Monday 7th January 2008.

Can you feel the excitement?

That's Pretty Far Out Man

There's not going to me much going on here until we get jiggy with the Ziggys in the Bowie-o-meter for our first album feedback, and that's not for 2 weeks yet!

In the meantime here's some hi-jinkery from my favourite TV show of 2007, Flight of the Conchords:

Introduction....

Hello people sat at computers.



MBJ: I checked my emails on New Years Eve and found one sitting in my in box from my good buddy Rueben with this promising heading:

‘BOWIE!’

Here’s a little extract for you:

‘I want to talk Bowie
its New Years and I’m listening to my ipod. I’m listening to Bowie, just Bowie.
I have reached the conclusion that if you don’t like David Bowie,
if you are a person that says:
“you know, to be honest I don’t really like David Bowie all that much, I just don’t like his music”,
then I think there must be something seriously wrong with you
– you should go for a cat-scan or take a test of some sorts.



I can appreciate that out there in this big wide world there are people who don’t like the Beatles and Pink Floyd,
heck, even people who don’t like Pop Will Eat Itself (the fools).



But for someone to not like Bowie they must have a screw loose or something.

I am listening to Ashes to Ashes now and it is just a perfect pop record;
intelligent lyrics, incredible music, that brilliant “twing/twong” guitar, the slap bass,
there is not a thing wrong with it.
And now Fashion has just come on, oh boy.
“beep beep”.’

MBJ: As somebody who can always be relied on to get slightly cared away,
I sent back this subdued response:

‘Yay Baby! THAT’S WHAT I’M FREAKIN’ TALKING ABOUT! BOWIE BABY, BOWIE.’

3 days later Rueb’s emailed me some more Bowie love. Here’s an extract:

‘Ok, so Bowie Zowie Bowie.

Just been over on Wikipedia – guess how many studio albums Mr Bowie has had – answer is… 28 albums, including Tin Machine and also soundtrack albums. Here they are here:



1. David Bowie (1967, Did Not Chart)
2. David Bowie (1969, rereleased in 1972 as Space Oddity, when it reached UK #17, US #16)
3. The Man Who Sold the World (1970, UK #26, US #105)
4. Hunky Dory (1971, UK #3, US #93)
5. The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (1972, UK #5, US #75)
6. Aladdin Sane (1973, UK #1, US #17)
7. Pin Ups (1973, UK #1, US #23)
8. Diamond Dogs (1974, UK #1, US #5)
9. Young Americans (1975, UK #2, US #9)
10. Station to Station (1976, UK #5, US #3)
11. Low (1977, UK #2, US #11)
12. "Heroes" (1977, UK #3, US #35)
13. Lodger (1979, UK #4, US #20)
14. Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) (1980, UK #1, US #12)
15. Christiane F.(film soundtrack) (1981, US #135)
16. Let's Dance (1983, UK #1, US #4)
17. Tonight (1984, UK #1, US #11)
18. Labyrinth (film soundtrack) (1986, Did Not Chart)
19. Never Let Me Down (1987, UK #6, US #34)
20. Tin Machine (with Tin Machine) (1989, UK #3, US #28)
21. Tin Machine II (with Tin Machine) (1991, UK #23, US #126)
22. Black Tie White Noise (1993, UK #1, US #39)
23. The Buddha of Suburbia (1993, UK #87)
24. Outside (1995, UK #8, US #21)
25. Earthling (1997, UK #6, US #39)
26. 'hours...' (1999, UK #5, US #47)
27. Heathen (2002, UK #5, US #14)
28. Reality (2003, UK #3, US #29)

I feel a plan lumbering ahead of me here,
and it this – basically, each fortnight of this year will have one of the Bowie albums as my focus music-wise - and listen to each album at least say twice during “its” fortnight.

So spring will see me in Berlin with Iggy Pop,
by the summer I should be trucking through Let’s Dance era Bowie,
Autumn I will be groaning under the weight of Tin Machine
and come Christmas 2008 I will be buzzing to Electro-Bowie.

“But Rueben, 28 albums and only 26 fortnights, how will you do it?”
– easy, the albums I know well will just get a week each,
freeing up a spare fortnight for, I dunno, the soundtrack to Labyrinth.


And then as the year goes on I will see the career of Mr Bowie unravel in front of me with all its highs and lows, kind of like his career in microcosm.
And I can record what I liked and didn’t like and I guess give it a score on the old Bowie-o-meter (marked from 1-100 ziggy’s I guess).

Do you want to take my hand and take this odyssey with me?’

MBJ: What kind of chump would say ‘No’ to a challenge like that?

Welcome to ‘2000 and BOWIE’.
Come back every fortnight to follow our freaky-far out treck past the ‘best of’ collections and into the unknown regions of the Bowie-Sphere.