17 January 2020

It's the freakiest show

Friday it is. And as I am a great fan of Robin, I will again tag along with her fabulous idea of music on a Friday.

And because I am somewhat afflicted by patterns and lists and order in my life, I am doing this alphabetically by first letter of the first name.

This is week D and well, obviously, there has to be David Bowie. I could write a long essay here, how David Bowie came into my live when I was a dreadfully lost and bored teenager on school exchange in Grimsby (a town as grim as the name implies), how my stealing glittery blue eye shadow  in Woolworth still burdens my conscience some 40 something years later and yet, how the memory still cheers me on a rainy day. Painting my eye lids blue (and refusing to wash it off with the result that I was expelled from school) may for some be nothing more than pointless cosmetics in poor taste, but for me, on that day, it was a thrilling act of rebellion.








11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow! I've never heard this music before. I love it. Just watching David Bowie and those stunning eyes. Fantastic. Thank you for this.

ellen abbott said...

love David Bowie. we went to see him when he did his tour, the last times he would perform his work prior to I forget which year but so many classics of his. the world lost an amazing talent when he passed. I notice his eyes here, one dilated and one not. were they always like that?

Linda said...

What a treat. Never heard this before.

Love hearing about your act of rebellion too. Ah, the good ole days.

Sabine said...

I remember reading that he had an accident as a child which resulted in one of his eyes being permanently dilated.

am said...

Expelled from school for that blue eyeshadow! Now there are lots of teenagers with blue hair going to school.

The only part of the Life on Mars song I had heard before was the line about the caveman. I heard it on the radio when I was 10 years old in 1960. I love that David Bowie mixed that line into his song! (-:

https://youtu.be/sz6IpmmYSXA

The sweet taste of rebellion. When I was the age you were when David Bowie's music came into your life, it was Bob Dylan and the Beatles and the Rolling Stones that brought something into my life that saved me from despair. When I was 15? 16? my father told me that I was a nice girl until I started listening to Bob Dylan.

https://youtu.be/PPxnCNRm_nY

It is good to be reminded via that video of the extraordinary art David Bowie created.

In 1971, I wasn't paying attention to David Bowie or much of anything else in due to my life taking a dark turn, although I clearly remember hearing the distinctive sound of David Bowie's voice and songs on the radio while driving in my VW. It wasn't until about 10 years later that I matched his face with his voice because a friend of mine then was a David Bowie fan.

Tara said...

He was brilliant. I didn't appreciate his music when it was current...I'm a slow learner. There are actually a few artists of the period that (Queen) that I didn't discover until they were past their prime. I was a folk hippie chick all the way -- anything electric or glittery went right past me. Thanks for sharing David Bowie with us today.

Colette said...

I have to admit that as a newly married and very pregnant 20 year old in 1971, I had a poster of David Bowie up in our apartment. The thought of you stealing glittery blue eye shadow in Woolworth's tickles me.

37paddington said...

Refusing to wash it off to the point of being expelled, now that is commitment to self-expression, a necessary act of rebellion in the quest to become who you are. Love this story.

beth coyote said...

I LOVED Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Brilliant.

beth coyote said...

And he was a hero for all the trans/drag/queer folks with his crossdressing, gender fluid presentation. Bless David Bowie.

Secret Agent Woman said...

I love that. Those acts of rebellion are so essential to figuring out who you are.