On Sunday February 18, Celebrating David Bowie came through Toronto, performing at The Danforth Music Hall. It was a fantastic night of David Bowie's music with an obviously beyond-excellent band, mostly comprised of veterans of Bowie's bands of the past. The band was led by pianist Mike Garson with Earl Slick and Gerry Leonard on guitars, Carmine Rojas on bass, Lee John Madeloni (who happens to be Earl Slick's son) on drums and I believe Mark Plati on guitar. Vocals were provided by Bernard Fowler, special guest Sass Jordan, Joe Sumner, and Gaby Moreno.
Sass Jordan was the special local guest for this show. She stepped on stage to take lead vocal duties twice and stuck around for back-up vocals for several more tunes. First up was her powerful rendition of "Moonage Daydream". She came back for "Panic In Detroit" and "Rock N Roll Suicide".
I've been a huge Bowie fan since I first heard his music as a kid and although I never got to see him perform live, I truly enjoyed this fitting tribute to one of the absolute greats of music, art and culture.
The setlist as I captured it:
"Bring Me the Disco King"
"Rebel Rebel"
"Moonage Daydream"
"Fame"
"Changes"
"Space Oddity"
"Quicksand"
"Drive-In Saturday"
"Win"
"Stay"
"Five Years"
"Panic In Detroit"
"Rock N Roll Suicide"
"Station to Station"
"Time"
"Lady Grinning Soul"
"Alladin Sane"
Cover of Johnny Mathis’ “Wild Is the Wind”
"Ziggy Stardust"
"Suffragette City"
"All the Young Dudes"
Encore
"Andy Warhol" performed solo by Gerry Leonard with some fantastic guitar playing and looping
"Life on Mars"
"Heroes"
My favourite tunes from the set:
"Rebel Rebel"
"Moonage Daydream"
"Fame"
"Changes"
"Space Oddity"
"Quicksand"
"Five Years"
"Rock N Roll Suicide"
"Station to Station"
"Ziggy Stardust"; an all-time classic and one of my favourite covers to play with the old band
David Bowie has been putting out ground-breaking music for longer than I've been alive. Not much longer, mind you, but still, longer. After an 18 month battle with cancer, David Bowie passed away yesterday, just two days after his sixty-ninth birthday and the release of his last album Blackstar.
David Bowie has been a constant in my musical evolution and musical history. I remember his music along with my earliest musical memories. Songs like "Changes", "Fame", "Young Americans" and "Golden Years" were on the radio when I was discovering rock music. They are indelible foundations of my musical life.
I remember discovering that the local library lent out vinyl albums and I took full advantage. I would take out anything that sounded like I'd heard of it, or anything that looked remotely cool. Just like today, there are more misses than hits, but that whole process was part of musical discovery that continues to this day. One of my favourite discoveries was a freaky looking album by David Bowie called Scary Monsters. It was a pretty out-there album for a pre-teen in the early 80s but I loved it. Some of my favourite tunes to this day came from that album; "Up the Hill Backwards", "Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps)", "Ashes to Ashes" and "Fashion". The first side was relatively normal, but the second side was pretty unhinged. It's got a pretty unique and powerful opening track, too. I loved it. I still do.
I remember seeing Bowie's characters such as Ziggy Stardust and The Thin White Duke, staring in wonderment at the diversity and evolution. I remember his shifting sounds from folk-tinged rock, to early R&B Americana, to avant garde rock, to smooth blues rock, to industrial, to dance music, and so on. I remember his innovation, the way he embraced and sought out change, the flexibility of his image and his thirst for collaboration. I remember that he first introduced me to a young blues guitar player named Stevie Ray Vaughan who would be a huge guitar influence. I remember seeing Bowie's love and thirst for that next new thing that matched my own.
David Bowie's music has become iconic for innumerable fans. "Ziggy Stardust" remains one of my favourite cover songs to play. I will always treasure the joy that his music brought to my life. He will be missed. But his music will be with us forever. For that, I'm truly thankful.
I can't possibly do justice to picking highlights of his musical career, but here are my choices for my favourite David Bowie music.
"Changes" from 1971's Hunky Dory
"Starman" from 1972's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars
"Ziggy Stardust" from The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars
"Young Americans" from 1975's Young Americans
"Golden Years" from 1976's Station to Station
"Heroes" from 1977's Heroes
"Up the Hill Backwards" from 1980's Scary Monsters
"Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps)" from Scary Monsters
"Ashes to Ashes" from Scary Monsters
"Fashion" from Scary Monsters
"Modern Love" from 1983's Let's Dance
"China Girl" from Let's Dance
"Let's Dance" from Let's Dance
"Dead Man Walking" from 1997's Earthling
"I'll Take You There" from 2013's The Next Day
"Lazarus" from 2016's Blackstar
I really loved David Bowie's 1989 side project Tin Machine's début Tin Machine
I've been letting the new David Bowie album The Next Day filter through my random smart playlists. The tune "I'll Take You There" came up the other day and I love the hard rockin' energy of this tune. I love when David rocks out, like he did with Tin Machine and at various other points in his long career.
So what if it's more than a week late?
And while this post has been sitting in queue, David released the newest video from The Next Day. It's for the title track, it stars Gary Oldman and it's got a controversial video. Ever heard that saying, "sacred cows make the best hamburger"?
I posted the first song released from David Bowie's forthcoming new album The Next Day when it came out. He's now released another tune. This one steps up the rock a bit. It's called "The Stars (Are Out Tonight)".
So I took some vacation. And the great David Bowie released a new song from a forthcoming new album that surprised everyone. Now I can't just sit back and pretend it didn't happen and not put up the track, can I? Definitely not.
The song's called "Where Are We Now?" and it's a beautiful, slow number featuring David's plaintive vocal performance, as emotive as ever, over a drum and piano mix that grows in intensity. And a kind of creepy video. To me, it's like seeing an old friend after years and years apart and realizing that they're still really fucking cool; just a bit older and more laid back.
David's long-time producer, Tony Visconti, has said that there are some more rock numbers on the album. We'll all have to wait and see.
If, by some chance, you haven't heard the song before, check it out below. If you have heard it, I think it's worth another listen.
The new album The Next Day is out March 12 in North America. I'm pretty excited to hear more now music from a wonderful artist who I thought would never release another album.
Back when I was a little kid with a budding passion for music, I used to get a lot of music at the local library. I'd flip through the Rock albums, borrowing anything that I'd thought I'd remotely heard of or anything that I thought looked cool. One time I happened upon David Bowie's Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) album. It met both criteria since I had heard of David Bowie and the cover sure looked cool.
Then I listened to it.
This album had some very cool music on it. From screaming Japanese lyrics to space age sound effects, all with really cool songs. You're probably familiar with tracks like "Ashes to Ashes", "Fashion" and the title track. One song that's always been a favourite of mine, and that's never been a big radio hit is "Up the Hill Backwards". It's a driving rock song with cool dynamics, great guitar work and an interesting lyric. Still one of my faves many years down the road.
