by

Rob Jones

Bye Bowie! What sad day it is on January 11 with the announcement that an 18 month battle with cancer has come to an end and David Bowie has passed away! After marking his 69th birthday on Friday, January 8, Mr. David Bowie has been sadly taken from us. After the recent trauma of Lemmy and John Bradbury the rock world is now marking another tragic loss.

Bowie has left behind an incredible legacy and in the song ‘Heroes’ alone he has written one of my most treasured songs and also one of the most iconic anthems in our times. However, there are so many more tunes and albums to admire as well as all of the other aspects of a career that has challenged so many fronts.

This departure from the ultimate musical chameleon is one which will shock the globe and the ‘Man who sold the World’ will hopefully get the respect that he so richly deserves. Without Bowie we would have been starved of so many aural adventures via his personal output and also the produce of the countless acts he helped (think Lou Reed and Iggy Pop). The plethora of plagiarists and also those who have been touched by the magic of the ‘Thin White Duke’ also score highly.

The influence of Bowie upon sonic genres is also immense e.g. Glam, punk and the New Romantic scenes. The wondrous wand of the man born David Robert Jones has been cast over a whole array of cultural variables. ‘Fashion! Turn to the left; Fashion! To the Right’………..it is impossible to gauge how different things would have been if Bowie had not made his incredible imprint.

I count myself lucky enough to have seen the great man live at Cardiff Arms Park in 1987 and that day now becomes an even greater event. There has also been the coutless hours of listening to the lustrous list of phenomenal fare that has come from the Bowie CV.
Perhaps the ‘Man who fell to Earth’ will now head in to another zone and find out what ‘Life on Mars’ is really like. Let us hope that he is now free from pain and we are grateful for the many pop pleasures that remain as a result of the artist formerly known as ‘Ziggy Stardust’. The new album ‘Blackstar’ has only just been released, and, its arrival is met with such sad news about its creator. David Bowie RIP.

Words do not seem to be sufficient as a means of expressing the positive spell that you have placed upon so many lives!

The picture shows David Bowie and Iggy Pop-and, that was a relationship that was extremely productive for both parties!