Black Star is the most haunting brilliant album. I listen to it all the way through at least once a month. It fully displays the genius of the man.
They say don’t meet your heroes. I’ve found that to be generally true.
I met Bowie 3 times when trying to sign him to Epic.
We had dinner in NY. It was like being with an old friend. He was completely charming.
I then flew to Switzerland a couple of weeks later to hear his new album, Outside. I’ve never been more disappointed. However hard I tried I just didn’t like it.
A month later he invites me to a studio in NY to hear some new mixes. On the wall he has hung a 12 inch record with the Epic logo on and the name Outside on it!
I was prepared to give it a go but got no support from Glew.
Three years later I take up the job of President BMG Europe. I walk into my office and there’s a fax on my desk.
It’s says
“We meet again Moriarty”
Signed by David Bowie!
What a man.

Richard Griffiths

PS.
Let’s Dance is a masterpiece too

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I couldn’t agree with you more in regards to “Lady Grinning Soul.”  It’s always been one of my favorite deep cuts from Bowie.  A little bit of background on the inspiration for the song.  Claudia Lennear was an American background singer who began her career as one of the Ikettes in Ike & Tina Turner’s touring band.  She subsequently left and became part of Leon Russell’s Mad Dogs & Englishman band with Joe Cocker as well as performing in George Harrison’s Concert For Bangladesh and appearing in the film of the concert.  Not only was she a great singer but one beautiful lady.  Both Mick Jagger and David were crazy about her.  Mick wrote Brown Sugar for her and David wrote Lady Grinning Soul in her honor.  In addition, she also covered “It Ain’t Easy,” on her debut solo album Phew! in 1973.  Finally, she was also one of the featured singers in the 2014 Academy Award winning documentary, “20 Feet From Stardom.”

Bennett Freed

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Thanks for bringing this up. The “Spiders” era is my absolute favorite Bowie, to me it’s akin to the Rubber Soul/Revolver era Beatles, when it was still rock and roll firing on all cylinders but pushing said envelope. For me it was and remains “Aladdin Sane”. I know it didn’t have the same commercial impact as “Ziggy”, but for me it had less of the schtick and more of what made that band transcendent… Mike Garson’s solo on the title track, Ronson’s guitar intro in “The Prettiest Star” (the tone…), the snarl of “Cracked Actor”, even “Drive In Saturday”… for my money the album as a whole tells a clearer dystopian story than any of his others. And that “Let’s Spend The NIght Together” cover is the only cover you’ll ever need to hear of one of the Stones’ best singles. I missed them when they played at the Tower in Philadelphia but got to see the full-on augmented Spiders in Oxford, England, in July 1973, which was a life-changing experience.

“Young Americans”, though I did grow to appreciate it later, was a tune out to me, Bowie trading in his teeth for gums. And don’t even talk to me about ‘80s Bowie.

Eric Bazilian

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I first heard HUNKY DORY at 605 ridgefield road. I was immediately aware i was only living half a life.

I made ch ch ch changes. Thankyou divine intervention, music via bowie.

Andrew Loog Oldham

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Funky Music @ Luther Vandross is where Bowie bought Fascination. Luther also sang for Bowie. Seems like he was President of the Bowie Fan Club.

I would contend that Black Star was the album of the decade, but you probably won’t hear it because of the Jazz aspect.
Lp

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Tower Theatre in Philly ‘72.
Sat in the last row of the balcony.
Was a memorable moment that
inspired a lifetime of design/ direction.

honest in all aspects.
without explanation.

Brave!

Stay Safe, Bob
marc brickman

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Seeing Bowie’s Ziggy tour at 18 in Cleveland confirmed what I first felt 8 years prior watching the Beatles on Ed Sullivan. The electricity was jolting. The presence, the grace, the command of the stage and the audience was messianic. Peter Pan and the Pied Piper in a space suit

It reaffirmed that I had to do this and set my life’s path to always remain a musician even if it wasn’t always my main source of sustenance. Staying on top of the music by working in various facts of the industry kept it close but playing with people who love it as much as I do remains the underlying life motivation.

Stephen Knill

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Mick Ronson is always in my top ten of most catalystic artists.

Without Ronson…

Bowie’s career might just have been a lesser known series of overly artistic travails.

Marty Bender

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Good one, but somehow you avoid ’77s Heroes.  The second of the Berlin Trilogy, after LOW which really missed the mark.  It is an interesting period in Bowie’s career as he hunkered down in the most happening city in Europe, even then.  I’ll admit the title track is the best song on the album thanks to having Robert Fripp as the guitar sorcerer.  A brilliant move.  It’s an exhilarating track to me.  Bowie seems to be more out in the open and absorbing it all in a way he didn’t with his other incarnations that, while great, are also rather specific to a particular incarnation.

As one of the first FM stations to go free form, you can believe that BCN played tons of black music.  How can you play early rock and roll without including the great r’nb and blues artists from whom it sprang?

John Brodey

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My very first concert was Bowie’s first US concert in September 1972 at Cleveland Public Hall. I was not quite 15 and completely crazy for his music after hearing it played on WMMS.  When he announced his Ziggy Stardust tour – which originally did not include a Cleveland date – WMMS DJs urged listeners to write in and perhaps persuade Bowie to add Cleveland to his tour. I must have sent 15 postcards. It worked, and he decided to open the tour in Cleveland; I’ve still never been more excited for anything in my life, and will never forget the thrill of hearing the Beethoven intro, seeing strobe lights for the first time, and watching Bowie jumping on stage to “Hang On to Yourself.”

During a long career in radio, I had the opportunity to meet and talk with him a couple of times over the years. When I told him that my very first concert was his first US concert, he kindly replied, “Oh, no, you can’t possibly be that old.”

Elise Brown
Philly

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I saw Bowie at the Public Auditorium in Cleveland in November 1972. My first concert.

The show was one of those experiences you never forget!

Marc Andrews

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To me Bowie is a classic example of a pre-steaming artist. Two maybe three good songs per album. Given enough of a career by the label to build up a catalogue of songs that would fill a greatest hits album. On their own though a lot of those albums aren’t that impressive.

Cheers

David Donaldson.

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1. The Korvette’s on 5th avenue had the best record department! 2. It’s the Ronson solo on Moonage! 3. Where’s Station to Station?

Tag Gross

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Aladdin Sane & Diamond Dogs were his 2 finest moments of his 70’s catalog.

But I agree, Somebody Up There Likes Me was overlooked & underrated.

Rick Marino

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Nice piece Bob. Interesting mention of “It Ain’t Easy.” I’d never heard the original, but was of course familiar with the Bowie and Long John Baldry versions. Even the Raconteurs have taken a swing at that one, but my favorite is Chris Smither’s solo acoustic reading of the song.

It’s just one man picking and singing with virtuosity, but otherwise the tune has zero bombast. This is the true mark of a great composition; when one breaks it down into only its most important constituent parts and it still sounds great.

Ben Hunter

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I was a high school freshman soaking all the new music like a sponge in 1972, when late one night, listening to an import/new music show on KMET, the opening chords to Suffragette City blasted through my headphones like a bolt of lightning, and just like that I was hooked. Had to seek out the Ziggy album in the import bins, but what an incredible sonic reward once procured. I was way ahead of the curve on this one and it felt good. I took some shit from my friends because of Bowie’s questionable sexuality, but six months later, they came around to Bowie and the vindication was sweet.

Dennis LeBlanc

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“Nothing Bowie ever did was as good as “Ziggy Stardust” and “Hunky Dory.”

Have you listened to the album “Heroes” lately?
Easily on par with “The White Album”.
Both have an indulgence or two, but other than that, perfect. “Heroes” is super solid, has a sound that is unlike any other, truly experimental, but on a subtle level that doesn’t distract from the music, and the songs are wonderful.

To each their own, but I feel you need to relisten to the Berlin period, if you’re making the above statement.

Cheers,

Jason Steidman

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Love most Bowie but you overlooked 1 track on Ziggy…
Where he kills Ziggy off – “you’re a Rock N Roll suicide”…
Great tune….
Jc

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I don’t always agree with you … and I don’t honestly agree with some of your assessment of Bowie’s works…but I will say this…

I consider myself a Bowiephile – a HUGE fan of the man & his work. My discovery of the Ziggy Stardust LP is largely responsible for my decision to chase a career in the music business.  It is THE recording that changed my life.

That said,  “Somebody Up There Likes Me” has been my favorite David Bowie song since that first  day that I dropped a needle on my new copy of Young Americans.  NO tune has supplanted its status since.  It is easily  in the Top 3 of my all-time favorite songs!

Kudos on the recognition of an unheralded masterpiece.

Bob Reeves

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I lived in a dorm at San Diego State University when Ziggy came out – my dorm mates were from Pacific Palisades and Malibu and saw the first Bowie tour that played Santa Monica Civic in 1972 I believe.  They turned me onto Bowie and me, a small town kid from Barstow, CA, immediately became a fan. I would go visit my friends in Barstow on weekends and tried to turn them onto the Ziggy LP but they couldn’t get past his looks and insisted on calling him David BOW-ie, as in Jim Bowie from the Alamo.  Saw the Diamond Dogs show in 1974 at the Universal Amphitheatre and to this day, one of my most favorite shows.  Lady Grinning Soul is a hidden gem on that LP for sure.  Thanks.

Tim Mays

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yes!

every garage band played “suffragette city” but i agree, its

“moonage daydream” all the way to the moon and back!   your taste here  is just impeccable here.  ziggy is 100 percent the best bowie album  . cranking it for the kids  3. 7, 11   right now.   they know the album.

and they make fun of todays pop music.

all the best,

ajr

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I thought “Station to Station”, “Heroes”, “Low” and especially “The Lodger” were better than Ziggy as was “The Next Day” and Black Star”….

Michael Fremer

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Vivid memories of all those Bowie records. It’s strange to consider that there’s a whole world of people who didn’t consume them as deeply and reflexively as we did back in the day. The deep cuts on Ziggy and Young Americans were so rich.

Talking Ziggy Stardust, I was not aware of this album outtake until a friend recently turned me on to the beautiful latter day reworking.

Shadow man Ziggy demo

Shadow man from Toy

Best,

Ralph

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Good stuff Bob, yes Lady Grinning Soul marvelous as are the Ziggy and HD LPs. Would slightly disagree about his best though, for my money the Low, Lodger and especially Heroes albums are superior and ‘Scary Monsters’ the absolute peak, it was all downhill fast after that.

Thanks for the piece though,

Keith Stael

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sorry Bob but i have to disagree with you here on a few points.  that’s the thing with Bowie though.  there is sooo much unbelievably strong material that anyone can credibly argue for what they ‘know’ to be the best Bowie.

personally i think his entire 70s output up to and including Scary Monsters is his strongest.  all of it.  Heroes being my favorite but barely ahead of Hunky Dory (with Rick Wakeman’s piano anchoring and coloring the entire record especially on Life On Mars, Changes, etc..), then Young Americans and Scary Monsters.  those records and everything in between.  that said, i love his 80s and 90s output including Tin Machine.  i feel he rested on his laurels a bit after Earthling on records and live w/backing tracks until his return with Blackstar.

but with such a huge catalogue of deep material touching on just about every genre across so many decades with so many collaborators and band members, the one factual constant was Bowie himself.  that is his unique greatness.  i’m hoping everyone can agree on that.

Angelo “Scrote” Bundini

Creator & producer of Celebrating David Bowie Concerts

CelebratingDavidBowie.com

P.S. ps – you attended and wrote about our show Celebrating David Bowie w/Todd Rundgren & Adrian Belew in October 2018. here’s a clip of Mike Garson guesting with us in Brixton on the one year anniversary of David’s passing.  Holly Palmer on vocals.  the promoter i worked with on that show called it the best show of her life.  it sold out in 2 hours.  the audience hung on every syllable of the 4 hour long show with 70s performers coming and going all night.  all live strings, horns , gospel choir, etc..

hope to see you again in 2021-22, Bob, when we get back touring.

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Similar to you I was mesmerized by Ziggy Stardust album, bought it immediately. And then checked out rest of his catalog.
One of my all time favorite live shows was seeing Bowie on Valentines Day in 1973 at Radio City in NYC. What a trip that was with what seemed like every downtown denizen showing up dressed to nines! All Warhol freaks, totally glam!  And then Bowie arrived on stage on a lift! Amazing performance. I saw him live multiple times but nothing surpassed this tour!
PS kudos to Station to Station also.
Regards;
Dave Bodnar

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David Bowie Auditorium Chicago – Oct 7th 1972

I was at this show with my girlfriend. We had cheap tickets way in the back but it was not very crowded so we were able to move very close to the front of the stage! While the opening band Wilderness Road was playing, we bumped into some friends who passed around a joint. Little did we know just before Bowie came on another joint was passed to us that was laced with Angel Dust. So now we are both completely out of our minds when Bowie hits the stage! This was absolutely the best concert I have ever been to! After the show we were still blazing from the Angel Dust and wound up walking all the way home to Old Town where I lived!  I bought the Bowie Santa Monica ’72 bootleg album months later to try and get a taste of what we had experienced on Angel Dust. It was great to hear that concert BUT still could not even remotely compare to what we had experienced at the Chicago show. David Bowie and Mick Ronson were major influences for me as a musician and still continue to inspire me as a musician and filmmaker!

Arthur

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Ziggy was the best. I missed the Santa Monica Civic show in 72; not even sure I knew about it until Robert Hilburn wrote an incredible review. He came back in 73 at the Long Beach Arena where I did see him. He changed his outfit at least 7 times during the show. Great show!!!. Suffragette City is still the classic in my mind

I saw him at the Anaheim Convention Center in 74. Elizabeth Taylor was there and in the seats, not backstage. There was an intermission I believe, or after a supporting act, and the line to get her autograph was lengthy. This was his “nightclub show” and his attire matched. Ziggy songs were all watered down but the performance was top notch.

Then Diamond Dogs…this is my favorite after Ziggy. “This ain’t rock and roll, this is genocide”  So much good stuff on here. Rebel; Rebel; 1984; Big Brother and more.

I saw Bowie 4 more times. At the Oklahoma Zoo Amphitheater with the B’52s during the Let’s Dance tour; the Roxy showcase performance where he and the Huntz Bros introduced Tin Machine; a showcase for a band Rhythm Tribe where he showed up; and with REM at the Palace in Auburn, MI.

I really miss him and Mick Ronson. I got to meet Mick and Ian Hunter after a show at the Pantages in the late 80’s. Mick had just had a kid and he seemed so happy. (My son was born right around that time). Soon after he died of cancer. This really bummed me out. At least their music lives on.

Randy Schaaf

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Hey Bob,

I never understood how or why Philadelphia got on the Bowie bus so early. As a 10th grader, some older stoner buddies took me out to the Tower theater in Upper Darby in 1972 to see the first Bowie shows in Philly. That was the night I got on the bus. A year and half later, when he came back for his week long Tower Theater residence that eventually became the album, “Bowie Live,” I caught four of the shows on a drug fueled fugue that I was still too young to either process or be responsible for. No regrets. During that run, WMMR, Philadelphia’s historical FM masthead, let it slip that Bowie was recording at Sigma Sound. We’d hang out in front of the studio all night after the shows, for no apparent reason other than to come down before going home at dawn, perhaps catch a glimpse of the Thin White Duke running to a limo. I remember the sensation of a city immersed in Bowie that week, still one of my most vivid memories.

It’s hard to believe that was so long ago.

At the same time we were tripping out for a week on Bowie shows in the city, the weekends, we were going to Springsteen shows 50 miles away down the shore. For whatever reason, nobody was picking sides, it was all just a part of our cultural mix from my teen-age years.

Bowie has been one of my lifelong, life affirming foundation for both a young, and now a much older me. But unlike most of the other rock cornerstones who have persisted since my pre- & teen-age years – Motown, the Beatles, Dylan, The Dead, Velvet Underground – Bowie was not a cul-de-sac, but rather a window to many new worlds who I appreciated not only for his own formidable work, but for the pop-culture signposts that he would point me to throughout his incredible life.
I saw Bowie whenever he went out on tour, and loved every show, especially the last run in 1995, but nothing compares to the first time seeing “Ziggy…” performed live when it was still culture-shock.
Stay safe.

Brad Kligerman
Paris, France

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Me too. Spent the summer of ’72 in England as a student. Got turned on to Bowie through his big hit, “Starman” that summer. Saw him on TOTP. He’d hit my radar previously during his “I’m wearing dresses” phase, but he hadn’t registered musically with me. That fall, back in the US, Bowie was booked to play at the Auditorium Theater (great Louis Sullivan turn-of-the-century venue) in Chicago. He must have been playing the same setlist, also started with “Hang On To Yourself.” The impact I still carry with me was the brilliance of the band’s presentation, visually. For several years there, we had suffered through one of my least favorite ’60’s rock concert conventions – band plays standing in front of tons of gear, band wraps, house lights up, then, a parade of roadies looking like biker gang rejects fumble about the stage for too long until the next band plays in front of too much gear. Bowie’s people at the Auditorium pulled all the shit off the stage except for the essentials. They raised every curtain leaving the brick wall at the back of this old proscenium arch theater exposed. The stage looked huge and naked. Mick Ronson was playing through his legendary Marshall Major head and a Marshall slant cab, alone, out in the open, not a traditional backline. I believe the drums weren’t on a riser. This all served to make the band members stand out in a much more powerful way. We were seeing a new thing. The number that really took me by surprise was Bowie’s cover of Jacques Brel’s “My Death Waits.” Brel’s morbidity was paired with a singer that could really do something with it. Ah, the joy of seeing a great band ripping up the playbook and showing us the future!

Robert Miranda

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Its cool now to talk about those amazing Bowie records but when I was in 6th grade you had to know how to fight if you wanted to talk about those Bowie records cuz kids and parents thought he was a freak.

I LOVED Bowie and even more I LOVED the band he had. I wasn’t a musician yet but when Diamond Dogs came out I knew something was way different and by David LIve I was downright angry….Mick Ronson was a God among men and years later I would realize Trever and Woody were too. In 6th grade for me it was all about guitar players and singers BUT I would freak out over Mike Garson’s piano. I lived in San Diego and I use to hear rumors that he lived in LaJolla and was playing at the LaJolla play house. I would always keep my eyes open wanting so badly to meet him but it never happened until MANY years later in the mid 90s. I was backstage at the Universal when my big Brother Carmine Rojas (another amazing past Bowie member) was talking to this odd guy named Mike. Carmine then said to me Stevie have you ever met Mike Garson? I almost fell on the ground…I said to him, I have been wanting to meet you since I was in 6th grade!! He said I live in Woodland Hills I’m in the phone book and no one ever calls me…SO I called him and asked him play on a song I was recording called A Dedication To You. When he walked into Cherokee Studios I was as nervous as I was when I first met George Harrison or Bill Graham because his piano playing was that important to me…He sat at the piano… I was too stupid to think to have it tuned before he arrived and he said…Its out of tune ( who used a real piano in the 90s on Alternative music??) but then he started playing and from the first bar it was 1972…Avant-garde Mike Garson making things sound so outside but so beautiful. I almost cried. We talked a lot about Bowie and became friends. I would hire him over the years for special things including having him create the massive opening for Adam Lamberts live debut on the American Music Awards ( I was Adams music Director and for his song Thats Entertainment I asked Mike to play a dramatic opening which was amazing for TV but sadly most people only remember Adam kissing the bass player on national TV causing the country to go nuts).

A few years ago Mike called me and asked me to play some dates on the David Bowie Celebration Alumni tour. I set up on his side of the stage and every night when he played Aladdin Sane and Lady Grinning Soul I not only had the best seat in the house I was in 6th grade again.

Stevie Salas

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Thankyou Bob, I loved this!  First of all, I’ve never heard anyone talk about Bowie in less than 100% awed reverence and worship, so to hear about the releases that were “misses” back in the day (I’m 31, born ’89) is really interesting.

I’m a vocal coach, and it was one of my kookier clients who introduced me to “Lady Grinning Soul” when he wanted to sing it. I’ve been fascinated by it ever since.  It’s seductive and strange, like staring into a crystal ball. All my other Bowie favourites will get a lot more play, but every now and then I put on “Lady Grinning Soul” and just enjoy the feeling of mystery.  There’s not enough mystery in our lives.

Bec Tilley
(Hobart, Tasmania)

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That final paragraph to your great Bowie homage sums it all up, Bob, that special night where it all comes together, that we get all misty eyed just talking about as a memory to others which no words can ever do justice in the retelling. I relived that moment just by reading your email. The best writing and the best music does that to is, takes us to that special place again. Beautiful, Bob, just beautiful. Thank you for taking me to that special place , you got a really BIG heart. Happy Hanukkah!

Chuck Steffen

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Killer last paragraph.

Andrew Samples

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Bob, I promise not to respond to every letter you write, but this is just too much for me not to reply to.  I’ve been working on some sort of memoir for a few years now, trying to get some of my best music business stories on paper before I’m wearing Depends and can’t remember them anymore. Here’s my Bowie story from my as-yet-unpublished book:

 

In the spring of 1977, Iggy Pop went on tour with David Bowie as the keyboard player, and three of us hardcore Bowie fans from the swap meet decided to go to the show and somehow find a way to meet Bowie.  It was me, Paul Behm, and his friend Linda. We figured that after the Santa Monica Civic show, the band would go party and then back to their hotel, and then in the morning the group would wake up and head to the airport to get to the next show. Our best guess was that they’d probably show up at LAX at 10:30 or 11:00 am the next day to make it to the next show.

 

Paul was a rabid Bowie fan who dressed like Bowie and had the red Alladin Sane haircut. Paul called himself Bobby Pyn and had a horrible group with Georg Ruthenberg called the Germs. Eventually “Bobby” and “Pat” made a record for local surf dude Chris Ashford which they put out on What? Records.  They really couldn’t play or sing or write, but Joan Jett made a record with them and Paul/Bobby then became Darby Crash and Georg became Pat Smear (Foo Fighters). I liked Paul and was a friend of his, but almost no-one in the L.A. scene took him seriously as a musician or artist, and he was known to follow fashion trends as quickly as they popped up. The last time I saw him he was really into Adam Ant and was wearing Native American garb and moccasins to a show at the Whiskey.  When he died of a drug overdose (bad timing, the same day as John Lennon was shot), he became a martyr of sorts and I’m told his parents sold off all his Bowie memorabilia to pay for his funeral.

 

So anyway, Paul, Linda and myself had hatched up this brilliant scheme to find Bowie at L.A.X. and we went down to the airport to find our hero. In those days there was no TSA and you could just walk straight up to the gate with your family and wait with them until they got on the plane. So we had free reign of the airport to find our hero. We went from one departing flight to another looking for the man, loaded up with all sorts of things we wanted him to sign for us.  (I seem to recall we were looking for flights to Dallas, but the internet tells me the next show was in San Diego. In those days it was much quicker to drive to San Diego from Los Angeles than to fly.)

 

After he didn’t show up in the departure areas for 4 consecutive departing flights, we decided it was a stupid idea (it was) and turned around to go home. Suddenly Linda screams “There he is.” He was in line at an airport cafeteria with a tray in his hand picking out some food for an early lunch. We ran over to him squealing like little girls, and asked him if he’d sign our stuff. He said he was just starting lunch, and if we’d wait for him, he’d sign our stuff after lunch.

 

So we went a respectable distance away from him to allow him to eat his lunch. In our mind a respectable distance was around 10 feet. As he looked up at us, he realized that eating his lunch in peace with three morons hyperventilating a few feet away would be impossible. Bowie got up from the table and said “why don’t I just sign your stuff now?” meaning “if I sign your crap, will you leave me peace?” I pulled out the original sheet music for his very first record “Liza Jane,” by Davie Jones with the Kingbees and asked him if we would sign it as his original name, Davie Jones. He said “no” and promptly signed the record “Bo” and wrote the year under it. He then signed my “dress cover” of The Man Who Sold The World. Then he signed Paul’s and Linda’s stuff and basically said something like “I trust that handles it,” meaning “Leave me alone now?”

 

With that he turned, threw down the cigarette he had been smoking, stepped it out,  and went back to his lunch. In a heartbeat, Paul and I scrambled to the ground to claim David Bowie’s cigarette butt. I won the fight and ended up with a filterless Gitanne but that had David Bowie’s actual DNA on it. Many years later I found it in my drawer and threw it away.  So giddy were the three of us at having hatched this brilliant plan (that actually succeeded) to meet our idol that we drove to the Sunset Strip and splurged on an expensive meal at the Old World Restaurant.

Randall Wixen

Music must be listened to on CDs. They’re a perfect format, a perfect listening experience and we spend a lot of money to make those productions and that is the way the creators want their music to be heard.

HUH?

We heard this rubbish twenty years ago. When the audience yanked the music industry into the twenty first century. Funny, all the youngsters are happy with the new world order, it’s only the oldsters who continue to complain, bitching that the old methods of compensation were superior and they must be restored.

Move fast and break things. Wasn’t that the motto of Facebook? And now Facebook is so big the government wants to break it up while the movie studios fight for survival, at least in the theatrical business. Statistics, they were and continue to be ignored in the music business and now the same thing is happening in the movie business. Theatrical attendance is DOWN! People just don’t want to go to the movie theatre, it’s a crappy experience. Sure, the screen is big, but the audience is rambunctious, talking and typing, and the floor is dirty and tickets are overpriced. Don’t argue with me, you’re just gonna appear to be an old fogey, like those who tried to argue the value of music decades ago, to rationalize the price of a CD. How did that turn out? Recorded music revenues sank until the industry aligned with the new paradigm, provided by outsiders, like Apple and Spotify, it’s always been outsiders, until now, when Warner Brothers wants to jet into the future and the establishment just can’t handle it, is crying like it’s two years old.

Let’s start with Covid-19. The movie industry is run by oldsters. How many of them have left their domiciles to go to a movie theatre? Yeah punk, you want everybody else to go, but you wouldn’t be caught dead there, because you don’t want to be dead. This is the coastal elitism many Americans have contempt for and despise. The truth is America is mostly locked down, and the movie industry could do a service and make shows that reinforce the danger of the virus and the need to take it seriously, but instead it argues for just the opposite. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

So, let’s hold back the productions until theatrical is flourishing once again. What, do you want to be the touring business, shut down completely, begging the government for relief as its workers starve? What ignorant bozos are protesting the distribution of these flicks. Furthermore, not every movie will survive on the shelf, motion pictures become dated just like food.

BUT THEY’RE SELLING THEM TO HBO MAX, IT’S INSIDER DEALING!

Yes, you’re exactly correct! This is one of the few real issues at play here. But we saw the same thing in the music business, is streaming a license or a royalty and how should artists be paid…when the truth is in the old game they were underpaid in an opaque world. This is still a problem in the music business, low compensation on indecipherable terms, just the way the majors like it. But the youngsters can circumvent the majors and go directly to the distributors, with their transparent payments…yes, all that bitching by artists who are signed to major labels with bad deals but somehow it’s Spotify’s fault? They’re just demonstrating their ignorance.

Not only do people not want to go to the movie theatre, they don’t want to pay for streaming an individual film on the flat screen, that ship has sailed. Would have worked five years ago, certainly ten, but the movie industry waited too long. Now customers are already paying for streaming services and they don’t want to pay the equivalent of a monthly fee just to watch one movie, films must be baked into a service, and not everybody is willing to pay for every service, no way, so it’s a race to see who survives, and not all of them will, this is not cable television, where the provider pays obtuse, small audience channels to keep them alive…in streaming people pay directly, they either want your product or they don’t.

Self-dealing… That’s another reasonable question here…what is the value of said Warner Brothers movies distributed by HBO Max? They’ll argue about it for a long time, meanwhile AT&T/WB/HBO Max will have achieved one of their goals, propping up, hopefully building their overpriced individual system, HBO Max. Yes, HBO is making the same mistake the major labels did, they think their customers are the cable systems just like the majors believed their customers were the retailers, when the truth is in digital the customer is the end user, THE CONSUMER! HBO Max is so overpriced, it’s a laugh. Drop the price immediately or be prepared for death. Disney+ raced to equivalency with Netflix with a low introductory price, which it just raised by a dollar, which is still nowhere close to that of HBO Max… HBO must drop the price today, before any of the films in question play on the service.

So, AT&T/WB/HBO is being vilified for pushing a moribund industry run by self-satisfied wankers into the present, never mind the future. The industry should be lauding AT&T/WB/HBO, those who resist change will be left by the wayside when it finally arrives.

Oh, I know, it’s hard to rationalize those giant costs to produce a film! But, once again, the music industry is a beacon…SPEND LESS! Turns out you don’t have to spend five hundred grand or a million to make an album, that was just allowed because of the economics of the old system.

And the new game allows people to make even more money, there are more opportunities! In music, you have to go on the road, boo-hoo, at ticket prices so exorbitant people’s jaws would have dropped in the pre-internet era, yet the public is lining up to pay them, looking for a unique experience people just can’t get anywhere else! Let’s call a spade a spade, there’s been no better time to be in the film business, BECAUSE THERE ARE SO MANY BUYERS! Netflix makes passion projects, like “The Irishman” and “Mank,” both overrated, when the studios wouldn’t lay down the money. Netflix is commissioning films all day long and what is the complaint? Once again, that they didn’t open in theatres first, they’re not entitled to Oscars… Then again, have you looked at the Oscar telecast recently? Ratings are in the toilet and winning is ignored by most of the public. The ceremony and its statuettes are out of date and out of touch. So, what does the industry do? Enlarge nominee pools to try and satiate those who aren’t paying attention while the films now included have no chance of winning anyway…look where half-measures get you, NOWHERE!

Come on, the standard home screen size is now 65″. And the TVs come with such miniscule speakers that almost everybody has a soundbar or system. And not only can you start the flick when you want to, you can pause it when you need to go to the bathroom… Yeah, how many of these aged movie businessmen can even sit through the lengthy productions they release, their prostates are too enlarged! In an on demand culture, the movie business wants us to stay in the past, get to the theatre at an anointed time to overpay to sit through endless advertisements and previews to get to a high concept film that doesn’t appeal to most people anyway! Is this what must be saved, superhero movies? Turns out “The Mandalorian” was a bigger draw on Disney+ than the recent “Star Wars” pictures in the theatre.

And any true artist will admit that consumption is more important than cash. In other words, they create for their work to be experienced! More people are exposed to your product in streaming, more people see it, this is a problem? As for windows…we live in a world where what happens this morning is forgotten by the afternoon, do you really think the marketing survives for a year, never mind the cost of said marketing?

No, the truth is movies are to be consumed on a flat screen at home as part of an overall streaming service. Done deal. WB wakes up and facilitates this and the industry is positively stunned by the obvious and is up in arms, complaining that someone has moved their cheese when the truth is the audience already ate it.

Meanwhile, the backwards news industry, decimated by the internet, can’t stop reporting this story, as if it’s sexy and everybody cares. NO ONE CARES EXCEPT THOSE INVOLVED! Come on, find me a consumer complaining that they can’t wait to overpay a year from now to see a film in the can today. YOU CAN’T FIND ONE!

The history of the internet is disruption. And if you follow the words of the dearly departed Clayton Christensen, the only way for established players to survive in the new world is to disrupt themselves. Disney is now doing this, it got in just under the wire, just in time with Disney+, and has said its future focus will be on its streaming service, because that’s where the future is, that’s where the bucks are. But the artists can’t stop complaining like David Crosby, who doesn’t understand the economics of streaming and doesn’t understand that most people don’t want to listen to his new work, and he’s lucky to be getting paid on his old stuff, prior to the internet, in the days of physical goods, no one would be stocking all those CSN(Y) and Byrds LPs, no way, never mind buying them. Yup, it’s a disaster, those records are going to generate revenue for the life of the copyright…but since they are, Crosby wants to be paid at sixties and seventies rates, not to mention that he’s got crappy deals with the labels?

But you can never satiate everybody, and the old with an audience are appealing to those who believe in conspiracy theories…hell, it’s just like Trump! Does Hollywood believe that Trump was defrauded and actually won the election? OF COURSE NOT! But it does believe that someone, not that they’re sure who it is, stole their industry, their bread and butter, and anybody who tries to address this issue is part of the problem, not the solution.

Soon we won’t be discussing this, only antiques will complain. The audience will expect new movies to stream just like they expect to be able to listen to every new record in the world on Spotify. THE HORROR! And if you want to make mazuma in the future it’s very simple…garner an audience. Major labels and movie studios have funded creators forever, most especially their losing projects. Now, if you have a limited audience, you create yourself, the means of production are in your hands, it’s inexpensive, and anybody can distribute on Spotify, et al. Same deal with the moving image, if you can’t get on one of the pay streaming services, you can distribute for free on YouTube! Or TikTok, which is even bigger than the movies. This is what embracing the future delivers.

Stop listening to old people wanting the old standards to continue to apply. We’re moving to electric cars. Social media is here to stay. Can we all get on the same page and try to eradicate the problems that do exist in the new world? NO, WE MUST KEEP OUR HEADS IN THE SAND!

https://spoti.fi/3qQXNse

1

Nothing Bowie ever did was as good as “Ziggy Stardust” and “Hunky Dory.” Sure, individual tracks hit peaks, although many will argue “Space Oddity,” his very first hit, was his best, but I disagree.

I started with “Ziggy Stardust.” I was in London in ’72 and Bowie and T. Rex were all the rage. Emerson, Lake & Palmer’s “Trilogy” got slagged. But little of this translated to the United States.

So, when I returned to American soil, after a flight on a Pan Am 747 so smooth that I slept through the landing, I immediately went to Korvette’s and purchased “Ziggy Stardust.”

Actually, that’s not the full name. It’s “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.” You see this was a concept. Albeit loose. It all seemed to be in service to Bowie himself, and his new persona. And eventually there was a film of that fall ’72 tour, but if you were there in person…

You used to be early on things, it was a badge of honor. Then again, we were so hungry for new music, to follow these artists as they pushed the envelope, we needed to get closer, and to see them live…that’s the only place you could see them. This was right before the launch of “In Concert,” then again, at first, when it was brand new, the show never featured anything obscure, anything that hadn’t broken or wasn’t a priority at the label. So I went to the Boston Music Hall, which was maybe half-full, and the strobe lights pulsed and Bowie and his compatriots took the stage in their “metallic” suits and through the magic of the internet, I can look up the set list and see the opening number was “Hang on to Yourself,” which was punk rock before the Ramones, just listen to the guitar, played, of course, by Mick Ronson, it’s a weird world wherein Mark is bigger than Mick, but Mick burned out early and is unknown to the younger generation. But the point is the band started with such energy, with no artificial help, no tapes, no musicians behind the curtain, that you were immediately wowed. Watching the music come alive was positively staggering, I felt like I was witnessing something that others were clueless about, that was important, although I had no idea that Bowie would eventually become a household name.

Actually, the best song was the encore, when the band came out after all the applause with the lights turned up high and performed “Around and Around.” Sure, it was a Chuck Berry number, but the Stones owned it, it was the opening number on “12×5.” But Bowie had a way of making an old chestnut original, solely his own. He exuded confidence. It was like he was channeling history and making history. And there was a way he stood on stage, long arms and legs splayed, almost like Gumby, it’s hard to describe his exact stance, but I’ll never forget it.

2

“I’m an alligator…”

“Moonage Daydream” is my favorite track on “Ziggy Stardust.” Today, people occasionally mention it, but back then…crickets.

It’s the crunchy guitar, the dynamics, but mostly the descending chorus…

“Keep your ‘lectric eye on me babe

Put your ray gun to my head

Press your space face close to mine love

Freak out in a moonage daydream, oh yeah”

And then Mick Ronson cuts the fog once again and the biggest surprise on “Ziggy Stardust” was the cover of Ron Davies’s “It Ain’t Easy,” which I knew from the A&M sampler album, “Friends.” And the funny thing is most people have never heard the original, it’s not on streaming services, but it is on YouTube: https://bit.ly/3oJ6OBZ and I still prefer it to Bowie’s rendition because the chorus in David’s cover is just too loud, too in-your-face. Listen to the original. They don’t make music like this anymore, at least major labels don’t sign it and most of the public is not interested in hearing it, then again the public seems to have lost touch with what a great song is…changes, melody, Bowie knew.

And it’s hard to forget the lyrical lead in the title track, and at this point “Suffragette City” is a classic, but really it’s all about the opener, “Five Years.”

“Pushing through the market square

So many mothers sighing

News had just come over

We had five years left to cry in”

1972 was the year of “A Clockwork Orange.” We were looking into the future and those on the artistic cutting edge were not painting a rosy picture, one of the reasons “Star Wars” was such a hit in ’77 was because of the wear and tear on the equipment, this was not your father’s Hollywood.

“News guy wept and told us

Earth was really dying

Cried so much his face was wet

Then I knew he was not lying”

This climate change thing is not new. California is burning up, there are endless hurricanes on the east coast, but there are still people denying the difference, but they’re probably the same ones who were listening to “Smoke on the Water.” Yes, a lot of mainstream rock was getting heavy and dumb. Not that I could not appreciate a good riff, it’s just that now there was an FM station in every burg, cars even had that band in the dashboard and the rest of the country caught up with the coasts but was mired in the heaviness as opposed to going on the ride into the future, with acts like David Bowie. On one hand, “Ziggy Stardust” was a bit cheesy, this space stuff was more sixties than seventies, but American music had split into dumb or soft, forget what was on Top Forty, yet there was room for experimentation in the U.K., such that you could accept the futuristic vision on “Ziggy Stardust.”

Which contained no hits.

At this point, you didn’t even have to cross over to AM to go massive, but without that one definitive track that programmers all agreed on, whatever your artistic chops, you were second tier.

3

I will always love “Ziggy Stardust,” it was my first, but when you loved something or someone you always went back to the catalog, which led me to “Hunky Dory,” and sure it contains “Changes,” but that’s not why I must say it’s Bowie’s best album. “Ziggy Stardust” was of a piece, whereas “Hunky Dory” was at times loud and at times soft and the lyrics weren’t all on the same theme, and some of them were so vivid.

I don’t think I’ve sat through “Changes” in years, probably decades, but you have to know that it was never a hit in the U.S., and its ubiquitous play on FM was years off.

Subsequent to Bowie’s untimely death, everyone agreed on the greatness of “Life on Mars.” But come on, “Kooks”? That’s the essence of the sixties spirit, which spilled over into the early seventies, there was still a bleeding edge outside the mainstream, made up of free-thinkers, where you felt you belonged when you didn’t fit in anywhere else. And there was a similar sentiment in “Oh! You Pretty Things,” which was a progenitor of “All the Young Dudes.” And “Andy Warhol” ultimately contributed to Andy’s image, with the Polaroid SX-70 and more rock press Warhol was part of the music firmament in the seventies, sure he sponsored the Velvet Underground in the sixties, but that was truly underground, even after Lou Reed broke.

And then there was the album closer “The Bewlay Brothers,” which starts off with the feel of Neil Young’s “Last Trip to Tulsa” and then ventures into a London back alley, shrouded in darkness. That was a feature of music back then, especially in the U.K., acts drove away from the mainstream, they wanted to investigate the underbelly, music was the other, so out there most people had no idea what was going on, but this feel permeated the airwaves back with the initial British Invasion and “Bewlay Brothers” is an extension of that.

4

“Aladdin Sane” was released the following spring, but it too was not a huge sales success, the album only made it to number 17, and there were no singles, but in hindsight, with the overplay of “Jean Genie” in ensuing years you’d think it burned up the airwaves back then…it did not.

“Aladdin Sane” was a disappointment. First and foremost the cover. Yes, Bowie featured the lightning bolt on his face, but the white background overpowered him and the whole effect ultimately looked cheap, especially in light of what had come before, i.e. “Ziggy Stardust” and “Hunky Dory.”

But 1974’s “Diamond Dogs” was even worse. There was a ton of advance press, over the Guy Peellaert cover, and now Bowie played arenas and “Rebel Rebel” was all over the FM airwaves, even if it stalled on the U.S. singles chart. Suddenly, Bowie was playing to the lowest common denominator, those who didn’t get it previously, and if you were on board earlier you winced. You weren’t completely rebelling, but your embrace of Bowie was not as strong.

And then came “Young Americans.”

This is what cemented Bowie’s place in the pantheon. Nothing he’d done previously indicated this is where he’d end up. And sure, the turn two albums later with the electronic “Low” burnished David’s image even more, but in 1975 no one saw the need for a spacy rocker to reinvent himself as an R&B crooner who called himself the “Thin White Duke.” FM rock stations never played black music. And R&B stations rarely embraced white acts, one can ultimately say Bowie paved the way, for Phil Collins and “In the Air Tonight” years later. But there was something winning about the sound.

I quickly burned out on “Fame,” not that I loved it to begin with.

The title track is catchy, but not a home run.

But “Somebody Up There Likes Me” and “Fascination”? WOW!

Nobody ever talks about “Somebody Up There Likes Me,” it doesn’t even rate its own Wikipedia page. But it starts with a swagger, David Sanborn’s saxophone dances all over the track and when Bowie himself finally appears a minute in it’s akin to James Brown taking the stage in front of the Famous Flames. And the most magic is in the pre-chorus and the chorus itself is just the cherry on top, it’s like the band is playing for itself, knowing how locked into the groove it is, how great they are, how the sound is indelible and incredible to the point it’s absolutely irresistible…WHICH IT WAS! I can still remember the first time I heard it, parked behind the Hart ski warehouse in Reno in the dark.

And “Fascination” is nearly as good. The magic is in Mike Garson’s clavinet and the chorus, it sounds like it’s being performed in an smoky club below street level after midnight, the listener feels like they’re on the outside looking in, nose pressed to the glass. This is the highest level, the biggest achievement, when you can cease being obvious, cease trying to grab the audience by the neck and be so confident that you know what you’re doing is so fantastic people will clamor to get a piece of it.

And Mike Garson is the special sauce, the key to “Lady Grinning Soul.”

5

“Watch That Man” was akin to “Young Americans, a solid opener that didn’t quite close you, then again “Young Americans” is superior to “Watch This Man.”

For the title track, “Aladdin Sane” is a disappointment, it was nowhere close to the title track on “Ziggy Stardust.”

The only certified winner on the first side of “Aladdin Sane” was “Panic in Detroit.” It had that futuristic feel of “Five Years.” This was Bowie firing on all cylinders.

The cover of “Let’s Spend the Night Together” was too obvious, and not an improvement on the Stones’ original, it seemed tossed off, not of the caliber that we expected from Bowie.

Then we had the “Panic in Detroit” of the second side, the aforementioned “Jean Genie.”

So we’ve got a whole album with only two cuts that grab the brass ring. If you were a fan of what had come before you were so eager for the album but you wondered how Bowie missed, it seemed like he hadn’t put in enough effort, didn’t care enough. And the truth is few people bought the album when it was released, never mind played it front to back, but if you did, you discovered the final track, “Lady Grinning Soul.”

Garson’s opening piano flourish and what ensued thereafter seemed more reminiscent of Broadway or a thirties Hollywood movie than anything in Bowie’s previous catalog. So much of “Aladdin Sane” is obvious, at times banging you over the head, but “Lady Grinning Soul” was subtle and removed, but if you were open to the sound it rewarded you.

“Cologne she’ll wear

Silver and Americard

She’ll drive a beetle car

And beat you at canasta.”

CANASTA? You can’t be any less rock. What next, CRIBBAGE? And Visa was once known as BankAmericard and the VW beetle was everywhere and…WHAT IS THIS?

“She’ll come, she’ll go

She’ll lay belief on you

Skin sweet with musky oil

The lady from another grinning soul”

This was no rock chick, not someone who followed the bands, but someone the bands themselves followed. But only a few in that rarefied air. These were not model beauties, but those with a pedigree, with titles, who didn’t need the rock stars’ money, who had their own status, this was what you reached for after all those nights with groupies in Holiday Inns, assuming you were culturally and intellectually up to it, and David Bowie certainly was.

“And when the clothes are strewn

Don’t be afraid of the room

Touch the fullness of her breast

Feel the love of her caress

She will be your living end”

There’s always someone richer, better-looking, more connected, that’s the essence of the world, at least for males, they want to climb the ladder, peel back the layers of the onion until they get to the center, they’re looking for the ultimate peak experience, even though that usually only exists in movies and music, but seemingly everybody on the planet has that carrot in front of their eyes.

“She’ll come, she’ll go

She’ll lay belief on you

But she won’t stake her life on you

How can life become her point of view”

You feel inferior. Less than. That’s how you know you’re playing for real, when you’re uptight, when you’re worried you’re not good enough, won’t be accepted. And what those further down the food chain don’t realize is those near the top of the pyramid feel this way too, life is a corridor of successive doors you must pass through to hopefully get to the diamond, assuming you have the chutzpah, talent and flair to open the doors to begin with, most people won’t take the risk, they’re too afraid of failure and rejection. But you cannot reap the rewards unless you play.

Sometimes reality lives up to the fantasy. I hope you’ve had this experience, the night of your life, when all your dreams come true. It almost never lasts, but when you experience it you know, that warm, tingling feeling remains in your brain forever, you trot it out on occasion to feel all warm and fuzzy, sometimes you tell the tale with a smile on your face but your audience can never really grasp the essence, the feeling, for in that one night, that one afternoon, that one interlude, you reached the pinnacle, you ascended to the throne, it was your living end.

Bob, we have been the back-office administrators for a number of catalog investment vehicles.  We’ve seen first-hand how many of them operate.   It’s easy to tout how great your marketing department is if you’re getting a ton of licenses by giving quotes on your newly purchased assets at a third of what they’re worth.   (I’m not talking about any company in particular here).   And we had one client who sold their songs a year ago to one of the ubiquitous catalog buyers, and only just this month we got a note from BMI informing us of the new income claimant.   Writers can expect income to go down if they sell to someone whose administration is done based on the lowest percentage administration cost rather than by finding the highest quality administrator who is going to collect a hell of a lot more money (like us) than the low-cost leader.  90% of a big pie is a lot more than 97.5% of a tiny pie.

Other factors:   Are first negotiation rights to buy additional publishing or writer shares involved in these sales?   Are there back-end bumps to the purchase price if income goes up over the next few years?   And are both of these factors an incentive to the buyer to not collect and/or report the maximum amount of income after they own the catalog?

Read the full prospectus on some of these publishing investment vehicles.   Does anyone have matching rights to buy the assets if they bankrupt the company?   Do any of the fund leaders get a percentage of what they can spend, catalog investment quality or expected return be damned?   How is the track record of the folks who have put these things together, and have they made money for their investors in the past?   What are these companies spending on their own salaries, offices, advertising, parties, PR firms, and overhead compared to the rest of the industry?

And what kind of safe return can your heirs get in an alternative investment (to the extent that you yourself don’t blow it all before you die)?   After you pay 20% in capital gains and (let’s just say) 10% to your lawyers and advisors, you’re maybe getting ¾ of 1% in a money market fund on a balance that is 70% of the value of the appreciating asset you once had.   Is your lawyer or manager driving the sale so he/she has something to charge you a lot of money for that probably wasn’t something he/she should have advised you to do in the first place?

And as Diane Warren pointed out in her comment on the Dylan sale, these songs may be special to you or may even have changed the life of someone you don’t even know.

I don’t know a single person that has sold their catalog that hasn’t eventually regretted it.  I always try and talk clients out of selling, and when they ignore me I feel more comfortable in making them an offer.

Anyway, I hope these thoughts are useful and interesting to someone.   As a person who has built a career out of protecting creators, it just kills me to see people selling their lives’ work in this manner.

Best regards.

Randall Wixen

Wixen Music Publishing, Inc.
24025 Park Sorrento #130
Calabasas, CA 91302