Send "David Bowie " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 Through the 1970s, David Bowie built his legend on a parade of changing persona and shrewd stylistic shifts. But his initial, late-1960s forays into the music industry illustrate that there's a fine line between "chameleonic" and "indecisive"-- in his early years, Bowie tried make his name variously as a mod bluesman, a traditional folksinger, an Anthony Newley-schooled theatrical raconteur and, on his 1967 self-titled debut, a music-hall dandy. Ironically, it was a song seemingly most susceptible to a brief, novelty-tune shelf life that would prove to be his first enduring work: the 1969 single "Space Oddity", which, of course, riffed on the similarly titled Stanley Kubrick blockbuster of the day, and was fortuitously timed to court a space-crazed populace still abuzz from that summer's lunar landing.The ploy didn't quite pay off-- though the "Space Oddity" single cracked the UK Top 5, the sophomore album on which it appeared flopped, as the efforts to establish the David Bowie brand resulted in a confusing release strategy. His UK label, Phillips, issued the album in Britain as David Bowie (making it his second self-titled album), while his U.S. benefactors at Mercury christened it with a title that begged to have it relegated to the folk-section cut-out bin: Man of Words/Man of Music. But rather than prompt another career about-face, the album's prog-folk hymnals (complete with guest keyboard wizardry from Rick Wakeman of Yes) helped point the way to the artful glam-rock that would make Bowie a superstar-- upon which he would reissue the album in 1972 and rename it after its most famous song....full text |
| Bbc |
| Along with Marc Bolan, with whom he shared a producer, David Bowie is credited with spawning glam rock in the 70s. However, 1969's Space Oddity is fledgling Bowie - not a feather boa in sight - but a spider’s web of influences. It shows a Bowie, not so much casting his own image, but in the shadow of others. Originally turned down by George Martin, this kaleidoscopic album is an amalgamation of Dave’s obsessions - directors, musicians, poets and spirituality of a distinctly late-60s hue. In this ever-shifting musical refraction there are glimpses of Stanley Kubrick (the title track – originally recorded in Bowie’s bedroom –is inspired by the film 2001: A Space Odyssey), and Muddy Waters (the harmonica and blues rhythm in ‘‘Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed’’ - another song about being an outsider, or as Bowie himself puts it ‘A phallus in pig-tails’). Dylan's influence looms in the social commentary '’God Knows I'm Good’' and the yearning '’Letter to Hermione’' – an ode to the girlfriend Bowie lost the very year the album was born; whilst the poetry of Jack Kerouac and Alan Ginsberg appears in the aching ‘’Cygnet Committee’’ (‘I bless you madly, sadly as I tie my shoes’)....full text |
| Thephoenix |
| David Bowie’s 1969 album Man of Music/Man of Words was retitled a few years after its debut, most likely because it was quickly becoming known as Space Oddity and Those Other Eight Songs We Could Care Less About. Strategically released just weeks before the Apollo 11 moon landing, that cinematic leadoff single recounting Major Tom’s dramatic liftoff has forever obscured the album’s remaining content. In fact, the whole of Space Oddity is engaging, if frequently naive and pretentious. (On the Bowie Pretentiousness Scale, it ranks second only to Hunky Dory.) Although it was his second LP, it was the first to showcase the chameleonic artist who would spend the next decade shapeshifting. Leapfrogging from folk prog (“Cygnet Committee”) to Disney-esque balladry (“Wild-Eyed Boy from Freecloud”) to Elvis pop (“Janine”), this is exactly the Portrait of the Young Artist Having a Genre Crisis that you’d expect from the guy who’d later pretend to be an alien glam icon, write a musical version of 1984, and dive nose-first into ice-numb cocaine music. The 40th-anniversary reissue includes a second disc of both rare and previously released stuff, most of it worth your while: a never-before-bootlegged demo of “Space Oddity” that shows Bowie in very different voice; the vastly superior two-part-single version of “Memory of a Free Festival,” Bowie’s own “Hey Jude”; and a handful of great singles, wanna-be singles, and BBC sessions. And then there’s “Ragazzo Solo, Ragazza Sola,” a version of “Space Oddity” sung in Italian that encapsulates the Bowie Allure, a blend of cojones, WTF, and pure romanticism....full text |
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