I went.
It was worth it.
That was the extasis I was after; Chords lifting and surrounding, that voice soaring. He played Five Years, and Hang on to Yourself and Ziggy Stardust and Heroes and Ashes to Ashes. He played four tracks from Low (Sound and Vision, Always Crashing in the Same Car, What in the World and Be my Wife) which would have made Jonathan’s day, but he would have been at last night’s gig.
When I was 17, I read a Bowie biography. I’d taped Ziggy Stardust quite a few years before. I was going out with a schizophrenic guy at the time and I was fascinated by the biographer’s reading of various Ziggy songs as odes to Bowie’s schizophrenic brother: so much of the symbolism resonates, hands, voices, ego.
I’m going to have to drag out the old video Rowan Greaves taped for me when I was at ATYP: full of rare clips. Bowie in Berlin singing Kurt Weill. The clip for Wild is the Wind. The clip for John, I’m Only Dancing. Interviews. I hope it still works.
He’s still so vibrant. So cheeky. So sexy. The way his body moves. This is the Bowie I wanted to see in the eighties, when I went last time. But that’s okay. I went this time. And it was brilliant.
Oh… and I’d like to thank the lovely daisynerd for her generosity in changing plans and the lovely people at Telstra for “payment arrangements” that let me spend my phone bill money on this concert.