Nov 9th was rather a red letter day for TV viewers in the UK!! Not only was VH1 having a day entirely devoted to David Bowie, but also he was to appear on the first edition of a new Channel 4 light entertainment show ‘The Priory’. I spent the whole day operating the remote controls on my TV and Video!!
We kicked off with ‘Greatest hits of...’, really a collection of mainstream videos we have all seen many times before.
Then VH1 to 1, which was new interview footage. David was filmed in two locations, but looked remarkably similar in each...wearing pale green patterned open necked shirts (two different patterns...lol). When asked about ‘hours...’ he said that instead of having two or three different focuses, like ‘Earthling’ and ‘Outside’, the new album had only one focus, the song and the lyric. The question of happiness came up, and he had this to say, “I hate albums that are really happy. When I am really happy, I don’t like to hear happy albums, and when I am really sad I don’t wanna hear happy albums...and I tend to gravitate towards the lonely and isolated anyway when I write.” (Strike a chord anyone??? I KNEW there had to be a reason why Radiohead and Nirvana were so successful...lol). On revisiting his back catalogue.. he said he had changed his mind from ‘never’ to ‘all right, maybe a bit’. He said that he had done ‘Changes’ in Europe recently “and yeah, it was great..its a really good song! (laughs). ”On staying young, the way to do this was by “keeping in touch with the society that you live in and not losing the original enthusiasm for what makes you tick and what tweaks your interest.” “I think life’s a cool idea! (laughs).” On the video for ‘hours...’ “this will be one of the favourite videos that I’ve made. I think its an exceptional piece of work.”
The highlight of the day was of course ‘Storytellers’. I won’t do a set list, as you have probably all seen it by now, but what a remarkable piece of film this was!! If anyone had told me that db would play a televised gig in which he related anecdotes from his career between songs, I would have been very sceptical. The stories were great, the band tight and obviously relating well to each other, happy and laughing, and db himself relishing offering his new songs to his biggest fans (was this their first outing?), enjoying teasing them with that snatch of ‘Rebel Rebel’, preceded by a wicked impersonation of Marc Bolan, and reworking some of the back catalogue with dazzling results. That acapella opening to China Girl was heart stoppingly special.......do it again in London, David PLEASE! There was a GREAT quote in there somewhere “I was somewhat blamed for putting the 60’s to their funeral. This is not true. As far as I was concerned, the 60’s were already dead....I merely helped to clear the bodies!” What a soundbite! I was searching the audience for my friends from the chat room, and wow.....Gilly..you were on the screen almost more often than db!!...lol. I think I also saw Pfurs (erm.., was he there?), but it was hard to spot anyone else when I didn’t know where they were sitting. We should have had a diagram of the Storytellers set at bnet with positions of chatters marked up...haha. Anyway, a wonderful opportunity for all who were there in person, and a special treat for fans worldwide when shown on TV.
The Priory was a bit of a silly show, something like TFI Friday, but not so funny. David appeared in a short section called ‘Sorry, I can’t be with you’. He said he was in Austria, so I guess that was for the Vienna gig. There were six videotaped questions for him to answer. The answers are paraphrased or we will be here all night!
Q : (Constance) What’s a normal day in your life?
A: (j/k ) I surround myself with cameras, and shoot shows like this one, and then in the afternoon I do a gig.
Q : (Bonnie) Name your favourite song?
A : Shipbuilding by Robert Wyatt (written by Elvis Costello) (1983). They showed a clip of it, erm..was he serious?
Q : (Phil) Where do you get your ideas for hairdo’s and funky clothes?
A : For the last 30 years I have consulted a guy called Norman Berkley in Willesden. Once a year, I ask him about what’s at the cutting edge, and he sends me a selection of magazines. (ROFL)
Q : (Adrian) Do you have pets, and what are their names?
A : I had a cat called Sally and a dog called Wendy, but they both got run over!
Q : Your mid 80’s output wasn’t really bad, just badly produced?
A : You are right
Q : If you were on Stars In Their Eyes, who would you be?
A : David Beckham
db was actually very funny in this show. Fancy a second career as a comedian David?
Thanks once again, David and the band and everyone at Bowienet, I have gotta go now and get on the phone to try and get hold of some tickets for the London gig!!! See ya there!!!!
Spaceface
Karen Dawson : 10.11.99