December 9, 2003 - The New Reality

I've seen Bowie perform live two times, and both were great experiences, if very different.

The first time was during his Sound and Vision tour in 1990. This was his so-called "greatest hits" tour. I saw this show in the Philadelphia Spectrum.

The show was impressive but still vastly pared down from his standards at the time. Don't forget; it wasn't long before 1990 that he launched the poorly reviewed Glass Spider tour with its extravagances like a giant spider on-stage or Bowie lounging about with a skull, as Hamlet.

By contrast, Sound and Vision was relatively low key. The main visual element was a huge screen on which he could project images. The most striking use of this was during his first song, "Space Oddity," when a huge version of himself, on screen, kneeled down and sang to the small version of himself on stage.

The audience was clearly there to hear their favorites, and singing along was encouraged. As in "Rebel Rebel," where the lights were turned on the audience so people could shout, "Hot tramp, I love you so."

I had only comparatively recent gotten into David Bowie. Of course, I'd known his classics and his '80s tunes ("China Girl" was my favorite). I'd been reintroduced to Bowie by a couple friends and had discovered such classic albums as "The Man Who Sold the World" and "Hunky Dory." But I didn't quite know all his work well enough at the time to appreciate it as much as I would if he did a similar tour today.

The second time I saw Bowie was very different. That was last summer, when he was touring as part of the Area 51 tour, which included numerous other musicians, including Moby. Bowie's on stage time was limited; he performed for about an hour.

This was a very low key event, at the Tweeter Center in Camden, N.J. It was a stifling hot day. There was a dance tent people hung out in simply because it was air conditioned. While the first portion of the Tweeter Center is under an amphitheater, it is by no means air conditioned.

Bowie did perform a few versions of old favorites, such as a version of "Let's Dance" in the style of a crooner. But he also did a healthy dose of songs from his new album at the time: "Heathen," apologizing before he played them. "I've got to get this stuff in there," he said.

My concert companion, who was the very Bowie fan who had awakened my interest in him 13 years ago, said she didn't care much for his recent stuff. But I liked it as much as any previous Bowie period, and I appreciate the fact that he continues to grow as an artist, rather than staying in an arrested stage of development like, say, the Rolling Stones.

I recently bought "Reality," the new Bowie album, because I wanted to recognize songs when he played them on-stage. I like what I hear; it sounds a lot like recent albums like "Hours" and "Heathen." You could consider it a return to his roots, a return to a singer's sensibility that he set aside for his concept-heavy, dance-heavy albums like "One" and "Earthling."

The album is called "Reality," and the cover art looks like an anime version of David Bowie, especially compared to the photograph that appears inside. He's got big eyes, pointed hair, bright colors. It makes me think about Bowie's persona.

Bowie has made no secret of the fact that he changes characters, personas. He's even given some of them names, like the alien rock star Ziggy Stardust to the emaciated Thin White Duke. For the last several years, he's claimed he's not doing that anymore, that he's showing his real personality.

I wonder how much of this return to basics has to do with him being a father again. He was a father for the first time with John "Zowie" Bowie with first wife Angela. At the time, he made a point to keep that child out of the media, and he seems to be doing the same thing with his young daughter with model Iman. He'll tell stories about her on the "Tonight Show" but doesn't pose for endless pictures with her. I'm supposing, like he did with John, he'll let her make those decisions on her own when she's old enough to do so.

Not being a parent myself, I'm just guessing that it brings out your essential qualities, who you truly are. I would think that the amount of work it takes to raise a small child completely obliterates pretentiousness, all costume and balderdash.

But it's interesting to me that the "Reality" cover art is like an anime version of himself, not a photograph. It brings up the question, how real can you ever be as a rock star, as a celebrity, as an artist.

Regardless of how genuine and true to yourself you try to be, you're always editing and selecting what you show to the public, so that we may be getting the real version, but it's like a heightened anime version of himself. It's his best qualities, thrown into high relief with bright colors, the person he wants us to see.

Every artist, every musician makes choices like this, whether it's to show your scary Halloween side like Marilyn Manson or to be everybody's folk teddy bear, like Paul Simon. Maybe there's a little bit of each of these in everyone, but you make a conscious decision what you want the public to see. As a writer, I can certainly identify with this. But I would argue that even this edited version of myself is pretty close to who I essentially am.

This return to basics, this return to "reality," is not so different from his earlier days. Even in his Ziggy Stardust days, not all his songs were about sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll. There were the wistful love ballads, even then. And if you listen closely to his lyrics, there's still an edge.

I hope to be able to test out my theories when I see Bowie in concert again. Hopefully, the new date will be a time when I can make it. Until then I'll listen to "Reality" and ponder and hope that the tour hasn't been delayed because of, say, mechanical problems with a giant mechanical spider.

 

Moral:
Your mom was right about spiders; avoid them.