David Bowie turns nasty
Sep. 25th, 2006 12:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomusFor boomers of a certain vintage -- people who were teenagers in the 1970s -- David Bowie has so infiltrated our idea of what it means to be a successful human being that we look into the mirror every morning only to feel a surge of disappointment that it isn't his extra-terrestrially intelligent and beautiful face staring back at us. (Some of us wouldn't mind his back catalogue, his gorgeous wife, or his heaps of money either.)
For those of us who feel this way, Bowie's cameo appearance last week on Ricky Gervais' UK comedy series Extras was particularly poignant. We've already noted on Click Opera how the young Gervais tweaked his eyebrows into suspiciously Bowiesque shapes as the singer in big-in-Manilla 80s pop sensation Seona Dancing. Like everyone from my own peer group of Scottish musicians (Paul Haig, Paul Quinn, Edwyn Collins, Roddy Frame, Billy McKenzie), Gervais was part of Generation Bowie. And one thing I'm sure we all share is a recurrent dream in which we meet our idol.
Bowie's appearance in Extras unfolds like a dream sequence. He's sitting in a London pub (as if!) chatting up a somewhat gormless girl with anecdotes about surgery and Decca Records. Gervais has to bribe his way in, but it takes his brash girlfriend to drag him over to Bowie's table. The conversation that follows is predictably buttock-clenching, as Gervais proceeds, with typical English self-deprecation, to give a dismal account of himself as a sadly compromised comedian.
We expect Bowie to be generous, positive, encouraging and enabling -- he'll send Gervais away re-inspired. That's how he always appears in my dreams, anyway: like the most supportive parent you could imagine. Instead, the dream turns to nightmare. Grim-faced, as though incarnating Gervais' highest and most dashed aspirations for his own career, Bowie starts improvising a song. "Little fat man who sold his soul," it begins, for all the world like one of my more vicious songs from Stars Forever ("butcher, philanderer, murderer, coprophile", went poor Maf's song -- and he paid for this, just as Gervais is paying Bowie).
As the whole room joins in with ever-more-cruel suggestions, it only gets worse for Gervais:
Chubby little loser, national joke
Pathetic little fat man
The clown that no-one laughs at
They all just wish he'd die
He's so depressed at being hated
Fatso takes his own life
He blows his bloated face off...
Like an out-take from Hunky Dory, the song ends in a cathartic singalong of "See his pug-nosed face, pug pug, pug pug..." as Gervais sits, suitably ruddy and pug-nosed, strung out somewhere between utter humiliation and chuffed amazement that his hero is actually singing a song about him, no matter how crushing.
I tried to imagine what Bowie would sing about me in a similar nightmare. Out of sheer humiliation, I've put it under the cut. Sing along if you must. Bastards.
Bowie (Tentatively, to Momus's face): Presbyterian would-be, with yellowy teeth...
Momus: Sorry?
Bowie: (Turning to piano):
Presbyterian would-be
Who wants to be me
Already a has-been
WIth an eye that can't see
You're remarkably ugly
You should never leave home
And your songs are as twee
As my own "Laughing Gnome"
Bowie (Speaking): No, wait, no "Laughing Gnome" references...
(Singing again)
Remarkably ugly
Inelegant man
As twee as a Belle
And Sebastian fan
Don't give up the dayjob
Your column in Wired...
Linda: The twat'll say he's resigned the day he gets fired!
Bowie: I like that, Linda! Very good!
Momus: Yes, very good Linda, I like that too!
Bowie (Singing):
You're just a big copycat
Playing my game
But nobody likes you
You'll never have fame
And it cuts like a knife
How it's all gone so wrong
Take revenge for your life
In Presbyterian songs
Crowd: And we all sing along...
You've made a new album?
We don't give a fuck!
Want to be a contender?
You're bang out of luck!
Bowie: Perverted old wannabe
Losing the plot
Look in the mirror
I am who you're not
When I look in the mirror
At least I see me
Not a thin scruffy Scotsman
With yellowy teeth
See his yellow teeth!
(Teeth teeth, teeth teeth)
See his yellow teeth!
(Repeat to fade)
For those of us who feel this way, Bowie's cameo appearance last week on Ricky Gervais' UK comedy series Extras was particularly poignant. We've already noted on Click Opera how the young Gervais tweaked his eyebrows into suspiciously Bowiesque shapes as the singer in big-in-Manilla 80s pop sensation Seona Dancing. Like everyone from my own peer group of Scottish musicians (Paul Haig, Paul Quinn, Edwyn Collins, Roddy Frame, Billy McKenzie), Gervais was part of Generation Bowie. And one thing I'm sure we all share is a recurrent dream in which we meet our idol.
Bowie's appearance in Extras unfolds like a dream sequence. He's sitting in a London pub (as if!) chatting up a somewhat gormless girl with anecdotes about surgery and Decca Records. Gervais has to bribe his way in, but it takes his brash girlfriend to drag him over to Bowie's table. The conversation that follows is predictably buttock-clenching, as Gervais proceeds, with typical English self-deprecation, to give a dismal account of himself as a sadly compromised comedian.
We expect Bowie to be generous, positive, encouraging and enabling -- he'll send Gervais away re-inspired. That's how he always appears in my dreams, anyway: like the most supportive parent you could imagine. Instead, the dream turns to nightmare. Grim-faced, as though incarnating Gervais' highest and most dashed aspirations for his own career, Bowie starts improvising a song. "Little fat man who sold his soul," it begins, for all the world like one of my more vicious songs from Stars Forever ("butcher, philanderer, murderer, coprophile", went poor Maf's song -- and he paid for this, just as Gervais is paying Bowie).
As the whole room joins in with ever-more-cruel suggestions, it only gets worse for Gervais:
Chubby little loser, national joke
Pathetic little fat man
The clown that no-one laughs at
They all just wish he'd die
He's so depressed at being hated
Fatso takes his own life
He blows his bloated face off...
Like an out-take from Hunky Dory, the song ends in a cathartic singalong of "See his pug-nosed face, pug pug, pug pug..." as Gervais sits, suitably ruddy and pug-nosed, strung out somewhere between utter humiliation and chuffed amazement that his hero is actually singing a song about him, no matter how crushing.
I tried to imagine what Bowie would sing about me in a similar nightmare. Out of sheer humiliation, I've put it under the cut. Sing along if you must. Bastards.
Bowie (Tentatively, to Momus's face): Presbyterian would-be, with yellowy teeth...
Momus: Sorry?
Bowie: (Turning to piano):
Presbyterian would-be
Who wants to be me
Already a has-been
WIth an eye that can't see
You're remarkably ugly
You should never leave home
And your songs are as twee
As my own "Laughing Gnome"
Bowie (Speaking): No, wait, no "Laughing Gnome" references...
(Singing again)
Remarkably ugly
Inelegant man
As twee as a Belle
And Sebastian fan
Don't give up the dayjob
Your column in Wired...
Linda: The twat'll say he's resigned the day he gets fired!
Bowie: I like that, Linda! Very good!
Momus: Yes, very good Linda, I like that too!
Bowie (Singing):
You're just a big copycat
Playing my game
But nobody likes you
You'll never have fame
And it cuts like a knife
How it's all gone so wrong
Take revenge for your life
In Presbyterian songs
Crowd: And we all sing along...
You've made a new album?
We don't give a fuck!
Want to be a contender?
You're bang out of luck!
Bowie: Perverted old wannabe
Losing the plot
Look in the mirror
I am who you're not
When I look in the mirror
At least I see me
Not a thin scruffy Scotsman
With yellowy teeth
See his yellow teeth!
(Teeth teeth, teeth teeth)
See his yellow teeth!
(Repeat to fade)
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Re: The fame and the girl and the money
Date: 2006-09-25 04:40 pm (UTC)Re: The fame and the girl and the money
Date: 2006-09-25 06:08 pm (UTC)Re: The fame and the girl and the money
Date: 2006-09-25 11:39 pm (UTC)"I look into your eyes and I know you won't kill me/ but I wonder why some times" (Black Tie White Noise) seems like a more thought-provoking lyric than "Planet Earth is blue/ And there's nothing I can do" (Space Oddity).
I don't think Pop artists necessarily make worse music when they're older. It's just that their audiences are older, and less easily besotted.
Re: The fame and the girl and the money
Date: 2006-09-26 09:56 am (UTC)HOW on EARTH???
the only thing I can say with all honesty is that he redeemed himself on occasion AFTER Tin Machine, but it was possibly the reason I consider Bowie's work NOW at this point in time, less than adequate.. and with his age, it offers no excuse, as he still was able to attempt in the face of what I could call "failure".
Momus you can never compare yourself to the ilk of "Tin Machine".. don't do it, its just heart sickening, you can remain comfortable with your progress, but don't bother to use Bowie's example as a "how to" map, in spite of how interesting it may actually be.
I have to consider how Howard Devoto's work matches up against Bowies at this time.. and although I never saw a need to compare, you have to admit "Buzzkunst" was still too far ahead of its time. Bowie could only blush with insecurity at that... and yet it is Bowie with the "fame, the girl and the money.. where as Howard says, "I don't wish to remain dependant upon my creativity for a living, as it hurts too much.." how can we not empthize?
Re: The fame and the girl and the money
Date: 2006-09-26 12:32 pm (UTC)Scandal, outrage, civil war, World War 2, exile from Spain, Franco, Hitler, having most of his films banned, sciatica, deafness, near-blindness didn't manage to snuff out his creative flame, what exactly has Howard Devoto got to complain about?
Re: The fame and the girl and the money
Date: 2006-09-26 12:55 pm (UTC)Possibly not having anything to fight against other than himself.. in that kind of perspective.
Creativity in itself is a tricky thing, the same thing which is poison to one person only spurs another into bouts of consideration, contemplation and doing things for the greater good.
Devoto in my opinion has only his fear of delving into his own depths and possibly a fear of insanity.. anyone who is "mad" may not understand this and carry on in spite, or anyone who is not afraid to look evil in the face.. but for him I suspect he sees a sort of "evil" within himself when his "talent" is activated. Insiders tell me he's sort of a control freak even.. projecting his ideas with a perfection which is not really humanly possible, seeing failure in everything he does and even stops calling friends who only slighted him even though they did so without knowing it.
Its the price he pays for not letting it out... astrologically I could say something about that, because I just went on about the need to express inspite of hardship just recently.. "not to deny the creative in the self.."
I also suspect he has had some sort of trama in his youth, which he never did quite come to terms with.. and instead of exploring it, he only managed to cover it up with other things, including failed psychology course, failed film courses and successful projections which he managed to let others take away from him.
We can't exactly forget that we must not use the example of someone who so amazingly overcome obsticals of age, health, political issues, banning ect against all other creative people but perhaps it is inspiring to use Bunuel as an indicator of what IS possible in the face of adversity when you want to spur yourself into action and succeed.
Re: The fame and the girl and the money
Date: 2006-09-26 10:50 am (UTC)I actually disagree. I think the Space Oddity lyric is much better. It's strange that you should pick that couplet, because I think that's one of the best couplets in pop history. Yes, it sounds simple, but that's the deceptive simplicity of nursery rhyme. In context it's a lyric that says a huge amount about alienation, helplessness, thwarted messiah-complex and so on, and all in a way that is ambiguous enough to be both despairing and weirdly uplifting.
The lyric from Black Tie/White Noise I find to be just common-or-garden thougtful, and far less memorable and resonant.
But I do take your last point. There's probably something in that.