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August 2, 2007
The only time I ever saw
David Bowie perform live At the time, I thought of
was during the "Low" this as being relatively
album tour, in 1977. late in his career, though
in retrospect it looks
This was at Madison comfortably in the
Square Garden middle... From one point
(I hadn't yet given of view, it was his peak.
up on "arena rock");
our seats were Klee's take
directly stage-right, on "Low": That's the
halfway up the side. KZSU DJ, not
"Bowie's only the painter.
This compromise had it's good album".
virtues: relatively close
to the stage (vs. the far (Being a music snob
side of the oval), and a is an art of it's own.)
relatively decent view over
the heads of the crowd.
I realized somewhat later A possible "drawback"
from looking at photos of is that we were up
this tour, that it was out of the surging
designed to be viewed from chaos on the floor,
the front: they were which is what many
performing in front of a people really go for.
wall of flourescent
lights, horizontal bands But I'd already had
of light that they could that experience with
strobe at will. my "first concert":
Of course, it could be that this HOT_SUFFOLK_FORUM
idea sounds a lot better than it
actually was, and we were happier
looking at those flourescents from
the side.
I was talking about this show
later with an older, more
experienced girl (all of 20 years
old), and her first question was
"What was he wearing?!"
It seemed like an odd question --
which shows you how much I knew
about Bowie at the time...
Anyway, he was wearing
some sort of big floppy
suit (bigger than a zoot
suit, I think) -- and
midway through the show
show he did a costume
change into an identical
suit of a different color. In retrospect: this was a
Neither color was very compromise between what he
bright: light gray and wanted to do and his reputation
dark gray, perhaps. for extreme fashion.
He had to do something
weird, so he did the most
unobtrusive, unremarkable
weird thing possible.
They did a Probably an example or the
creditable rule of reversals: he'd just
version of done tight-fitting, tapered
"Suffragette This was a suits in the "Thin White Duke"
City"... big party phase, and to avoid being
hit: accused of repeating himself,
Halfway through he went with large, floppy
the song, Bowie Throughout suits.
stopped singing the 70s it
the "Hey Man" was not RULE_OF_REVERSALS
refrain, holding possible to
his mic out to go to a
the audience, college-
letting them take level "blow-
it. out" without
hearing
Then, the band "Suffragette
slid from this City". Bigger even than
upbeat and "Louie Louie"...
energetic
popular number I don't believe
into the slow, I ever heard it
atmospheric on the radio,
track "Art even once. Bowie's American
Decade" off of radio hits have
the new album always been strangely
"Low"... un-representative--
with the exception
of "Jean Jeanie".
The colored spotlights--
a ubiquitous feature of E.g. "Golden Years"...
70s arena rock-- began to
gradually drift around E.g. "Fame", which
the stage, from band made it on the strength
member to band member. of the John Lennon
connection.
Then the lights gradually
wandered farther, until they Or the execrable "Absolute
were sweeping around the Beginners", which was
audience, first scanning the pushed as part of a movie
floor, and then the tiers of tie-in, and probably sank
seats up to the tremendously the movie.
high ceilings.
Though, the early 80s "Major
Then they brought up Tom" song (the sequel to
the houselights -- "Space Oddity") wasn't bad
at all, and reflected what
And this did it, Bowie was doing around then
that pulled off well enough.
The Trick:
And "Sound and Vision"
We went from a crowd (off of "Low") got some
focused on a stage and play as well.
became something else; a
group fused into one
thing, thousands of us
aware of ourselves as a
single entity.
MEASURE_OF_MAN
HOLY_COATS_OF_BLACK
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