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[video static]
[Bowie] Once upon a time, your father--
my father, everybody's father, I presume,
wanted a good job with a good income
to secure their family life.
A role in society.
And that's where it ended,
but now, people want to be an individual.
And I think there's a lot of searching to find
the individual within oneself.
["Fashion" by David Bowie playing]
[music stops]
[woman] Once upon a time, there was a little house.
["The Man Who Sold the World" by David Bowie playing]
[man] Just say where you came from?
[Bowie] David Robert Jones from Stansfield Road, Brixton.
That's the first thing I knew, in case I got lost,
'cause I used to wander off a lot.
["The Man Who Sold the World" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] It wasn't a particularly happy childhood.
My parents were cold emotionally. There weren't many hugs.
I always sort of craved affection because of that.
[Bowie singing] ♪ I never thought I needed so many people ♪
♪ A girl my age went off her head ♪
♪ Hit some tiny children ♪
[Bowie] I think there's a passion for most people
who have an iota of, sort of, curiosity
are bound to escape and get out,
and try and find who one is.
["The Jean Genie" by David Bowie playing]
♪ Small Jean Genie snuck off to the city ♪
♪ Strung out on lasers and slash-back blazers ♪
♪ Ate all your razors while pulling the waiters ♪
♪ Talking 'bout Monroe and walking on Snow White ♪
[music stops]
[Bowie] And I spent all those formative teenage years
adopting guises and changing roles,
-and, um, -[phone rings]
just learning to be somebody.
♪ There's a starman ♪
♪ Waiting in the sky ♪
♪ There's a starman ♪
♪ Waiting in the sky... ♪
♪♪♪
I want to do really quick changes on the encores.
[woman] Oh yeah, there will be, there will be.
-Fastest ever. -Providing Mick keeps out the dressing room!
[indistinct chatter]
No, I told Ron about some things, has he told you?
-[man] Yeah. All right? -Yeah.
And the intro to the show?
[indistinct chatter]
What were you doing before you hit the bright headlights?
Were you a nobody and suddenly thought,
"Jesus, I must get into the scene by some other way?"
I never asked Jesus for a thing, no.
It's always on my own initiative.
[audience laughter]
When I was 14, I became a Mod,
and it just carried on from there.
I've always dressed in what I consider
clothes that prevent me becoming humdrum,
so that I would receive reaction from people, which would encourage me to write.
["I Can't Explain" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] London represented a lifestyle,
a new kind of language, culturally.
It was really fantastic at that point.
[music stops]
[man] Where you writing songs at this period?
[Bowie] Not very good ones.
The majority of the things were other people's numbers.
Little Richard stuff. Things like that.
But I became disenchanted with singing other people's songs.
I thought I'd write my own.
["You've Got a Habit of Leaving" by Davy Jones playing]
[Lancaster] He was a nobody within my scope of knowledge
of who was in the music industry.
But we needed a singer.
And different people came.
Amongst them was David Jones,
or Davy Jones, as he was promoting himself at that time.
[Taylor] We were impressed with his voice,
although I thought he was going to play the saxophone.
He had the alto sax around his neck,
and it wasn't until he started singing we realized
he was the boy for us, really.
We employed him. He didn't employ us, we employed him.
[Lancaster] And this was David's fourth go in terms of bands,
hoping this would be it.
But David, of course, had his own agenda,
where it was going to be Davy Jones and the Lower Third now,
but next it's going to be David Bowie and whatever.
So there was a side to David that you--
that wasn't revealed to you.
Hah! He was a rascal, mate.
That's it, that's all I can really say about it.
["Baby Loves That Way" by Davy Jones and the Lower Third playing]
♪ Baby loves that way ♪
♪ Yes she does, yes she does ♪
♪ Baby loves that way ♪
♪ Oh, I love my baby... ♪
[Bowie] I mean I was always very vain.
Then I found out that, up in London,
all the mods wore make-up, eye shadow.
And I thought that was really peculiar,
and I thought it looked rather good.
[Lancaster] The group van was this London LCC ambulance.
We lived in this ambulance, as well as traveling to the gigs.
So, we were talking about how could we be different from everybody else,
and David said, "What about wearing make-up?"
Right, I was... make-up, OK.
Now, I thought he meant clown make-up.
Graham was driving, as he always did.
"Here," I said, "Dave's just come up with an idea. What about we wear make-up?"
So Graham turned around, "Fuck that!"
["The Jean Genie" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] Years later, I had, uh, the same problems.
I didn't actually tell The Spiders that we'd have to wear make-up.
I said, "You looked very green tonight on stage.
Do you think if-- I think if you wore make-up,
you'd probably look a little more natural-looking."
♪ Poor Jean Genie snuck into the city ♪
♪ Strung out on lasers and slash-back blazers ♪
♪ Ate all the razors while pulling the waiters ♪
♪ Talking 'bout Monroe, walking on Snow White ♪
♪ New York's a no-go, and everything tastes nice ♪
♪ Poor Jean Genie... ♪
[Bowie] Actually, when they realized how many girls they could pull
when they looked so other-worldly,
they took to it like a fish to water.
[laughs]
♪ ...lives on his back ♪
♪ Jean Genie loves chimney stacks ♪
♪ He's outrageous, he screams and he bawls ♪
♪ Jean Genie, let yourself go, whoa... ♪
[Lancaster] David had such a wide, eclectic taste in things.
He thought, "Well let's have a go at this, because it's completely different,
it's gonna throw people off balance, I'm sure,
uh, and let's see how it goes."
And we did that with our set on stage.
Mostly, it was David's own compositions,
but we'd do hits by The Kinks or The Who,
but we'd also do things like "Chim-Chimeree" from Mary Poppins.
I thought, "Why are we doing that stuff?"
["You've Got a Habit of Leaving" by Davy Jones playing]
[Bowie] Looking back on it, it just felt like a lot of fun at the time
and quite, kind of, mischievous.
You laugh a lot when you're young, you know,
it was-- it was just, a lot of it was really funny.
[radio tuning]
Greetings Pop Pickers, it's Pick of the Pops.
[Lancaster] David told us we'd got an audition at the BBC.
This was, wow, you know, I mean, something special. The BBC.
So, we walked into the BBC, and did our three numbers.
"Out Of Sight," "Chim-Chimeree,"
and "Baby That's A Promise."
That's one of David's songs.
We did that, came away, and then waited for the results.
I've been having second thoughts about this, and I'd like to hear more from the music department.
Well, frankly, to me, this savors too much of a gimmick.
[Lancaster] They said that it was quite a different sound,
especially in the Mary Poppins number.
"And the treatment of 'Chim-Chimeree' kills the song completely."
[laughs] You cheeky sods!
"Routine beat group, strange choice of material.
Amateur-sounding vocalist [laughs]
who sings wrong notes and out of tune," yes.
"Group has nothing to recommend it."
[laughs softly]
"I don't think the group will get better with more rehearsal.
The singer is a cockney type, [laughs]
but not outstanding enough."
Well, you need to be an outstanding cockney, obviously, for the BBC.
"There is no entertainment in anything they do.
An inoffensive, pleasant nothing.
Backing singer devoid of personality."
[laughs]
Where are these people now?
[radio tuning]
And each one says, "No, no, no, no."
So, that was our post-mortem, I suppose.
[radio tuning]
We failed.
But we got a recording contract with Tony Hatch.
This, to me, was awe inspiring.
["Can't Help Thinking About Me" by David Bowie playing]
[Hatch] I'd written and produced the song "Downtown"
with Petula Clarke.
And I'd produced Sandy Shaw's first hit.
And when somebody called me and said,
"We have this artist, and he really has got a great talent,
and he writes all his own things," I was more than happy.
[Lancaster] David came up with "Can't Help Thinking About Me."
We rehearsed it, played it at the Marquee,
and then, took it into the studio and recorded it with Tony Hatch.
♪ I can't help thinking about me ♪
♪ I can't help thinking about me... ♪
[Hatch] I thought, "This has got the shape of a hit.
It's structured well. It has a very strong hook."
[plays and sings "Can't Help Thinking About Me"]
I don't know where you found this, but it is a piano,
in case anybody wondered what it was.
♪ Question-time that says I brought dishonor... ♪
[Bowie] "Can't Help Thinking About Me." [laughs]
Well, this came out of trials in short story writing,
little things about leaving home and stuff like that.
♪ Mother says that she can't stand the neighbors talking ♪
♪ I've gotta pack my bags, leave this home ♪
♪ Start walking, yeah... ♪
[Bowie] I couldn't really relate to America too well,
so I started writing more about Bromley and Beckenham.
And I tell a story from beginning to end.
♪ Remember when we used to go to church on Sundays ♪
♪ I lay awake at night, terrified of school on Mondays... ♪
[MacCormack] He was certainly a different child,
and I think you could tell he was gifted,
even at that age, eight or nine years old.
A thinker.
♪ I can't help thinking about me... ♪
[Underwood] The difference with him and other kids was
that David had interests in things that other kids didn't have.
He was ahead of his time regarding, you know,
reading and music and all the things which he was into.
♪ As I pass a recreation ground ♪
♪ I remember my friends, always been found and I can't... ♪
[Hatch] There are some songwriters that are just commentators,
but Bowie was a storyteller.
And so, he was going to rummage into all his experiences
to find things that he could write about.
It was something new.
♪ The station seems so cold the ticket's in my hand ♪
♪ My girl calls my name Hi, Dave ♪
♪ Drop in, see around, come back ♪
-[music fades] -[woman speaking German]
...London's top teenage club, Der Marquee.
["Do Anything You Say" by David Bowie playing]
♪ Two by two, they go walking by ♪
♪ Hand in hand, they watch me cry ♪
♪ Two by two ♪
♪ Hand in hand ♪
♪ Lonely nights, I dream you're there ♪
♪ Morning sun and you're gone ♪
♪ Lonely nights... ♪
[Hutchinson] David wanted The Buzz to play sessions,
and we would be his band on stage.
He wanted a band that was very much a backing band
so that he would be the front man, as a separate entity.
♪ Maybe I'll do anything you say... ♪
[interviewer] And now, a young British boy
whose career will surely develop him into one of
the bigger names in the showbiz field.
He's a great attraction here at the Marquee, and his name is David Bowie!
[crowd applauding and cheering]
David, you're working with a backing group, The Buzz.
Have you always been with them?
[Bowie] As David Bowie, yes.
[interviewer] Why do you say, "As David Bowie"--
[Bowie] I was somebody else before that. [laughs]
[interviewer] This is, what, your second record,
and it's a song you wrote?
[Bowie] Yes, I write most of the stuff I record,
the B-sides and A-sides.
[Gillespie] I don't think people realized how important the Marquee was
as a venue.
It was the hottest place to go as far as I was concerned.
I wouldn't have said that I would have gone specially
to see his act at the Marquee club,
I went mainly to see some of what I called the hotter bands.
I would sit in the audience and gape at...
The Yardbirds or The Who.
♪ Maybe ♪
♪ I'll do anything you say ♪
♪ Maybe ♪
♪ I'll do anything you say ♪
♪ Maybe ♪
♪ I'll do anything you say ♪
♪ Do anything... ♪
The record company decided it didn't matter what I was going to make with David,
they were losing faith.
His songs, they weren't good enough
to actually capture everybody's imagination.
You know, it still isn't that unique Bowie magic.
[Gillespie] David was never the success
that all his other contemporaries were,
because of being that much younger.
You could say that he almost had missed the boat.
But he was a very driven man, even from those early days.
But he always was helpful to me.
You know, I always felt I was kind of a fellow musician with him.
Love never came into it, which, thank God, you know,
if you're going to fall in love with Bowie, you might as well kiss your sanity goodbye.
Because he loved himself extremely, always did.
And I was quite happy with that.
[birds chirping]
At one point, David said, "Do you want to come home and meet my parents?"
I said, "Yes, why not?"
So, that meant taking the train to Bromley.
[Bowie] You find yourself in the middle of two worlds.
There's the extreme values of people who grow up in the countryside,
and the very urban feel of the city.
And in suburbia, you're given the impression that nothing culturally belongs to you.
That you are sort of in this wasteland.
["Trendilly" by Alan Blaikley playing]
[Underwood] David lived in Sundridge Park,
a mile or so from the center of Bromley.
And, um, it was quite quiet,
there wasn't-- there was not a lot happening there, you know.
There was a corner pub, couple of shops.
[Gillespie] When I was in his parents' house,
they're facing a television,
and the parents were sitting there quite quiet.
They offered me some tuna fish sandwiches.
But then, there was silence. And I'm somebody that, I mean,
I can talk to anybody, and it was hard going.
It was soulless.
Once they'd gone out, he said,
"Whatever it takes, I want to get out of here.
I do not want to live like this."
["I Dig Everything" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] I think there's a passion for most people
to have an iota of, sort of, curiosity about them,
to escape and get out and try and find who one is,
and find some kinds of roots, you know,
and a desperation,
an exhaustion with the blandness of where we grew up.
[MacCormack] So, London was magnetic for us.
It was somewhere we wanted to belong in.
And I think that's why David writes about it
so often in his early career.
["The London Boys" by David Bowie playing]
He would want to write songs from the perspective,
like Ray Davies did, really, of a London boy.
He always wanted it to be home-grown.
♪ Cow bell strikes another night ♪
♪ Your eyes are heavy and your limbs all ache ♪
♪ You've bought some coffee, butter and bread ♪
♪ You can't make a thing, 'cause the meter's dead ♪
[demo version] ♪ You've moved away ♪
♪ Told your folks you're gonna stay away ♪
What struck me was just a lot of them were really--
they were great songs, they just--
people didn't know about them yet.
He just wasn't David Bowie, per se.
As we know him today.
♪ Cow bell strikes another night... ♪
[Plati] For him to revisit these early songs of his,
it's just a very typical thing for him to do.
You hear the Bowie in the early songs.
Like he's already there.
He's, you know, he's bubbling to the surface,
but he's already there.
♪ ...You moved away ♪
♪ Told your folks you're gonna stay away ♪
♪ Bright lights, Soho, Wardour street ♪
♪ You hope you make friends with the guys that you meet ♪
♪ Somebody shows you 'round ♪
♪ Now you've met the London boys ♪
♪ Things seem good again ♪
♪ Someone cares ♪
♪ About you ♪
[Plati] Well that's not your typical 60's pop song, is it?
[Slick] None of it was.
"London Boys" is a really good example of David using
-his natural accent to sing, to make the point. -Right.
If you're gonna write a song called "London Boys," and you are from London,
and it's about you being a young man in London,
then the accent really drives the point home.
[Dorsey] I think he even exaggerates it a little bit.
It's almost like theater.
-Oh, yeah. -It's like he's-- it is in a sense,
he's doing a song, and whatever the theme of that song is,
he's putting on the character vocally that-- that tells the story the right way.
-That's exactly-- -And he's brilliant with that.
♪ It's too late now, 'cause you're out there boy ♪
♪ You've got it made with the rest of the toys ♪
♪ Now you wish you'd never left your home ♪
♪ You've got what you wanted, but you're on your own ♪
♪ With the London boys ♪
♪ Now you've met the London boys ♪
[Bowie singing] ♪ Two and two are four ♪
♪ Four and four are... ♪
[Bowie] So much of what any teenager or young person writes
comes from a sense of uniqueness.
Other than just rock music,
there has always been a history of the rebel.
Of not being drawn to the tyranny of the mainstream.
I really am open to influence and new ideas
and old ideas, as well.
I don't put up a block on things.
I was one of the first kids in Britain to have the Velvet Underground album.
I know that for a fact, because somebody had brought me back
a demo copy of it before it was even released in America.
The Underground were, I thought,
the most incredible sound.
There was the sort of mixture of rock and avant-garde.
And the combination was so brutal.
[Hutchinson] I don't think David lacked confidence in himself.
He probably always knew that he was very adaptable.
And it was more a question of him getting on the right track
to do the thing that would take him furthest.
And it obviously took him a long time to do that,
with the Lower Third and then, The Buzz,
and the other things that he did.
["I Take It That We're Through" by The Riot Squad playing]
♪ Well, I know you've had it bad, girl ♪
♪ And you're not to blame... ♪
[Roll] I think the attraction for David
was he was looking to move forward
and be a lot more adventurous with his musical styles.
And we were looking for a singer that was totally flexible.
But then David made it plain, really, right from the get-go,
that he wanted to go more left-field, if that's the right term, musically.
And already, he was talking about Velvet Underground.
[Davies] He knew what he wanted, and, uh, he was there to do it.
He just wanted a backing band, with extra goodies put in.
Which we did, we started having face painted,
we started to go more outrageous.
I remember him coming over to me,
"Can I draw a petal on your face, or a flower on your cheek?"
I said, "Yeah, do what you want with my face.
♪ Once upon a time, there was a toy soldier ♪
♪ And he lived in the play room ♪
♪ Once upon a time, there was a toy soldier ♪
♪ With a whip lash in his hand... ♪
[Bowie] To me,
the Velvet Underground represented the wild side of existentialist America,
the underbelly of American culture.
That was everything that I thought we should have in England.
But, of course, being filtered through this British system,
it came out more vaudeville. [laughs]
["Little Toy Soldier" by The Riot Squad playing]
[Davies] "Toy Soldier" was a bit of an odd one,
because it was about a young girl coming home from school,
going to her bedroom, and winding up a little toy soldier,
and then, being whipped by the toy soldier.
♪ And every night, little girl Sadie would take all her clothes off ♪
♪ And wind up the toy soldier, and he'd raise his whip and say to her ♪
♪ On your knees little Sadie... ♪
[Roll] I don't think he was ever embarrassed about
nicking some ideas.
He wasn't against taking a basic number,
and then, rearranging it by any means, including the lyrics.
♪ Taste the whip in love not given lightly ♪
♪ Taste the whip and bleed for me... ♪
[Roll] That, we brought into the stage act.
-It was just so visual. -Yeah.
A tailors' dummy, I think, used to get flagellated or something,
it was ridiculous, you know, it was bizarre.
-I certainly-- I enjoyed playing, that's for sure. -Yeah.
Great visual act.
I don't think people listen to the words at times,
-they could just see people whipping, and, uh... -Yeah.
Not many people used to get whipped on stage in them days.
No.
♪ One day Sadie wound and wound ♪
♪ And wound and wound ♪
♪ 'Till suddenly, the little toy soldier's spring ♪
♪ Went ♪ [screaming]
♪ And he beat her to death ♪
[Davies] He had some great ideas for that time.
But David's time with us was eight weeks.
25 gigs, that's all.
Maybe he just felt... overnight, you know,
he's done his bit with us, and now, want to move on to
something a bit more theatrical.
["Rubber Band" by David Bowie playing]
[Pitt] I was looking for someone who
could be an all-around entertainer.
And I thought in David, we had found someone who could be.
When we first went to the Deram label,
the man who was in charge of the album department
said to me,
"This is the greatest thing that's come here
since Tony Newley."
♪ With no star to guide me ♪
♪ And no one beside me... ♪
And he was a funny sort of guy, very much a...
cockney, lovable cockney kind of character.
And David will only be Anthony Newley
all the way through doing all the other stuff.
♪ Maybe tomorrow ♪
♪ I'll find what I'm after ♪
♪ I'll throw off my sorrow ♪
♪ Beg, steal or borrow my share of laughter ♪
[Bowie] The thing is, I never thought that I could sing very well,
and I used to kind of try on people's voices
if they appealed to me when I was a kid, about 15, 16.
So, I started singing like Anthony Newley.
And so I was writing these really weird Tony Newley-type songs.
I thought, "Yeah, this is my bag."
["Rubber Band" by David Bowie playing]
♪ Won't you play a haunting theme again to me ♪
♪ While I eat my scones and drink my cup of tea ♪
♪ The sun is warm, but it's a lonely afternoon... ♪
[Dudgeon] He just had such wacky songs.
About the only thing that used to bother us
was he sounded like Anthony Newley all the time.
I mean, to the point that, you know, we used to comment on it,
and David would just say, "Well, I can't sing any other way."
We knew bloody well he could, but he just had--
I think he just had a fixation to the point that as soon as he opened his mouth,
Anthony Newley shot out.
You know, and it was like he just had no control over it.
♪ I hope you break your baton ♪
[laughter]
[Bowie] Go on!
[plays "The Laughing Gnome" by David Bowie]
[vocalizing "The Laughing Gnome]
That's very, very simple.
["The Laughing Gnome" by David Bowie playing]
♪ When I heard footsteps behind me ♪
♪ And there was a little old man
♪ Hello! ♪
♪ In scarlet and gray, chuckling away ♪
[high-pitched chuckling]
[Alomar] One of the great influences that, you know, he had
was Anthony Newley.
Which to me, I didn't get that.
Who got it was my wife Robyn.
He was singing once, and Robyn looked at me and went,
"Did he just Anthony-Newley us?"
I said, "Yes, I think he did, honey."
♪ Ha, ha, ha, hee, hee, hee ♪
♪ I'm a laughing gnome, and you can't catch me ♪
♪ Ha, ha, ha, hee, hee, hee... ♪
[Bowie] I'll always associate "Laughing Gnome" with Gus Dudgeon,
because he used to sit there doing tricks with his glasses
whilst I was making it.
[laughs] Because we had the technology.
[Bowie on recording] Ha, ha, ha!
Get down with it! Whoo!
Fuck off.
Hee, hee, hee!
He said, "Right, we need some gnome voices on this thing,"
and I showed him it could be done, and he was--
he went, "Oh, well, that's it, we've got to do it."
[Bowie on recording] ♪ I'm a laughing gnome ♪
♪ And you can't catch me ♪
[radio distortion]
["The Laughing Gnome" playing]
[Vernon] You have to slow the tape down to pretty much the half-speed
and sing normally.
We did quite a lot of takes
and got very silly and got very rude at times.
And there were some obscenities that we can't possibly talk about.
But everyone had a good time doing it.
[Bowie on recording] Come on, friend! Ha, ha, ha!
["The Laughing Gnome" playing]
♪ I'm a laughing gnome, and you can't catch me ♪
♪ Said the laughing gnome... ♪
[Alomar] In a way, David is also very clever.
A simplicity aspect, I think, is very, very important.
I mean, his love for the Velvet Underground and the whole Lou Reed thing,
and the simplicity of "Waiting For the Man."
[plays Bowie's "Waiting for the Man"]
♪ Waiting for the man ♪
That same pulsation--
♪ I was walking ♪
[vocalizing to the tune of "The Laughing Gnome"]
It's exactly the same.
♪ Waiting for the man ♪
Two chords. I mean, "Fame" is three chords.
And so, this simplicity is amazing.
And it's totally relevant.
But...
the Velvet Underground was cool.
There's nothing cool about "The Laughing Gnome."
["The Laughing Gnome" playing]
[Bowie laughing] ♪ I'm a laughing gnome, and you can't catch me ♪
[Gillespie] Everything he did kind of failed.
"The Laughing Gnome," that single that he loathed,
didn't give him satisfaction.
I don't know how he coped with this,
except that I do know that if you want something hard enough and it's not happened,
it only makes you want to go on and want it even more.
["Sell Me a Coat" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie vocalizing]
Oh, my word.
54 years or so of history coming back at me.
Bowie was young. He was trying to make a mark for himself.
And he was very much a Jack the Lad, there's no two ways about it.
But, I mean, he was very funny to work with.
We did have a lot of moments where we collapsed in laughter.
[recording] Where there's muck, there's brass.
Crisp green shirt and a lemonade sandwich out on a horse-shoe.
That's where the men are.
David was an easy guy to get along with, you know,
it's just that his songs were wild.
[man in recording] One, two, one, two, three, four.
[Vernon] They were totally quirky and off-the-wall, you know.
And there are some really good songs, and there are emotions,
and there are stories.
And this was the one thing that Bowie was very good at.
There's no discussion about it.
["Love You 'Till Tuesday" by David Bowie playing]
♪ Just look through your window ♪
♪ Look who sits outside ♪
♪ Little me is waiting ♪
♪ Standing through the night ♪
♪ When you walk out through your door ♪
♪ I'll wave my flag and shout ♪
♪ Oh, beautiful baby ♪
♪ My burning desire started on Sunday ♪
♪ Give me your heart, and I'll love you 'till Tuesday ♪
Well, I might be able to stretch it 'till Wednesday.
The songs had a different viewpoint,
singing songs that were-- appeared to be written by children.
I don't remember ever hearing, really, any other song
at that time that was a story that was apparently being told by children.
It seemed to me completely unique.
["There is a Happy Land" by David Bowie playing]
♪ There is a happy land ♪
♪ Where only children live ♪
♪ They don't have the time to learn the ways ♪
♪ Of you sir, Mr. Grown-up... ♪
Good heavens, it's been 60 years since I've been here.
And I never ever used the front door.
We always came in through the back alley.
♪ It's a secret place ♪
♪ And adults aren't allowed there ♪
♪ Mr. Grown-up ♪
♪ Go away, sir ♪
[music stops]
[Amadeus] David used to do his performances
on the window sill over there.
And David would go, "Ta-da!"
And he'd do his Flowerpot Men.
He would jump around with a terracotta pot on his head.
[characters chattering]
[Amadeus] His father, John, absolutely doted on him.
But David's mum, Peggy, never became involved in games.
She would sit and watch, but she would never enthuse, you know,
she wouldn't be, "Oh, how wonderful" or anything like that.
And she would often tell us we were being soppy.
["Inchworm" by Danny Kaye playing]
[Bowie] "Inchworm," Danny Kaye,
it conjures up my childhood for me. [laughs]
It's very sweet.
And it was from the film Hans Christian Andersen.
♪ Inchworm ♪
♪ Measuring the marigolds... ♪
[Bowie] It sounded so personal.
And the person who was singing it sounded like he'd been hurt, too.
And I think that really got to me, and it might have gone into the way I wrote a bit.
You know, I've been hurt too. [chuckles]
♪ Inchworm ♪
♪ Inchworm... ♪
[Bowie] Often talking out your hurt,
you know, is something I find that, you know, writers can do.
And I may have done that a few times.
["Come and Buy My Toys" by David Bowie playing]
[Underwood] David's mum was quite quiet, really, she didn't say a lot.
I wasn't sure if she liked me, even, you know.
Because sometimes you-- you'd think,
"Well, maybe she doesn't like me, she's a bit quiet and doesn't say anything."
[MacCormack] I never saw her laugh or smile. Certainly not to me.
And, bless her heart, when she died,
I wrote to David and said,
"I'm sorry about your mother," etcetera.
I said, "Actually, she never quite took to me, your mother,"
and he wrote to me and said, "Trouble is, Geoff,
she never quite took to me either."
♪ Smiling girls and rosy boys ♪
♪ Come and buy my little toys ♪
♪ Monkeys made of gingerbread ♪
♪ And sugar horses painted red... ♪
[Amadeus] David spent his entire life trying to win her approval.
I think when David was young,
he suffered a lot
from the problems in his parents' marriage.
They didn't engage in...
affectionate conversation with each other.
John was very much in love with Peggy.
Peggy would say to John's face it was a marriage of convenience.
And so there was this rift.
And David had to be very careful,
if he allowed his father to make too much of him, it would annoy Peggy.
I think the most significant thing in David's life
was that he was always striving for Peggy's love.
I think he spent his life trying to win her approval.
♪ Rich men's children running past ♪
♪ Their fathers dressed in hose ♪
♪ Golden hair and mud of many acres on their shoes ♪
♪ Gazing eyes and running wild ♪
♪ Past the stocks and over stiles ♪
♪ Kiss the window merry child ♪
♪ But come and buy my toys... ♪
[Bowie] The idea of writing, sort of, short stories,
I think that was quite novel at the time. Excuse the pun.
I was quite satisfied with the way things were going.
I mean, I hadn't found any voice style, and I hadn't found any way to perform.
[Vernon] The Beatles' Sergeant Pepper unfortunately
came out at the same time.
I mean, it was pretty strong competition.
Frankly, Bowie didn't stand a chance, really,
and that's why the record, I guess, at the time,
completely flopped.
I mean, it didn't really do any business at all.
["When I Live My Dream" by David Bowie playing]
[Kemp] It was absolutely beautiful.
It was the first time that I heard David.
I loved all the songs, some more than others, I suppose.
And it was that song "When I Live My Dream."
♪ When I live my dream, I'll be there ♪
That started the whole thing off.
That's when I fell in love with him, for one thing.
♪ When I live my dream ♪
♪ I'll take you with me ♪
♪ Riding on a golden horse... ♪
[Pitt] Lindsay was using the Deram album in his show.
He was miming to certain aspects of this album.
And news of that got to David,
and therefore, he went to see one of Lindsay's performances.
[Kemp] And the curtains opened,
and there was a very beautiful man sitting in the front row
who turned out to be David Bowie.
Well, he came around after the show,
and there was a kind of a tatty curtain, which he pulled to one side,
and it was like the Archangel Gabriel
standing there. This kind of light.
♪ 'Till that day ♪
♪ You'll run to many other men ♪
♪ But let them know it's just for now ♪
♪ Tell them that I've got a dream ♪
♪ And tell them you're the starring role... ♪
He had a grace and a brain, as well as beauty.
But he was funny.
And, you know, I mean, beauty and humor
are the two things that attract me the most.
They gotta have both of those
if they're going to last more than a weekend.
["Threepenny Pierrot" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] We said, "Well, let's get together," you know.
"I'd love to write some music for your show."
And he said, "Well, I can't pay you,"
because he wasn't earning anything.
"Yeah," I said, "Well, look, that's all right, because I want to learn mime.
So, in exchange, you teach me mime, and I'll work with you,
you know, write some music."
♪ Bang the drum and blow the bugle call ♪
♪ Pierrot takes the stage to play for all ♪
♪ For here's a life his fortune rules ♪
♪ Forsaken by his Columbine... ♪
The premiere was at the Oxford Playhouse,
so we got paid a nominal kind of fee from there.
And, uh, we transferred to the West End.
Albeit, West 11, Notting Hill,
which was not quite so fashionable then as it is now.
And the tiny Mercury Theater,
the home of, uh, British ballet.
And I think it sat 120 seats, so we didn't make much money.
Need I say more? Nobody came at all. Nobody came at all.
♪ 'Till the day my dream cascades around me ♪
♪ I'm content to let you pass me by... ♪
[Bowie] I thought, "Well, here I am,
I'm a bit, sort of, mixed up, creatively.
I've got all these things going on I like doing at once on stage or whatever.
I'm not quite sure if I'm a mime or a songwriter or a singer.
Why am I doing any of these things, anyway?"
And I realized it was because I wanted to be well-known.
♪ Tell them I'm a dreaming kind of guy... ♪
[Bowie] I've always been a very curious and enthusiastic person.
I just had to accept that
I was a person that had a very short attention span,
would move from one thing to another quite rapidly,
then I got bored with the other.
♪ Ground Control to Major Tom ♪
♪ Your circuit's dead, there's something wrong ♪
♪ Can you hear me, Major Tom?... ♪
[Bowie] Somehow, I knew that what I was doing was important.
Taking elements from areas
that really shouldn't sit comfortably with each other.
Her name was Hermione Farthingale,
and I absolutely adored her.
I mean, she was the real first love in my life.
And she was a ballet dancer.
We did fall in love. It took maybe five minutes.
[laughs] Maximum.
He was a lad, a youthlet,
he was very, very young, looked ridiculously young. He looked about eight.
And in fact, when I first went out with him,
it did sort of bother me a little bit, you know,
I had to sort keep reminding myself he was actually 21.
[Bowie singing acapella] ♪ And we talked with our eyes ♪
♪ Of the sweetness in our lives ♪
♪ And tomorrow's a rich surprise ♪
Hermione was a couple of notches up, you know.
She was posh.
["Let Me Sleep Beside You" by David Bowie playing]
[Hutchinson] But really nice.
And they looked like mirror images, so they fit together.
[Farthingale] Our life was not regular.
Neither of us were working nine to five.
And it wasn't a very rock 'n' roll life either.
Occasionally, we had a glass of white wine. [inhales]
And David wasn't even very good at having a spliff.
♪ Baby, baby ♪
♪ Brush the dust of youth from off your shoulder ♪
♪ Because the years of threading daisies ♪
♪ Lie behind you now... ♪
[Harris] David was, I have to say, the perfect English gentleman.
I mean, I remember, for example,
when he and 'Mione sat down for dinner,
David held the chair for her and, uh,
pushed the chair in for her,
and being very polite, easy-going,
and very lovely people.
♪ Let your hair hang down ♪
♪ Wear the dress your mother wore ♪
♪ Let me sleep beside you... ♪
In the early days, he wasn't happy, professionally, at all,
because it was a sort of massive struggle,
that whole year.
[Bowie] I remember there was this endless period
where I was, like, scrubbing out people's kitchens.
I know I did that. Anything to pick up a few dollars.
But I needed something that didn't tie me down in any way,
so if an audition came along or whatever,
I'd be free to do it, you know?
[Farthingale] But by August, it suddenly came to him
that what he wanted to do was this mixed media performance.
♪ I will give you dreams ♪
♪ And I'll tell you things you'd like to hear ♪
♪ Let your hair hang down ♪
[Bowie] I was in a mixed media group,
which means that one of us could dance,
another one could sing, and another one had some poetry,
and we put it all together. And, uh, it went underground.
It was called Feathers.
And the girl was Hermione
and, uh, the guy was Hutch on guitar.
["Ching-A-Ling" by Feathers playing]
♪ Two lover souls we spied ♪
♪ They wished the cloud boys sang to me ♪
♪ A cheerful happy cry... ♪
[Hutchinson] David and, uh, Feathers, we could do a song
quite heavy and quite deep.
But you can change the mood on a gig
by doing something with a nice snappy guitar riff.
And "Ching-A-Ling" song was, uh, fine.
It was a good song. And it had, uh,
you know, that was unusual, in its way.
[Visconti] "Ching-A-Ling" was based on David's 12-string,
his traveling piano, you know, that's what he used all the time to write on.
And as long as he stayed on that instrument,
songs were gonna come out that way. It was, you know,
you can't play, like, uh, rock riffs on a 12-string.
You just can't. [laughs]
He'd try one thing, try another.
Things didn't-- If they didn't work out, that was absolutely fine.
And just move on to the next.
But he wasn't lost. He just wasn't found either.
["Sell Me a Coat" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] We used to do some mime pieces, you know, and it was like
just throwing in everything I knew to keep an audience's attention
more than anything else.
I can't remember the specifics of his performance,
other than what I photographed.
[Stevenson] It was pretty much like mime exercises,
but a bit extra.
It didn't really do it for me.
But the man did. [laughs]
♪ Sell me a coat with buttons of silver ♪
♪ Sell me a coat that's red or gold ♪
♪ Sell me a coat... ♪
[Stevenson] I didn't shoot color with David,
'cause it seemed like a waste.
Color, whole different thing and expense.
Yeah, he was obviously not gonna be a massive star, so...
why would I want color in my library?
[Kemp] David asked me to see
a little show that he'd got together with Feathers.
[Bowie] I was walking home,
and I happened to glance in the window of this junk shop.
And there it was.
[Kemp] It had a piece called The Mask.
David, I suppose, had seen Marcel Marceau along the line.
But he wasn't Marcel Marceau.
[man and woman laughing]
[Kemp] It was dreadful.
I cringed. [stammers] I really cringed.
[recorded applause]
And there are always people that say,
"He was very good in that miming, wasn't he?"
Oh, no, he was a load of shit.
[Harty] Has any of the criticism or any of the attacks hurt you?
[Bowie] Yes, everything hurts me very much. I'm very sensitive.
But, uh, I put myself in that position, so that's...
what I'm in for, isn't it?
[Farthingale] Feathers was never destined to last.
He never said, "Let's the three of us get really famous together."
It was a stepping stone.
But I had also said to myself,
"Am I actually going to be with David for the rest of my life?"
And I didn't think I was actually going to.
He was clearly going somewhere.
And I just didn't think I was going to tread that path with him.
Song of Norway was a big MGM spectacular,
which needed dancers for seven months or so.
It was something that nobody in their right mind would've turned down.
I just thought, "Yeah, this is what I want to be doing."
I suddenly realized that I had to...
I had to pull out, stop.
[Bowie] Oh, God, yes, my heart broke.
She was doing this funny romp in Norway
with bits of ballet in it, and that she was, uh, cast in that.
God, I didn't get over that for such a long time.
It really broke me up.
[Amadeus] I think he was vulnerable,
and he was scared of being abandoned.
I think he was very hesitant about giving himself.
["When I'm Five" by David Bowie playing]
And David must've been very frightened
by all the comings and goings of various family members.
♪ When I'm five ♪
♪ I will read the magazines in mummy's drawer ♪
♪ When I'm five ♪
♪ I will walk behind the soldiers in the ♪
♪ May Day parade... ♪
[Bowie] I have a cousin who's very dear to me
who was shuttled around from family to family
and came to stay with us for a while.
My mother had, uh, children that I never really knew about,
but were also shifted off to another family.
It just seemed everybody in the family
had this kind of attribute of being in transition from one stage to another.
♪ When I'm five ♪
♪ I will catch a butterfly and eat it and I won't be sick... ♪
[Bowie] I think I'd realized that
the transitory nature of life was, um,
something that we all had to deal with.
I think one of the reasons he was so very good as a child, and he was,
was because he was afraid he'd be given away too.
[Bowie singing acapella] ♪ Ground Control to Major Tom ♪
♪ Your circuit's dead, there's something wrong ♪
♪ Can you hear me, Major Tom? ♪
[Bowie] I related it to myself a lot more
than anything I'd written up until then.
There was something about it that touched areas of my fears
about my own insecurity, socially,
and maybe emotionally.
This feeling of isolation that I had ever since I was a kid
was really starting to manifest itself.
I think the isolation of the film 2001
made itself very obvious when I wrote the song "Space Oddity,"
because for the first time,
I really felt a sense of how you could write as an isolationist.
["Space Oddity" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] I thought, "Well, gee, I am Major Tom.
Here I am in my own cosmic space, and
nobody can possibly understand what it's like to be out here
on this umbilical cord attached to my craft."
♪ Ground Control to Major Tom ♪
♪ Take your protein pills and put your helmet on... ♪
[Hutchinson] David wrote it as a song for two people,
Ground Control and Major Tom.
David would sing the lead, and I would come up with easiest way
for me to sound right as the harmony voice.
♪ Check ignition and may God's love be with you ♪
♪ Blast off! ♪
Not only that, I should've been on the record
as Ground Control, obviously.
But I'd left. I was in a drawing office in Scarborough by then.
♪ This is Major Tom to Ground Control ♪
♪ I'm stepping through the door ♪
♪ And I'm floating in the most peculiar way ♪
♪ Can I please get back inside now, if I may?... ♪
[Visconti] When I heard the demo of "Space Oddity,"
I didn't like it all that much.
And, uh, I handed it to Gus Dudgeon.
He really loved David.
[Dudgeon] I said, "Tony, you're crazy.
Are you sure you don't wanna do this song?" And he said,
"No, you wanna do it, obviously." I said, "I can't wait."
And, uh, so he said, "Well, you do that on the B-side,
and I'll do the rest of the album." I said, "OK, fine."
[Visconti] If Gus were alive, which he isn't, unfortunately,
he would be presenting this to you.
And, uh, I was really, really impressed
with the job that David and Gus Dudgeon had done on this.
What makes this work is drama.
The first thing you hear is an ominous 12-string guitar
fade up from nothing.
So all that is quite dramatic.
That's not your average pop song.
But you know, it doesn't hit you in the face, doesn't hit you in the head.
It's drama. And you're sucked into it.
So this is a very clever device that he used.
[Bowie singing acapella] ♪ Ground Control to Major Tom ♪
[Visconti] So David used this revolutionary new instrument,
the mighty little Stylophone.
So it all adds to the kind of science-fiction quality of the song.
♪ Check ignition and may God's love be with you ♪
Very dramatic lift-off, isn't it?
["Space Oddity" by David Bowie playing]
♪ This is Ground Control to Major Tom ♪
♪ You've really made the grade ♪
And another new thing it had on it,
which the Beatles kind of debuted, was the Mellotron.
[playing chords from "Space Oddity"]
David wanted it, because he wanted it to sound,
not like strings, but like strings.
And I knew exactly what he meant. It's recorded strings.
So, tapes inside.
Um, but one of the problems you have with this instrument
is that, uh, a note only lasts eight seconds.
And then, it cuts out.
So, if you hold a chord long enough,
and sometimes you need to hold it for a lot longer than eight seconds,
after you get to the eight-second mark, it starts to...
[chord distorts and stops]
to do that, which is why I hated the bloody thing,
um, to be brutally honest with you.
♪ And the papers want to know whose shirts you wear ♪
♪ Now it's time to leave the capsule if you dare ♪
Covered it in echo to get the actual sound that David wanted.
Which I have nicked ever since to use on Yes records.
♪ Though I'm past 100'000 miles ♪
♪ I'm feeling very still ♪
♪ And I think my spaceship knows which way to go ♪
♪ Tell my wife I love her very much, she knows ♪
♪ Ground Control to Major Tom ♪
♪ Your circuit's dead, there's something wrong ♪
♪ Can you hear me, Major Tom? ♪
[Harty] David, the record which you have
in our charts in Britain at the moment
is undoubtedly your biggest success to date, isn't it?
[Bowie] My only success to date.
♪ Here am I floating round my tin can ♪
[Visconti] When he had the big hit with "Space Oddity,"
that's where the change came where he started seeing himself as a star.
♪ Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do ♪
[Visconti] People knew who David Bowie was then.
He was the Major Tom guy
and they'd say, "Hey, Major Tom" and all that. People would see him, you know.
Which he loved. He absolutely loved it.
[announcer] Accepting the Special Merit Award for Originality,
David Bowie.
[Visconti] But they said, "You'll never write another song
like this again," and he didn't.
What he did come up with was something no one dreamt about at the time.
He was the first rock star to take on a different identity.
In other words, it was Ziggy Stardust by David Bowie.
That was his stroke of genius.
["Starman" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] Off the record, what everybody told me is that,
"David, you've gotta have a single."
So, I said, "Right, I'll go away,
and I'll write an RP-type single in my style.
[laughs] Based loosely on "Oddity."
[man] Loosely on "Space Oddity".
-Right. -So that people say,
"Ah, this is what we were waiting for from David Bowie,
is a follow-up to 'Space Oddity.'"
That's "Starman." "Starman" was strictly, I wrote it in about 15 minutes.
I used every cliché phrase I could think of
to do with starmen and people in space [unclear] and
let the children boogie and all that.
Shoved it in three minutes and on a nice tune.
♪ Didn't know what time it was and the lights were low ♪
♪ I leaned back on my radio ♪
♪ Some cat was layin' down some ♪
♪ Get it on rock 'n' roll, he said ♪
♪ Then the loud sound did seem to fade ♪
♪ Came back like a slow voice on a wave of phase haze ♪
♪ That weren't no D.J. that was hazy cosmic jive ♪
[interviewer] Do you enjoy being a rock star?
[Bowie] Fantastic. [laughs]
I'm just really, I'm itching to write.
I've never really thought, "Well, I'm gonna make my mark as a..."
I just thought, "Well, I'll be David Bowie.
The first David Bowie, that's all."
♪ There's a starman waiting in the sky ♪
♪ He'd like to come and meet us ♪
♪ But he thinks he'd blow our minds ♪
♪ There's a starman waiting in the sky ♪
♪ He's told us not to blow it ♪
♪ 'Cause he knows it's all worthwhile ♪
♪ He told me ♪
♪ Let the children lose it ♪
♪ Let the children use it ♪
♪ Let all the children boogie ♪
[Cambridge] When we did the Space Oddity album in Trident studio,
David used to walk about like he was a star.
You could see it just by--
He could walk into a pub, and you think,
"He's gonna be a star," and you could t--, you know, that.
But not necessarily about his music or his playing at that time, you know.
["Letter to Hermione" by David Bowie playing]
He was a bit like a folky singer.
He wasn't, like, the rock God he became.
But, then again, David was very deep, you know?
He would never...
wore his heart on his sleeve,
he would never come out to you and say, "I'm really worried about this," you know.
He would just ride over it.
♪ The hand that wrote this letter ♪
♪ Sweeps the pillow clean ♪
♪ So rest your head and read a treasured dream ♪
♪ I care for no one else but you ♪
♪ I tear my soul to cease the pain ♪
♪ I think maybe you feel the same ♪
♪ What can we do?... ♪
[Bowie] So, I wrote my, you know, my "Letter to Hermione"
on my album. There, that'll show her.
I write something that public,
and she'll see that she really messed me up.
♪ So I've been writing you just for you... ♪
He was definitely feeling that song.
That was him being vulnerable.
I think we only did one or two takes.
There was no reason to keep recording it
and do it one more time, better.
He just did that performance
and it was heart-tugging.
♪ They say your life is going very well ♪
♪ They say you sparkle like a different girl ♪
♪ But something tells me that you hide ♪
♪ When all the world is warm and tired ♪
♪ You cry a little in the dark ♪
♪ Well so do I... ♪
Did I cry? Probably.
I missed him terribly. We missed each other.
As friends, apart from anything else, you know,
that's what we really, we really missed. Yeah.
♪ I'm not quite sure what I'm supposed to do ♪
♪ So I'll just write some love to you ♪
♪ Still don't know what I was waiting for ♪
♪ And my time was running wild ♪
♪ A million dead end streets and ♪
♪ Every time I thought I'd got it made ♪
♪ It seemed the taste was not so sweet ♪
[Bowie] It almost seemed like 1970 was the cumulative year for me.
That's where it all sort of started to make sense.
["Conversation Piece" by David Bowie playing]
♪ I took this walk to ease my mind ♪
♪ To find out what's gnawing at me ♪
♪ Wouldn't think to look at me ♪
♪ That I've spent a lot of time in education... ♪
[Bowie] I was living in this, uh, huge, almost neo-gothic pile
down in Beckenham called Haddon Hall.
Which had some kind of, uh, baronial hall entrance hall-type thing.
And the band that we collected together,
Visconti and, at the time, Angela,
all kind of shared this, uh, baronial hall.
So it's kind of a commune thing.
[Visconti] Angie, when I met her, was this free spirit.
She was outspoken, had courage like you wouldn't believe.
She could walk up to anybody and give them a piece of her mind.
Or get things.
And Angie was the one who made things happen.
["The Width of a Circle" by David Bowie playing]
[Bowie] Mick came from Hull, you know, and was very down to Earth.
[laughs]
But when I first heard him play, I thought, [gasps]
"That's my Jeff Beck. He is fantastic, this kid is great."
And so, I sort of hoodwinked him into working with me.
[Victonti] What David should've said was, "He's my Mick Ronson."
Mick was his own man.
He could play like Beck,
but he was definitely a very different guitarist
in the sense that Mick was also a violinist and a pianist.
He studied classical music.
He picked up things that most rock guitarists didn't know.
[Bowie] My new band was called Hype.
Tony Visconti on bass, Mick Ronson on guitar,
and John Cambridge on drums.
And myself on rhythm guitar and keyboard thing.
♪ In the corner of the morning in the past ♪
♪ I would sit and blame the master first and last ♪
♪ All the roads were straight and narrow ♪
♪ And the prayers were small and yellow ♪
♪ And the rumor spread that I was aging fast... ♪
[Bowie] One of the first gigs that we did was in February 1970
at the Roundhouse with Hype.
And I think it was probably my first costume band.
And our respective girlfriends and wives and whatever
put together all these really ridiculous, like,
cartoon capers comic hero costumes.
[Cambridge] The Roundhouse gig with the costumes,
that was Angie's idea.
She said we should all get dressed up,
and maybe David did want to maybe, uh,
a bit in it as well, but Angie had a lot to do with it.
I was Cowboy Man with a cowboy hat on. I had a frilly shirt.
[Bowie] Ronson was Guitar Gangster,
and he wore a sort of gangster's outfit.
And I became this kind of Spaceman,
silver llama and all that.
Tony was Hypeman.
He was like a converted Superman-type thing.
♪ So softly a super God cries ♪
[Bowie] We thought we were kind of, you know, smart.
But nobody even looked at the stage.
I mean, it was really just the most depressing night of our lives.
♪ Where all were minds in uni-thought ♪
♪ Power is weird by mystic's thoughts... ♪
[Bowie] But I think I was getting nearer to what I wanted to do,
which is to create this alternative world.
Which is what I ultimately ended up doing with the Ziggy thing.
♪ A man would tear his brother's flesh, a chance to die ♪
♪ To turn to mold ♪
[Woodmansey] I got a call from David.
"I've got this place in Beckenham in Kent
called Haddon Hall, and we all live there.
And I'm doing another album.
You know, will you come?" So, I was like, "Ooh."
[laughs]
["Looking for a Friend" by David Bowie playing]
♪ Watch me while you can... ♪
[Coleman] Haddon Hall was obviously neglected, wonderful building.
They just rented it and
probably someone was glad to have anyone in there.
It was a bit like a squat.
[Woodmansey] Mick and I slept on the landing in sleeping bags.
I remember waking up one morning, there was a--
I just heard giggling and screaming down below through the banisters.
I looked down and there was like, ten naked females
prancing about downstairs.
♪ You don't have to be a big wheel ♪
♪ You don't have to be the end... ♪
I never saw ten naked women. I saw two.
But people would try to get into my bedroom.
And climb into bed with, uh, Liz and myself,
and it was like, "Mate, you're in the wrong room.
Go back in that room," you know? "It's not like a bordello."
Which it kind of resembled after a while.
[Woodmansey] You never quite knew what was gonna happen.
And then David would come down the staircase in the dress.
You know, you'd never seen that before.
"It's a man's dress." I said, "Yeah, I assumed that," you know?
[MacCormack] It was definitely a man's dress.
Although zipped up in the same way as a woman's.
We all wore dresses at that time.
And, uh, no, we didn't. No.
["She Shook Me Cold" by David Bowie playing]
♪ We met upon a hill ♪
♪ The night was cool and still... ♪
[Bowie] I was still very much trying to find who I was as a writer.
And electric music was appealing to me more and more.
Especially the heavier kind of guitar-oriented things.
♪ I will go back again ♪
♪ My God, she shook me cold ♪
[Woodmansey] I mean, The Man Who Sold The World
is not completely disconnected from the Led Zeppelin style
heavy metal that was beginning to arrive, as well.
I think all the sounds that he's going through
are things that he's listening to, having a look at,
pulling into the next record and, you know,
using that and going on from there.
["Running Gun Blues" by David Bowie playing]
♪ I slashed them cold, I killed them dead ♪
♪ I broke the gooks I cracked their heads ♪
♪ I'll bomb them out from under their beds ♪
♪ But now I've got the running gun blues... ♪
[Woodmansey] On Man Who Sold The World,
he was starting to get more of a concept of
"I'll do what I want to do"
lyrically, particularly, and song-wise.
Um, Man Who Sold The World opened the floodgates.
I think he was learning that his ideas could be put across.
And I think the times when he didn't compromise
on what he wanted to say were the successful things.
["All the Madmen" by David Bowie playing]
♪ Day after day ♪
♪ They send my friends away ♪
♪ To mansions cold and gray... ♪
[Bowie] One of my, sort of, half-siblings
meant so much to me in my early years, and his name was Terry.
He was my half-brother. My mother's son.
♪ To the far side of town ♪
♪ Where the thin men stalk the streets ♪
♪ While the sane stay underground... ♪
[Bowie] Terry probably gave me
the greatest education that I could ever have had.
I mean, he just introduced me to the outside things.
And I guess Terry had shown me
that there has always been a history of the outside,
of the rebel.
Of not being in the center,
not being drawn to the tyranny of the mainstream.
But then he would go away for long periods.
One period he went away, he joined the, uh, RAF.
And when he came back, he had changed considerably.
And was showing very evident signs of schizophrenia.
And then, he went into hospital,
and he stayed in hospital for the rest of his life.
♪ Day after day ♪
♪ They tell me I can go ♪
♪ They tell me I can blow ♪
♪ To the far side of town ♪
♪ Where it's pointless to be high ♪
♪ 'Cause it's such a long way down ♪
♪ So I tell them that ♪
♪ I can fly ♪
♪ I will scream, I will break my arm ♪
♪ I will do me harm... ♪
[Bowie] Insanity was something that I was terribly fearful of.
But I felt that I was the lucky one,
because as long as I could put those psychological excesses into my music,
then I could always be throwing it off.
[Amadeus] One of the porkies that David perpetuated
for a very long time was that he came from a family
where insanity seemed to be the norm.
And it just wasn't true.
Yes, Terry had his breakdown.
But, um, I believe it was a bad acid trip.
[Visconti] Every arrangement we did
on The Man Who Sold The World album,
we started them in Haddon Hall,
but we finished most of the album in the studio
and made up our own parts on the spot.
And David would go off into the hallway and write the lyrics.
I'd go out half an hour later,
and he'd just be holding hands with Angie.
I'd go, "Come on, write the damn lyrics, for God's sake!"
The Man Who Sold The World was writ--,
the lyrics were written on the same day we recorded it,
which was the last day of the album.
["The Man Who Sold the World" by David Bowie playing]
[Woodmansey] "The Man Who Sold The World" as a song
was kind of about
meeting himself in the future and where he'd been
and you kind of--
that's the picture you, or I had in my head.
♪ We passed upon the stair ♪
♪ We spoke of was and when ♪
♪ Although I wasn't there ♪
♪ He said I was his friend ♪
♪ Which came as some surprise ♪
[demo version] ♪ I spoke into his eyes ♪
♪ I thought you died alone ♪
♪ A long long time ago ♪
[Woodmansey] I thought at the time,
"OK, it's pretty hard rock and progressive, a lot of it."
So, imagine you've got a Zeppelin album, a Sabbath album,
and this guy in a dress.
It's not gonna happen, just from the cover alone.
♪ Who knows? ♪
♪ Not me ♪
♪ We never lost control ♪
♪ You're face to face ♪
♪ With the man who sold the world ♪
[Coleman] I was having to create a bill out of nothing.
And so, I started off with people that I liked and knew.
So, I rang David and said, "Are you interested in doing it?"
Got Angie, who said, "No, he's doing some solo gigs, and
he's not enjoying them very much," um,
in her inimitable way.
And then, I rang again and got David a couple of days later,
and he said, "Well, I'm kind of interested in doing it."
[Bowie] I did the second festival ever in 1971.
I got on at 5:30 in the morning.
And it was just me and this electric Woolworth's organ that I'd brought.
[organ playing "Oh, You Pretty Things"]
♪ Wake up you sleepy head ♪
♪ Put on some clothes, shake out your bed ♪
[David and crowd laughing]
[Bowie on stage] This is about homo superior.
You're letting the lyrics down, badly.
[laughter]
[Gillespie] David, Angie, and I went to Glastonbury.
And I do remember people crawling out of their sleeping bags and their tents.
And he was up there on his own.
♪ I still don't know what I was waiting for ♪
♪ And my time was running wild ♪
♪ A million dead end streets and ♪
♪ Every time I thought I'd got it made ♪
♪ It seemed the taste was not so sweet... ♪
[Coleman] Then, a few more arrived, and a few more arrived,
and then, people were running around waking people up.
I could see people,
I could see little scurrying figures up the hillside
from my seat on the side of the stage.
Until eventually there were about 4-500 people there.
♪ How the others must see the faker... ♪
[Coleman] The sun was out, it was warming up,
and these people had obviously thought they were the only people on the planet
that had discovered this young man, and it r--,
it really was an important moment for a lot of people.
[Bowie on stage] I tell you what, um,
I just wanna say that you've given me more pleasure
than I've had in a good few months of working,
and I don't do gigs anymore, because I got so pissed off
with working and dying a death every time I worked.
And it's really nice to have somebody appreciate me for a change.
[applause]
[Bowie] '71 is when I got down to seriously writing
and trying to, uh, not diversify too much.
I was, uh, trying to be a one-man revolution.
[laughter]
["Changes" by David Bowie playing]
[Grace] I know exactly what he wanted, he told me.
He said, "World domination."
He said there was absolutely no doubt that he was going to be,
you know, a world-class superstar that he became.
And that's what he wanted.
♪ Still don't know what I was waiting for ♪
♪ Time was running wild ♪
♪ A million dead end streets and ♪
♪ Every time I thought I'd got it made ♪
♪ It seemed the taste was not so sweet ♪
♪ Then I turned myself to face me ♪
♪ But I've never caught a glimpse ♪
♪ How the others must see the faker ♪
♪ I'm much too fast to take that test ♪
♪ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes ♪
♪ Turn and face the strange ♪
♪ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes ♪
♪ Don't want to be a richer man ♪
♪ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes ♪
♪ Turn and face the strange ♪
♪ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes ♪
♪ Don't tell them to grow up and out of it ♪
♪ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes ♪
♪ Turn and face the strange ♪
♪ Oh, changes ♪
♪ But you see, you've left us up to our necks in it ♪
♪ Time may change me ♪
♪ But I can't trace time... ♪
[Bowie] God came to me and he said, "Let there be Ziggy," you know?
And I just saw the world in another kind of fashion.
And it was about pushing together all the pieces
and all the things that fascinated me culturally.
A hybrid of everything I liked.
Just playing around with the idea of rock 'n' roll.
♪ Turn and face the strange ♪
♪ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes ♪
♪ Look out all you rock 'n' rollers... ♪
[Woodmansey] He needed a vehicle,
he needed a character to feel comfortable
and to put his ideas across.
It seemed like he really needed that.
Which was missing from all those earlier attempts at success.
♪ Time may change me ♪
♪ But I can't trace time ♪
[audience applauding]
["My Death" by David Bowie playing]
♪ My death waits like ♪
♪ A beggar blind ♪
♪ Who sees the world ♪
♪ Through an unlit mind ♪
♪ Throw him a dime ♪
♪ For the passing time ♪
♪ My death waits ♪
♪ To allow my friends ♪
♪ A few good times before it ends ♪
Is it difficult for you to do what you've just been doing
in a tiny television studio? I mean,
throwing yourself outwards.
Uh, I find singing and performing very easy.
But, uh, this is awful.
I've never done this before, chat show like this.
-Never done-- -I find this very difficult.
-Are you nervous? -Yes, very.
♪ Oh, let's pick violets for ♪
♪ The passing time ♪
♪ My death waits there ♪
♪ In a double bed ♪
♪ Sails of oblivion ♪
♪ At my head ♪
♪ Pull up the sheets against ♪
♪ The passing time... ♪
[Harty] How long do you give it?
-What, me? -Yeah.
-How long do I give me? -Yeah,
how many years do you give yourself?
I don't mean, "How many years do you give yourself in life?"
But how many years can you be a head of the glamor field
and the head of the glitter field?
Oh, no, I've never been ahead of anything.
I've been, I think on my own.
I'm not, I'm not in an Olympics.
[piano playing]
[Bowie] The artist is strictly a figment
of people's imagination.
I really believe that.
We're the original false prophets, we are the Gods.
We want it all, you know, we want all the adulation
and people to read the lyrics and everything,
just to play the game.
We don't exist.
And I know that that, that's-- I feel that same emptiness
that they all feel when they get there.
'Cause they know that it's not real.
[Garson] David didn't like a comfort zone.
He could've done Ziggy for his whole life,
and he would've had fans, but he wanted to move on.
So, I knew Ziggy was not gonna be long-lived.
[Bowie] Well, it's the last one tonight, you know?
[interviewer] Is it? Oh, I heard it was last for all time, is that right?
We shall see at the end of the show.
[laughs]
Has been mentioned.
[interviewer] You're making an announcement, are you, tonight?
[Bowie] Um, if that's the case, I will be.
I knew that it was a very important show.
I knew he was nervous.
Because something was really working.
And he spent a decade working to that.
Go away.
[interviewer] I can glean that you're nervous,
but I really think the audience you have tonight,
it's the easiest you've ever had.
-You think so? -Oh. And how.
["Moonage Daydream" by David Bowie playing]
♪ I'm a mama-papa coming for you ♪
♪ I'm the space invader ♪
♪ I'll be a rock 'n' rolling bitch for you ♪
♪ Keep your mouth shut ♪
♪ You're squawking like a pink monkey bird ♪
♪ And I'm busting up my brains for the words ♪
♪ You know I am ♪
♪ Keep your electric eye on me, babe... ♪
The Hammersmith gig, of the thousand shows I did with him,
had a mystique, an energy.
This is something special.
It was something electric about it.
["Suffragette City" by David Bowie playing]
♪ Oh, don't lean on me man ♪
♪ 'cause you can't afford the ticket ♪
♪ I'm back on Suffragette City ♪
♪ Oh, don't lean on me man ♪
♪ 'cause you can't afford the ticket ♪
♪ I'm back on Suffragette City... ♪
[Hutchinson] We finished the last song
and David walked to my side of the stage.
And said, "Don't start 'Rock And Roll Suicide,'"
which I play the intro on,
"until I tell you."
So I figured he must be gonna say,
"Thanks for the tour, we'll see you in September," or whatever.
But he didn't.
[Bowie] Of all the shows on this tour,
this, this particular show will remain with us the longest.
-Because... -[audience cheering]
not only is it, not only is it the last show of the tour,
but it's the last show that we'll ever do. Thank you.
[Woodmansey] I thought, "OK, maybe this is a stunt."
And then, part of me was going,
"I've just got the sack." [laughs] Live.
♪ Time takes a cigarette ♪
♪ Puts it in your mouth ♪
♪ You pull on your finger ♪
♪ Then another finger, then your cigarette ♪
♪ The wall-to-wall is calling ♪
♪ It lingers, but still you forget ♪
♪ Oh ♪
♪ You're a rock 'n' roll suicide... ♪
[MacCormack] It did really seem odd that, at the very height of his career,
he was extinguishing it with a couple of phrases.
It must've seemed to people,
"Why would you do that? Why would you give it all up?
When you're just at the starting grid."
♪ But you can't eat when you've lived too long... ♪
[MacCormack] Extraordinary night, an extraordinary statement.
♪ You're a rock 'n' roll suicide... ♪
There was something very calculated about it.
And I think
what he had that most artists didn't have is he had a sense of
what is commercial, what works,
what can sell in addition to his own integrity.
♪ Don't let the sunlight blast your shadow ♪
♪ Don't let the milk float ride your mind... ♪
[Hutchinson] Ziggy Stardust was a culmination
of all the things that David tried to do in the 60's.
I think with Ziggy Stardust, he achieved the success,
uh, that an individual like Ziggy Stardust would aim for.
But David himself wasn't Ziggy Stardust.
So, I think he'd already stepped outside of that character,
back into being David Bowie.
Thank you very much.
Bye-bye, we love you.
[audience cheering]
[Bowie] To make the kind of breakthrough I needed,
I had to put on a few trappings in the beginning.
And I think now,
I will just be David Bowie, period.
I've got massive plans for the future.
["Rebel Rebel" by David Bowie playing]
♪ Rebel rebel ♪
♪ You've torn your dress ♪
♪ Rebel rebel ♪
♪ Your face is a mess ♪
♪ Rebel rebel ♪
♪ How could they know? ♪
♪ Hot tramp, I love you so! ♪
♪ Rebel rebel ♪
♪ You've torn your dress ♪
♪ Rebel rebel ♪
♪ Your face is a mess ♪
♪ And you're a ♪
♪ Rebel rebel ♪
♪ How could they know? ♪
[audience] ♪ Hot tramp, I love you so! ♪
You bet!
♪ Hey baby, let's stay out tonight ♪