I got into Bowie around the same time that most people of my age did which was around the time of the Ziggy Stardust album, when I was about 15, 16. That was one of those albums that one of your pals bought and was passed around from mate to mate. Then I backtracked and bought Hunky Dory and Man Who Sold The World. In fact, I bought them all up until Lodger. It was an incredible run of albums that were all groundbreaking. Low is my all time favourite. I liked Bowie but wasn’t a big Bowie freak like all my friends at school but I loved the song writing and the fact that he did his own thing. As far as for leading things and inventing new style and musical genres you have to put him up there with the Beatles. I also like his Mod phase, there’s a great song he made around 1965/66 called Can’t Help Thinking About Me, which is kind of Who sounding but in terms of lyrics and subject matter is really advanced and then there’s London Boys, which I also really like. I like some of the whimsical Anthony Newley period although Laughing Gnome is not a favourite.
By the time, Station to Station came out I was into a different thing. I was into rock bands and the Mod stuff, but I still went to the local disco in Woking and would see all my mates from when we were skinheads or suede heads in the early-1970s wearing the plastic sandals, the peg trousers and the Hawaiian and bowling shirts with the wedge haircuts. They danced to Philly stuff but you’d also hear TVC 15 and Young Americans amongst it all. Our drummer played Station to Station endlessly on the tour bus in those days and I still love Wild is the Wind – the vocal is superb. Stay is another great song. It is a great album.
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