David Bowie Is in my room

Well, it finally arrived. 

I must say it is a beautiful book. The cover is orange with a sort of rubbery feel & semi-negative photos on it - Ziggy on the front, later rugged Bowie on the back. 'David Bowie Is inside' printed on the spine - the Is theme is used throughout the book, he is Is Blowing our minds, Is Putting out fire with gasoline, Is A human being, Is at given moment of time a given moment of time, even Is Referenced and Is Indexed 

The inside is beautiful, even sumptuous with the expected catalogue collection of essays, which while I haven't read them all yet looking interesting and varied. Life, album covers, impact on fashion, visual imagery, sexual revolution, writing and so on. I am sure there will be some pseudoish stuff in there, but hey this is an art catalogue. Go here to get to the V&A site

As a visual artifact we are obviously going to lose the sound aspect of the exhibition, which by all accounts was quite spectacular. But we do get loads and loads of images: costumes in full view and close up of detail and also in concert photographs, photos from the life, lyrics, drawings and paintings, draft covers, variants, simple lyrics given as a single line of text on each of facing pages and more. A visual feast well worth getting  (You can buy this from the V&A website, who direct you to their Amazon shop page. But if you buy it direct from Amazon it is cheaper. Though not a cheap book).

It's the sort of book to return to and savour. And to also make you think about Bowie and Bowie's impact on you. And as this is a spot for me to reflect, here goes.

When I review my musical life Bowie plays a rising, plateaued, rising again trajectory. After hearing the second self-titled album which is usually considered his first one, Bowie was in my hearing but not essential (I got an american import of **The Man** with the strange cartoon cover in a sale - and wasn't ready for it). As for many listeners, I should think, he sort of sank into a background until **Ziggy Stardust** - an album that I knew the songs from but didn't own till later. In that period I will admit ELP or Jethro Tull or even Elton John were higher in my consciousness. After that though, I became a more consistent buyer, **Pinups**, **Diamond Dogs**, probably not **Aladdin Sane** first up. The release of *Man who fell to earth* reignited the fire a bit & Young Americans & Station to  Station came more to the ofre (I think the Lennon duet helped). Then there was my stated **Low** epiphany. Interestingly, like many epiphanies I can recall it - and I happened to have a diary of that trip to England and there is no mention of **Low**, the radio, Crashing in the same car while we were driving or the album. Some mention of Eno later though.

That said, Bowie was back. I closely followed from that point for the next decade - even the seeming commercial dredge of **Let's Dance** and its relatives. Then Bowies quiet phase as he restructured his finance. I was excited by the return: I enjoyed **Black Tie** and **Outside** was a return to Eno, complexity and difficulty (and was probably overstretched as it is, but has some great songs) and **Earthling** was ahead of the game. Then we hit the period where my reviewing seems to have overwhelmed mainstream listening, then **Heathen** which I love, reality which I came to later and now the dramatic return.

In terms of my Bowie collection I have all the albums (I did own the Decca one but have never bothered to relisten) digitally, vinyl or CD: including the **sound and vision** box set (the second edition with 4 CDs, digital version), the best of DVD which includes the wonderful Top of the pops clips with beused young brits watching on & pretending to 'dance'.  A couple of bootlegs - scary monsters outtakes and the lost Toys album. 

I saw him live once - the Stages tour. It was good to do, but I think in retrospect disappointing: the sound was terrible, the songs too much like the records, the show quite downbeat. Looking at the costumes some of the early personas looked pretty weird - David Bowie Is pushing the boundaries! But I have got recordings of life shows from most of his various periods & enjoy them.

And a couple of other books, bought for the kindle have been interesting.

David Bowie Is in my life - and has really been a part of it for the last 40+ years. And David Bowie Is never disappointing really - the albums which are at the bottom of peoples lists of Bowie Albums From Worst To Best are (a) often near the top of someone elses and (b) better than most else which is or was going around and (c) different to the other albums in that list which means there is always something new fresh different to listen to.

I feel privileged to have been able to grow with Bowie's changes (I just inserted a note above that I wasn't ready for it when I bought The Man & that is true of other artists as well, you have to learn what they are trying to do; my late coming to Miles Davis is another example) and the pleasure of being able to think about when his musical journey and my life intersected (what was going on in my life when the thin white duke documentary came out for example). To have had one artist whose life has burned bright at the same time as I have developed is probably unique: there are not that many pop musicians who have such an extended strong career (Robert Fripp and Brian Eno come to mind, not surprisingly). Crooners - yes; classical - yes; jazz - yes; but not pop/rock I think, and not ones who have developed changed and effected so much change (I proffer the Rolling Stones as exhibit A).

And somewhat topically David Bowie Is given the best ever cover version with the Space Oddity from the space station. A good version sonically, but when tied to the so appropriate and so not bluescreened visuals it was a treat.

TIMR 12: supportive labels

Here, in the CD section of my Ikea Billy bookcase, is a special section for labels that have small labels which supported me amazingly when I was into high level reviewing. This is a brief acknolwedgement for them - some of which will get a special mention later. But as the TIMR is about things around me which have meaning for me when I look at them, here is a bit of a trip down memory/thankyou lane.(Later we may have an artist special)

• Public Eyesore and Eh? - Bryan Day
• NoType - actual releases from the amazing netlabel
• KrKrKrKr and related New Zealand labels - David Khan
• Mystery Sea
• Burning Shed
• Fencing Flatworm
• TwoThousandAnd
• Accretions - Marcos and Marcelo
• Bowindo
• Foton
• Crouton
• Pax
• Henceforth
• Absurd
• Humbug
• AES
• Throat
• BipHop
• The Foundry - eM
• Grob
• pfMentum
• Consume
• XI

And more I am sure

TIMR 11 : aube shrines

A bit of a different flavour - though still music and design.

Darrin (of course) sold me Aube's Four Shrines - a series of collaborative cassettes from his label G.R.O.S.S. in 1996. The four cases are stuck on a red corrugated plastic cross, and a continuous red string weaves around to hold the covers closed. This was released under his real name Akifumi Nakajima and there are 3 duo collaborations and a final shrine which features all four artists. To be honest, it is not something I have played a lot but I love the look of it. It now sits as a small shrine on top of my bookcase with a couple of pieces my sister brought from South America and a St Francis Carol got in Italy. Along with my 3D Shroud of Turin postcard and windup fire-spitting nun it is a fairly godless room.

And in a lower 'niche' in my bespoke CD stand - made by Wilkins and Kent on Brunswick street (I have had about 4 CDbookcases from them and also a stereo stand which was made to my specs) are two Aube covers: Metal de metal which was the first one I bought and Seton. The disks are not in them but slimline covers in the A section - many of the most attractive covers are actually pretty inconvenient, short lived or dangerous: with this the metal band could wear, the metal or stone could damage the disk or with ChopShops lead one, unfolding the metal everytime would be laborious. I have a few Aube CDs and transferred cassettes, and it's music I will put on when I want some noise and distraction, but it isn't the most seductive of sounds. But in the right time and place, it works.

TIMR 10: hipgnosis and roger dean

I had planned on doing this anyway, but reading about the death of Storm Thorgerson gave it some impetus.

If you listened to much music in the late 60s and the 70s - actually what I mean is if you looked at the covers of the albums you were playing - you would be hard pressed to avoid the impact of the design team at Hipgnosis or the artistry of Roger Dean.

Hipgnosis was initially linked to Pink Floyd (many of their icon covers are from the team) but many other groups like 10cc, Genesis and peter Gabriel, Led Zepplin, The Nice, Wings, XTC and many many more their covers - and inserts: the graphic design of George Hardie was always a striking feature of many lyric sheets - his graphics were very much ruler drawn, with often a detached architectural feel. He would often 'illustrate' the lyrics (I am thinking of Fischer Z). Admittedly some covers were crass (and horridly sexist even then and more so now, chewing gum and crotch shots come to mind) some overly cooked - but most are iconic images that take the sound and give it some vision. The two books here have given me much pleasure beyond those albums with Hipgnosis covers I have.

For many Roger Dean is Yes and vice versa. His covers for their albums (and stage designs) are probably his most well known, but he did other covers and other work. His idea for a listening pod always struck me as a great idea, and his organic architecture (developed in the covers) was also intriguing. 

All three of these books have great text to go with them  Hipgnosis explaining their thought processes, techniques and discussion with clients (it is interesting to see how ideas rejected by one group are taken by another such as the XTC typed cover). Roger Dean talks about his philosophy, techniques and history to the essayist, so it is a little more distanced. The Dean book is also album cover sized - so you get the full impact of the pictures.

the album cover book - very Dean lettering - came out in 82, and includes a section on punk and new wave as well as recent years, themes and styles (which show notable trends), japanese, singles and portfolios. So a nice range of material.

None of it is the same as holding those large cardboard sleeves and taking out lyric sheets and other inserts. But a nice reminder of a past time: there don't seem to be many books of cassette or CD covers! 







Some covers I recall:

• Ringo - with a Klaus Vorrmann illustration for each song
• Elton John - Captain Fantastic with poster, lyric book and biographical comic
• Starless and bible black - Tom Phillips (Another green world too)
• John Cooper Clarke with the book of poems in a shirt pocket
• Simple Minds Sister feelings call & Sons and fascination as a double album
• XTC englishsettlement in the green cover and the full double album
• UB44 with a hologram on
• Curved Air's second album which unfolded
• Even the excess of ELP WBMFTTSTNELAGELP
• Bill Nelson Close encounters double album with a 7" single, speaking of which
• Elvis Costello Armed forces with a live single
• All sorts of inserts
• and on and on

TIMR 9: eno box sets

The Eno CD box sets: released in 1993 they come in a nicely designed box from Russell Mills reflecting Eno's interest in soft-porn playing cards and 50s images. And also with ready made coffee stains and cigarette burns.

They weren't Eno's first box. Working backwards 1983-1973 was a vinyl collection of 11 albums that included a couple of rarities: an EP with singles (RAF and 7 deadly finns) and some instrumental tracks. And music for films 2. Luckily for me (who had all the main albums) Impact records in Canberra broke the sets up, so I could buy the missing disks and the box.

This set was rumoured for a while, and was going to be called Familiar strange and Strange familiar (as in making the familiar strange - an oblique strategy). But eventually there were called I and II, or Instrumental and Vocal.

Instrumental has Music for Films 1 and 2, a couple of tracks from Another green world and Before and after science on disk one, collaborations (such as Fripp, Budd, Bowie or Cluster) on disk 2 and long Eno pieces on 3 (some in edit).

Vocal has almost all of the four 'song' albums across the first 2 disks (with some frustrating omissions) and the singles, then the third disk is again collaborations (Cale, Cluster, Byrne) and the grabber - some tracks from My squelchy life - the almost released album which circulated in review copies but was then pulled. Some tracks were reworked for Nerve net - but this was a sought after item at the time.

The material was reproduced using Sony's Super-bit mapping - to give higher fidelity 20 bit sound instead of the standard 16 bit on most CDs. Wow!

But it was great to get all of this on CD. The quality control on some aspects of the packaging was iffy: I remember I had to return one disk which was duplicated, and it was probably made harder in the plants because the screen-printing on the disks seemed to put I or II almost randomly (2 of the disks in Box II have ENO I on them). So enough rarities, better production, plus the fantastic content. A great pair of boxes.

This link to discogs has some nice images of Eno Box I to give you a better idea!

TIMR 8: talking heads

This is the one that almost got away.

When we lived in Canberra a godsend was Impact Records - back in those glorious days of independent record stores that imported albums. Their selection was great and every year there was the Impact sale where you could pick up things to try and delight in - especially 12" single - there are many in the loft from there. I would buy anything from Factory (single or album), things I had sort of heard of, ones which looked interesting, and then the must haves like Bill Nelson's Das Kabinet and La Belle et La Bete. And of course buying stuff in the not sale - my first Severed Heads for eaxmple (The Big Bigot, aus version with free 12").

One day there was the latest Talking Heads. Speaking in Tongues. But it was a premium price. Why? Because of the Robet Rauschenberg cover.

The album comes in a clear plastic container - not a sleeve. The disk itself is clear vinyl (I bought a YMO cause it was on red, my favourite Jona Lewie is on blue). But the killer is three plastic disks printed in red, blue and yellow which sit in the sleeve - transparent red and yellow above the album, blue below. The blue has album details which can be rread from the back. But the main impression is from the front where the colours overlap, blur with the album, have elements which align but others which don't - which altogether give a unique impression and a Rauschenberg artwork to own.

Couldn't afford it. And when I could it had gone. So along with PiL's Metal Box it was a missed opportunity. Yes I still had the music (with this a cassette which had some extended plays, and the double album Second Edition from PiL). But...

Until, through our connection via Muslimgauze, I saw that Terry Bennett had a copy for exchange. Which I jumped at and am now the happy owner of.

When looking at Ebay etc I am surprised about how relatively cheaply you seem to be able to find these. I can't fathom why.

The plastic sleeve is starting to yellow with age, I've never played the disk, but it is a wonder.