In the 1970s, David Bowie released a series of albums that changed the sound, look and subject matter of rock music forever. His 1977 album Low, produced in collaboration with composer Brian Eno, was recently named the best album of the 1970s by Pitchfork. Elvis Costello recently called it one of the greatest albums ever in Vanity Fair. In terms of critical acclaim and popular success, I could compare him to Kurt Cobain, Bruce Springsteen, maybe REM.
In 1983, David Bowie starred in the vampire movie The Hunger. In 1986, he starred in the Jim Henson movie Labyrinth as Jared the Goblin King.
There’s nothing wrong with that, but I know music fans. I was too young to be tuned into indie rock debates at the time, so I’m curious to ask if anyone remembers. How did Bowie fans react to these roles?
{ 56 comments }
des von bladet 01.17.05 at 6:11 pm
It took a double-take before I realised this was intended as praise.
But if that lot are Fuzzy, Sweaty and Whiny, which dwarf is Bowie? Kinky? (Did anyone ever actually find the genderbendning stuff credible? I am also too young to know.)
PZ Myers 01.17.05 at 6:21 pm
Well, this Bowie fan thought that his role in The Hunger was brief but well done.
We had several young kids in the our house at the time of Labyrinth which may have colored our views a little bit, but the whole family loved it. We got it on tape later, and we saw it many times. It’s a good movie, edgier and darker than the Care Bears and Smurf crap they were getting on TV at the time.
Jennifer Connoly was great in it, too.
Carl 01.17.05 at 6:24 pm
Yeah, I saw Bowie at Madison Square in 1985. That kicked ass.
mjones 01.17.05 at 6:25 pm
The movies were one thing, but when he recorded “The Little Drummer Boy,” a line was crossed.
djs 01.17.05 at 6:27 pm
Pretty much ignored it; by 1983 it seemed to me that Bowie was aiming for commercial success; nothing he did could take away from the artistic status he had achieved in the 70’s.
Sorta like hearing Iggy Pop songs for cruise lines; it doesn’t detract from previous works like “I Wanna Be Your Dog”, “I Gotta Right”, “Kill City”, “Raw Power”, or “Metallic KO”
John Emerson 01.17.05 at 7:13 pm
I think that the Iggy Pop / Bowie stuff was the best that either of them did.
Bowie’s first album was Beatles-ish and as I remember, pretty sweet in the non-good sense of that word. I’m improvising wildly now, but I think that he figured out around 1970 that the idealistic change-the-world stuff wasn’t going anywhere, and that the counterculture was fake, but that spectacles, getting loaded, screwing, striking attitudes, role-playing, posing, and the music biz were still real. The Alice Cooper kind of thing.
He was pretty upfront about all this, so for anyone to criticize him for being fake after that would have been just silly. He really wrote himself a blank check and dared anyone to say anything.
Except for the Iggy Pop stuff, I’m not an admirer of Bowie’s. Des’s double-take receives my qualified support.
dc 01.17.05 at 7:26 pm
I remember it all. Bowie’s film roles were not seen as departures from his music career but as an extension of it. The parts he played; a vampire; the Goblin King; an alien in The Man Who Fell To Earth; Baal; were all sf/magical/musical characters in the same vein as Bowie’s own stage personae (Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane). They were percieved as another ‘new look’ and I remember no particularly adverse reactions.
Such theatricals were always part of the Bowie experience. He could always surprise. He still can. Bless him.
steve duncan 01.17.05 at 7:29 pm
I was at an Iggy Pop concert in the mid-70’s. Concert is an overstatement as the venue was a campus bar in Columbus, Ohio with maybe 200 people in attendance. I paid probably $5.00 to get in. Iggy did one raging set, the bar was into it and he took a break. All during the first set I kept noticing this very banged up, raggedy, fire engine red upright piano off to the left of the band. It was never played by anyone and I took it to be a house instrument just sitting there for lack of anywhere better to put it. My friends and I arrived early and had seats right up against the stage. Midway into the first song of the second set I saw a rustle of the curtain and a tall, bleached out, nearly skeletal man sauntered quietly out and sat down to the piano. He pulled a pack of cigarettes out and lit one, then proceeded to wail away at the keyboard, taking most in the audience by surprise. Before he was seated I nudged a friend and pointed, “That’s David Bowie!” I said. “Nah, can’t be,” was his reply. But it was. He played and chain smoked nearly the entire second set. Then as quietly as he slipped on stage, halfway into the final song he stood and slipped behind the curtain. It was Iggy’s gig and he wasn’t going to let himself become anything more than a visiting piano man. Very classy. And he kicked ass! For $5.00! Best deal on a concert I ever had.
Brian 01.17.05 at 7:30 pm
Actually, Bowie has done a number of movies. His best is probably “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence,” followed by “The Man Who Fell to Earth” and then “The Hunger.” Critics (not just Bowie fans) hated “Labyrinth.”
The good movies were well received by fans and critics; the bad movie (Labyrinth) was disliked by both groups. None of them much affected his reputation as a musician, though “The Man Who Fell to Earth” was a cult classic that bolstered Bowie’s status among alt-culture fans (e.g., folks who liked the roughly contemporaneous “Liquid Sky”).
Henry 01.17.05 at 7:32 pm
bq. _The movies were one thing, but when he recorded “The Little Drummer Boy,†a line was crossed._
Surely, he’d crossed that line a long, long time before with “The Laughing Gnome?”
Brian 01.17.05 at 7:32 pm
Actually, Bowie has done a number of movies. His best is probably “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence,” followed by “The Man Who Fell to Earth” and then “The Hunger.” Critics (not just Bowie fans) hated “Labyrinth.”
The good movies were well received by fans and critics; the bad movie (Labyrinth) was disliked by both groups. None of them much affected his reputation as a musician, though “The Man Who Fell to Earth” was a cult classic that bolstered Bowie’s status among alt-culture fans (e.g., folks who liked the roughly contemporaneous “Liquid Sky”).
Note that “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” was a Viet Nam movie, very different from the other sci-fi/fantasy-type movies. I recommend it highly.
Rob Stephenson 01.17.05 at 7:44 pm
DC’s comments are similar to what I remember. Station to Station (1976) and Low (1977) both had covers that featured photos from The Man Who Fell To Earth. Low, however it is has come to be viewed, was one of his worst selling album when it came out and it was trashed by many reviewers and fans. I think linking Low to the film was not such a great idea at the time. Fortunately, the music perservered in the long run. Yay! Bowie even presented the whole album (LOW) live at Roseland in the 90’s. He is still capable of remarkable things. The underated “Outside” that he made in the late 90’s was also hardly noticed when it appeared. It is now starting to receive quite a bit of belated praise. I think it might be another sleeper that will endure the test of time.
dsquared 01.17.05 at 7:51 pm
I could compare him to Kurt Cobain, Bruce Springsteen, maybe REM.
Oh god … how old am I?
lazyman 01.17.05 at 8:02 pm
I can’t believe everybody’s overlooking Bowie’s major contribution to Zoolander. ;)
I’ve been sentient for a good hunk of his career, and I don’t recall anybody I know as a fan of his being terribly upset by anything he’s ever done. For myself, I think a lot of the music is great, and the above-mentioned incident shows the man is aware of part of his role in the culture.
bob mcmanus 01.17.05 at 8:10 pm
“Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence” was his best performance…Bowie was a fine actor. Good enough to be considered as an actor, not a musician pretending. In fact I consider him a better actor than songwriter or musician, he always had serious assistance on his best stuff. Ecept for some of the late 70’s material, I viewed him closer to Andrew Webber than Mott the Hoople. No rocker, he.
As far as Labyrinth goes, well, it did have Jennifer Connolly in it
bob mcmanus 01.17.05 at 8:19 pm
“I was too young to be tuned into indie rock debates at the time”
Bowie wasn’t anywhere near “Indie” as I remember. I guess music was different then: you had Olivia Newton-John, you had obscure singer/songwriters and prog bands with limited pressings, and then you had everything else. I mean, I remember the Sex Pistols in Dallas.
Uncle Kvetch 01.17.05 at 8:29 pm
I was a big fan for many years–less so today, but I still “check in” on DB once in awhile and he still seems to be doing interesting stuff.
The “Eno trilogy” (Low, Heroes & Lodger) alone is enough to grant him a place in the all-time pantheon; everything else is gravy.
ian 01.17.05 at 8:31 pm
I go with p z myers on the Labyrinth – and at the risk of wearing out the record it did have Jennifer Connolly!
Andrew Boucher 01.17.05 at 8:44 pm
“Pretty much ignored it; by 1983 it seemed to me that Bowie was aiming for commercial success.”
I’d second that appraisal.
Anderson 01.17.05 at 9:08 pm
By 1983, every moment Bowie spent in the studio was a moment not spent making awful recordings, so the more flicks the better.
triplejay 01.17.05 at 9:13 pm
yeah bowie was cool.
When he worked with Eno, Fripp et al…
But at the same time – it’s pop music, man. No one is cool in this sphere.
Bowie had forsaken his “rock” credentials a long time b4 the filming of “Labyrinth” (which – incidentally, was pretty engaging but, as a previous poster outlined ,the competition at the time was laughable.
Alden 01.17.05 at 9:20 pm
I was a senior in Highschool and pretty into Bowie when Cat People came out. And my girlfriend was absolutely devoted to his music.
I wasn’t particularly off-put by Cat People. What broke my heart at that time was the album he put out around then. I don’t recall its name but it had Putting Out Fire with Gasoline and China Doll on it. Maybe that was Cat People soundtrack? Or some songs appeared on both? That was a long time ago. But it was lame. Especially coming off Scary Monsters which I liked a lot.
By the time Labyrinth came out, I’d already written him off.
neil 01.17.05 at 9:28 pm
As someone who was even younger than Ted in the ’80s, I can report that most Bowie fans of my own generation first knew him as “that guy from Labyrinth” and they continue to cherish his performance in that film after becoming familiar with his more, ehm, mature work.
Low was always my favorite too. But Station to Station is also a classic — I can’t see why ‘Stay’ isn’t in the running for best rock song of all time.
Iron Lungfish 01.17.05 at 9:43 pm
Bowie made me want to have sex with androgynous space aliens. For that, he will always have my thanks.
alden 01.17.05 at 9:59 pm
I’d add that at that time (early 80s) in the Punk/Ska circles I was running with, Bowie was generally considered fairly droopy and girlish – the province of depressed introverted gals who wrote lurid poetry. Like the niche The Cure would fill in later years.
Planethalder 01.17.05 at 10:48 pm
I first heard of Bowie in 1983 with Let’s Dance and rapidly devoured his back catalogue. Having done so, I realised his current phase was a “sell-out” even though his mass-marketing was very successful (ie, I discovered him).
I then ignored all his work from 1983 until 1995 while, secretly calling myself an ardent Bowie fan on the back of his 1970s output (between 1983 and the 1990s it wasn’t cool to like Bowie in my circle). Then Outside came out, followed by Earthling and I thought, “He’s innovating again!”
His 2000 album Heathen held me rapt and I have no hesitation outting myself as a Bowie fan any more.
Ken C. 01.17.05 at 10:53 pm
Fun Fact to Know and Tell: The intended title was “Low Profile”, a visual pun based on the cover image (profile) from “The Man Who Fell to Earth”.
The album was surely great, but of course not as good as “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust…” For sheer wacky synthesizer fun, nothing beats Eno’s own “Another Green World” or “Before and After Science”. This was when synthesizers were arty and avant garde, before Soft Cell and Human League.
“Changing the sound… of pop music forever”? Well, up until the SugarHill Gang.
alden 01.17.05 at 11:04 pm
“I first heard of Bowie in 1983 with Let’s Dance…” – planethalder
Let’s Dance, that was it. The one I was talking about above that left me cold. I did go see him perform during the tour for that album, just because I had never before had a chance to see him live. He put on a pretty good show but the general sentiment of the crowd was that he did too much “Let’s Dance” and not enough old stuff. Hardly suprising.
The encore was Young Americans, if memory serves. That’s a neat song.
dru 01.17.05 at 11:22 pm
Funny that no one mentioned his role as Andy Warhol in Basquiat. It was definitely the most convincing Andy I’ve seen in a movie (not that I knew the guy, or anything).
Lorna 01.18.05 at 12:07 am
Jareth!
Labyrinth was actually the thing that turned me into a Bowie fan. (And contact juggling, for that matter, even through it’s Michael Moschen and not Bowie doing that impressive crystal manipulation.) Suspect I’m younger than a few of the people commenting, though.
Clancy 01.18.05 at 12:47 am
I was twelve years old when Labyrinth came out, and I loved it. I had a fascination with the Goblin King, a crush tinged with intimidation: basically the same stirrings we can observe in Jennifer Connelly’s character.
Doctor Slack 01.18.05 at 1:27 am
Oh god … how old am I?
A sentiment I’ll heartily second. Michael Stipe can now be comparied to Bowie? Say it ain’t so…
Ayjay 01.18.05 at 2:25 am
Did anybody notice that on the cover of Low the photo of Bowie, beneath the title, was in profile? Get it? — low profile. Heavy irony there, dude, because with all the movies and everything he was scarcely keeping. . . . oh never mind.
John Emerson 01.18.05 at 2:51 am
Hm, I thought there’d be more Bowie-haters. I guess I’m old.
Jason Kuznicki 01.18.05 at 3:47 am
I’ve quite liked all the Bowie films I’ve seen, including Basquiat, Labyrinth, The Man Who Fell to Earth, and his brief appearance as Pilate in The Last Temptation of Christ Yup, that’s him.
I’ve tried without success to find Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, but I can’t find it at video stores, and even Netflix doesn’t carry it. Now I hear two different people saying that it’s his best work. Argh.
Tom T. 01.18.05 at 4:20 am
I want to hear from all of the young people who first encountered Bowie dancing with Mick Jagger in the video of their version of Dancing in the Streets.
Russ Hicks 01.18.05 at 4:32 am
“…Roxy…Roxy…”
Barry Freed 01.18.05 at 4:46 am
The Hunger: “Bitchin”” or words to that effect.
Labyrinth: I suppose Tim Curry was otherwise engaged.
Iron Lungfish 01.18.05 at 4:59 am
I was waiting for someone to mention Bowie’s Pilate, probably my favorite interpretation of the character: “So you’re the Messiah. Can you do any tricks?”
doghouse riley 01.18.05 at 6:06 am
“…Roxy…Roxy…â€
Yeah, for a Roxy fan Low was more of an Eno record.
I was a huge fan of Ziggy Stardust, which led to the discovery of Hunky Dory, but I didn’t care much for his direction after that. I did buy Station to Station and Low out of continuing esteem, but haven’t listened to either in years.
Now, Eno and the various permutations of Roxy, them I’ve kept up with.
Redshift 01.18.05 at 6:53 am
And how can we forget Into the Night! ;-) I enjoyed his movie roles, even the bad ones. I came of age and became a fan during the late-70’s hiatus, so neither the movie roles nor the commercial nature of Let’s Dance, etc. bothered me since they got him out and touring (and playing lots of the old stuff, too.)
Planethalder 01.18.05 at 9:26 am
More films featuring films:
+ Just a Gigolo (with Marlene Dietrich)
+ Christiane F (just him singing but about a drugged up Bowie obessive)
+ Yellowbeard (walk-on part)
+ Absolute Beginners (all dancing, all singing Bowie)
+ The Linguini Incident (with Rosanna Arquette)
+ Twin Peaks (walk-on)
+ Everybody Loves Sunshine / Buster (Bowie as gangster boss – actually an excellent and convincing role in a very bad film)
+ Mr Rice’s Secret
I’m ashamed to say I’ve watched every single one (I even own Just a Gigolo on video – I hunted it down on eBay).
Planethalder 01.18.05 at 9:28 am
Sorry, “More films featuring Bowie”..
ajay 01.18.05 at 9:54 am
“Note that “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence†was a Viet Nam movie, very different from the other sci-fi/fantasy-type movies. I recommend it highly.”
I agree, except that it was a WW2 film.
chris 01.18.05 at 10:19 am
Riley is right about Bowie’s trajectory after Ziggy Stardust. Of course this coincided with the point at which he became a mega-star, so quality control was subsequently out of the question, on celluloid or vinyl. It was also the point at which he stopped playing small theatres and colleges, so his live act suffered as well.
Of course, I’m so old I can remember seeing him as a white-face mime in 1967, so you could say I’d had my suspicions all along.
cleek 01.18.05 at 3:11 pm
Bowie on IMDB:
62 composer credits
25 acting credits
25 “misc” credits
praktike 01.18.05 at 6:31 pm
Everything he did with Eno was great, but Low is my fave.
Ancarett 01.18.05 at 9:48 pm
I first became a Bowie fan when I saw his duet, on a Christmas special, with Bing Crosby. Talk about culture clash potential (but it worked).
I didn’t have any problem with his movie roles. Labyrinth remains a favourite. They’re all part of his constant reinvention, which is a great part of his charm.
nick 01.18.05 at 11:22 pm
I’m glad that redshift mentioned Bowie’s cameo in Into The Night, which is a very fun film, although I suspect it’s dated terribly in the years since I last saw it.
(Perhaps it’s my recent addiction to GTA: Vice City, but I’m feeling a little less embarrassed about the slick, pastel-coloured world of the 80s than I did a decade ago.)
novakant 01.19.05 at 12:02 am
I’ve been a fan since I was twelve (was born the year Space Oddity came out, getting old, he) and went through his whole back-catalogue then. I must have displayed a bit of well earned arrogance when “Let’s Dance” came out and everybody who never had heard of him before borrowed it, but in the end I was happy that he acquired so many new fans, even though I harboured similar feelings to what planehalder described about the sell-out and creative crisis starting with this album. Tried hard to avoid/cancel my family’s summer holidays to see him live at the “Serious Moonlight” tour, alas, to no avail. “Tonight” was a bit of a letdown and the “Tin Machine” thing just awful (loved “Blue Jean” though), so my enthusiasm went away slowly but surely, until, sometime in the late nineties I noticed he was writing good songs again. I finally saw him live in 2003 in Berlin and he played for almost 3 hours, 33 songs a lot of not so well knowns too – one could feel he truly loved to be back in Berlin it was heaven. (You can get a good impression of the Reality tour on DVD, it was recorded in Dublin, pity the Irish had to murder “Life on Mars” with a big singalong :) ). So now I’m glad I never had written him off completely.
As to the question “Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence” is really good, “The Hunger” was fair enough, I never managed to see “American Gigolo” (any good?), and don’t really want to see Labyrinth. Btw, did you know he “starred” and performed a few songs in a video game called “Omikron – The Nomad Soul”, it’s quite fun actually.
novakant 01.19.05 at 12:32 am
ahem, make that “Just a Gigolo”
radek 01.19.05 at 12:45 am
“Surely, he’d crossed that line a long, long time before with “The Laughing Gnome?—
No, no, no. That’s a great song.
“Why don’t you go gnome?”
“I can’t, I’m a gnomad.”
It takes a certain kind of genius to write that and get away with it.
Keith M Ellis 01.19.05 at 6:55 am
“Funny that no one mentioned his role as Andy Warhol in Basquiat. It was definitely the most convincing Andy I’ve seen in a movie (not that I knew the guy, or anything).”
I was going to mention this, too. His “Warhol” was the best thing about that film. He was absolutely fantastic. Accurate? Seems like it—but, like you, I didn’t know the man or anything. But that this is my favorite portrayal of Warhol is saying something given that my main man Crispin Glover memorably played Warhol in “The Doors”.
Jesus, quit playing the old man, d^2. I’m pretty sure you’re not that old. I don’t have a problem with Ted’s comparisons and I’m 40.
Steve E. 01.19.05 at 5:07 pm
As a 47-year-old, I’ll take great pleasure in stating that I am indeed old. Saw Bowie for the first time back in ’72, supported by an almost unknown group called Roxy Music. Reminds me that even though Low was voted best album, it is apparent that the most influential musician throughout the Seventies (for his own work, plus Bowie’s, Devo’s, Talking Head’s etc, etc ) was Roxy’s synth supremo Brian Eno.
I also found Wire having all three of their albums on the list highly amusing. They are the only band I’ve ever booed off stage (in fairness, I was completely off my head and desperate to see the Tubes for the first time in London, having been a fan across the water for over two years… )
st 01.19.05 at 8:53 pm
Booed off Wire to get to the Tubes, huh? Wow… I wasn’t there, so I can’t say for sure, but that doesn’t sound like a choice I would have made.
mark s 01.20.05 at 3:43 pm
i seem to remember him explicitly remarking – maybe round abt the time he did the voiceover for “peter and the wolf” (late 70s?) – that he was doing something for the real actual kids (ie pre-teens rather than “Ver Kids”), seeing as zowie was now [well depends when he said it, i guess]: so stuff like labyrinth fitted in w.that, and i think fans – if they needed to – put it on the “stuff for zowie’s generation” shelf and didn’t mind
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