David Robert Jones OAL (8 January 1947 – 10 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, Bowie is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century. He was acclaimed by critics and musicians, particularly for his innovative work during the 1970s. His career was marked by reinvention and visual presentation, and his music and stagecraft had a significant impact on popular music.
Bowie developed an interest in music as a child. He studied art, music and design before embarking on a professional career as a musician in 1963. “Space Oddity”, released in 1969, was his first top-five entry on the UK Singles Chart. After a period of experimentation, he re-emerged in 1972 during the glam rock era with his flamboyant and androgynous alter ego Ziggy Stardust. The character was spearheaded by the success of Bowie’s single “Starman” and album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, which won him widespread popularity. In 1975, Bowie’s style shifted towards a sound he characterised as “plastic soul”, initially alienating many of his UK fans but garnering him his first major US crossover success with the number-one single “Fame” and the album Young Americans.
In 1976, Bowie starred in the cult film The Man Who Fell to Earth and released Station to Station. In 1977, he further confounded expectations with the electronic-inflected album Low, the first of three collaborations with Brian Eno that came to be known as the “Berlin Trilogy”. “Heroes” (1977) and Lodger (1979) followed; each album reached the UK top five and received lasting critical praise.
After uneven commercial success in the late 1970s, Bowie had three number-one hits: the 1980 single “Ashes to Ashes”, its album Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps), and “Under Pressure” (a 1981 collaboration with Queen). He reached his peak commercial success in 1983 with Let’s Dance: its title track topped both the UK and US charts. Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, Bowie continued to experiment with musical styles, including industrial and jungle. He also continued acting: his roles included Major Jack Celliers in Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (1983), Jareth the Goblin King in Labyrinth (1986), Pontius Pilate in The Last Temptation of Christ (1988), and Nikola Tesla in The Prestige (2006), among other film and television appearances and cameos. He stopped touring after 2004 and his last live performance was at a charity event in 2006. In 2013, Bowie returned from a decade-long recording hiatus with The Next Day. He remained musically active until his death from liver cancer at his home in New York City. He died two days after both his 69th birthday and the release of his final album, Blackstar (2016).
During his lifetime, his record sales, estimated at over 100 million records worldwide, made him one of the best-selling music artists of all time. In the UK, he was awarded ten platinum, eleven gold and eight silver album certifications, and released 11 number-one albums. In the US, he received five platinum and nine gold certifications. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996. Rolling Stone named him among the greatest artists in history and – after his death – the “greatest rock star ever”.
Changesbowie is a compilation album by English rock musician David Bowie, released by Rykodisc in the US and by EMI in the UK in 1990. The compilation was part of Rykodisc’s remastered Bowie reissue series, replacing the deleted RCA Records compilations Changesonebowie and Changestwobowie.
While the cover artwork was dismissed by author David Buckley as “a sixth-form cut ‘n’ paste collage”, the collection gave Bowie his first UK chart-topping album since Tonight in 1984. The Guinness Book of British Hit Albums noted that Changesbowie was “his seventh album to enter the chart at number one. Nobody else had debuted at the top as often.” (wikipedia)
Changesbowie is a CD greatest-hits collection that revamps the original Changesonebowie by adding selections from David Bowie’s late-’70s and early-’80s albums. Consequently, it functions as a definitive single-disc introduction to Bowie, featuring all of his major hits from “Space Oddity,” “Changes,” “Ziggy Stardust,” “Jean Genie,” and “Rebel Rebel” to “Heroes,” “Ashes to Ashes,” “Let’s Dance,” “Modern Love,” and “Blue Jean.” One complaint: It wasn’t necessary to substitute the “Fame ’90” remix for the original to hook completists, since it is inferior and was already issued as a separate single. (by Stephen Thomas Erlewine)
Personnel:
David Bowie with many, many studio musicians
Tracklist:
01. Space Oddity (Bowie) (“David Bowie”;1969) 5.16
02. John, I’m Only Dancing (Bowie) (non-album single; 1972) 2.49
03. Changes (Bowie) (“Hunky Dory”; 1971) 3.36
04. Ziggy Stardust (Bowie) (“The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars”, 1972) 3.13
05. Suffragette City (Bowie) (“The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars; 1972) 3.28
06. The Jean Genie (“Aladdin Sane”; 1973) 4.09
07. Diamond Dogs (Bowie) (“Diamond Dogs”; 1974) 6.06
08. Rebel Rebel (Bowie) (“Diamond Dogs”; 1974) 4.31
09. Young Americans (Bowie) (” Young Americans”;1975) 5.13
10. Fame ’90 (Gass mix) (Bowie/Alomar/Lennon) (Fame ’90 CD single; 1990) 3.41
11. Golden Years (Bowie) (“Station To Station”; 1976) 4.01
12. Heroes (Bowie/Eno) (single version; 1977) 3.38
13. Ashes To Ashes (Bowie) (“Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps)”; 1980) 4.25
14. Fashion (Bowie) (“Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps)”; 1980) 4.49
15. Let’s Dance (single version; 1983) 4.10
16. China Girl (Bowie/Pop) (single version; 1977) 4.17
17. Modern Love (Bowie) (single version; 1983) 3.59
18. Blue Jean (Bowie) (“Tonight”; 1984) 3.11
More from David Bowie:
Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps), also known simply as Scary Monsters, is the 14th studio album by English musician David Bowie, released on 12 September 1980 by RCA Records. It was Bowie’s final studio album on the label and his first following the Berlin Trilogy, which consisted of Low, “Heroes” and Lodger (1977–1979). Though considered very significant in artistic terms, the trilogy had proven less successful commercially.[2] With Scary Monsters, Bowie achieved what biographer David Buckley called “the perfect balance” of creativity and mainstream success; as well as earning critical acclaim, the album peaked at No. 1 and went Platinum in the UK while successfully restoring Bowie’s commercial standing in the US. Scary Monsters would later be referred to by some biographers as Bowie’s “last great album” and a benchmark for later releases, although some give this distinction to Let’s Dance (1983).
And here´s another rare item from my bootleg collection:
Moulin Rouge! is a 2001 Australian–American jukebox musical romantic comedy film directed, produced, and co-written by Baz Luhrmann. It tells the story of a young English poet/writer, Christian (Ewan McGregor), who falls in love with the star of the Moulin Rouge, cabaret actress and courtesan Satine (Nicole Kidman). It uses the musical setting of the Montmartre Quarter of Paris, France.
The year is 1899, and Christian, a young English writer, has come to Paris to follow the Bohemian revolution taking hold of the city’s drug and prostitute infested underworld. And nowhere is the thrill of the underworld more alive than at the Moulin Rouge, a night club where the rich and poor men alike come to be entertained by the dancers, but things take a wicked turn for Christian as he starts a deadly love affair with the star courtesan of the club, Satine. But her affections are also coveted by the club’s patron: the Duke. A dangerous love triangle ensues as Satine and Christian attempt to fight all odds to stay together but a force that not even love can conquer is taking its toll on Satine… (by imdb.com)
This is just a sampler, full with 20 old and classic christmas songs, performed by many stars in the easy listening style.
Let’s Dance is the fifteenth studio album by David Bowie. Co-produced by Chic’s Nile Rodgers, the album contained three of his most successful singles; the title track, “Let’s Dance”, which reached No. 1 in the UK, US and various other countries, as well as “Modern Love” and “China Girl”, which both reached No. 2 in the UK. “China Girl” was a new version of a song which Bowie had co-written with Iggy Pop for the latter’s 1977 album The Idiot. It also contains a re-recorded version of the song “Cat People (Putting Out Fire)”, which had been a minor hit for Bowie a year earlier.
The success of the album surprised Bowie, who felt he had to continue to pander to the new pop audience he acquired with the album. This led to Bowie releasing two further solo albums in 1984 and 1987 that, despite their relative commercial success, did not sell as well as Let’s Dance, were poorly received by critics at the time and subsequently dismissed by Bowie himself as his “Phil Collins years”.[8] Bowie would form the hard rock and grunge-predecessor band Tin Machine in 1989 in an effort to rejuvenate himself artistically.
ManyFantasticColors 