Transcription
[Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Good evening, and welcome to what’s going to be an unusual program. In a moment, we shall be bouncing ourselves, uh, into orbit, via satellite, and we’ll be landing in Los Angeles, where David Bowie is waiting to talk to us and to sing to us. Later, we’ll be coming a little more down to earth with the writer and the homme, Jerifan Kingsley Amis. But first, David Bowie—the boy who was born in Brixton in 1947 and who, after one or two false starts, launched himself on one of the most amazing careers ever known in the pop musical world. His meteoric rise to fame almost equaled that of the mythical character Ziggy Stardust, featured on his records. His admirers called him a prophet, a demigod, and a superman; his critics said he was simply a hoaxer and a charlatan. But his fans adored him and copied his outrageous dress, and some of them, to the extent of dying their hair orange, just like his. But nearly two years ago, he left these shores for America, where he has lived in retirement from the glitter of the pop musical world. Earlier this year, he starred in a film in Mexico. I’ll be having a sneak preview of a bit of that film a little bit later, but more important than that, David Bowie has an announcement to make. Let’s now go over live by satellite to beautiful downtown Burbank in Los Angeles.
Are you there, David Bowie?
Yes.
Last time we met on the air, you were sitting in this studio, at this side, and you had a very elegant earring hanging from either your left or right ear; I can’t remember. Do you remember that? How are you, Russell?
It’s nice to see you.
Thank you. It’s nice to see you, Devon. You look well.
What color is your hair?
Which bit?
The, the center bit at the top, above where your nose would be.
Well, it’s… what color does it look?
Well, it looks like a bit of something out of the end of Straw Dogs.
Something out of the end of Straw Dogs.
Right. Right. Now, you’ve got an announcement to make to us all, David, haven’t you? You’re changing your plans for the future, and you’ve got something up your sleeve for 1976.
Yes. Um, I’m touring, but I’m… I’m coming back to England in May to, uh, play shows and, and uh… look at you, and look at England, and be there, be English again.
Well, as always, but English in England. You know, you haven’t… your accent, your voice, your method of speech has not changed. You’ve been away for two years.
Yeah.
Does that mean you’ve been locked away somewhere?
Yes. I don’t talk to anybody.
But do people talk to you? I’ve heard it rumored.
Yes.
Now, when you come back to England to sing… I’ve always had this thing in my ear, so it’s been difficult to hear them.
But people could shout into your other ear, couldn’t they?
Yes. Right. Now, when you come back to England, you’re not presumably coming back with the glamory, glittery Ziggy Stardust thing, are you?
Uh-huh.
Are you coming back as… then? I don’t… I haven’t… I don’t know yet. I haven’t, uh, even worked on it. I think it’ll probably be a lot more spontaneous.
What, you haven’t planned your wardrobe? You haven’t planned a figure? You haven’t planned an image, whatever that may mean?
I… I think the image I may adopt may well be, uh… me. I’m sort of… sort of, uh… inventing me at the moment.
You mean reinventing yourself?
Yeah, self-invented from the waste upwards.
Yes. Jolly uncomfortable, is it? Now then, how are you? But you really have no simple idea about what you’re going to wear. I mean, are you going to wear a little suit? A straight suit? Are you going to be… fun?
What songs I’m going to sing, which is the most important thing.
Are they new?
But nothing else, no.
Are there new songs? I know the kind of musicians I’m bringing back, uh, and I know, uh, sort of approximately how long I’m going to sort of play for on stage, but that’s the important thing. Right. What is… what… what’s brought you back? Are you short of mummy, or are you short of the feeding-off-live-audience bit?
I’m short of England more than anything else.
In what way? I mean, you do know that the England you left two years ago is not the England you’re going to come back to.
Yeah. Well, this Thursday is nothing like last Thursday, but it’s just as important. I’d miss it if it wasn’t after Wednesday. Do you know that, uh, the pop scene, that this end, the pop world has changed somewhat since you left?
No.
Have you heard of the Bay City Rollers?
Yes.
Well, you know that they… they are appealing to a kind of large, mass, hysterical audience of young people who wave a lot of stuff around. Now, I wonder what kind of audience you’re going to come back to face?
I don’t know.
What do you think?
I don’t know. I’m… I’m thinking in the kind of way you may have to create a whole new scene for yourself.
No. What… can’t qualify that. I’ll just come back and play my songs.
Now, for someone… you’ve been quoted as saying, David, that for someone who’s not really a very good musician, you’ve made a lot of rompus, a lot of noise…
Um, yeah.
If you don’t think you’re a good musician, what are you looking for at this moment? What are you searching for?
Liquid treetop apple juice. Is it good? Would you spit some across the satellite?
No, good. Um… for someone who claims not to be all that good a musician, why are you coming back to… to perform on stage? Or have you… are you a better musician in fact than you admit?
I can’t link those two parts. If I’m not that good a musician, why am I coming back?
Yes. Yes. Well, coming back has got nothing to do with being a musician.
But do you think you’re a better musician after two years away from, say, anything on stage?
I’m… I’m… I’m a good performer, and I’m a good singer. That has nothing to do with being a musician, does it?
Well, I don’t know. I mean, you must… you must tell me that. I mean, such a profound statement… I don’t think I can… I can… it doesn’t have to be that one-sided, does it?
Well, no.
Are you going to contribute a little bit?
Yes. I’m worming away by expensive satellites.
No. All right. Now, you… you… you’ve also said that you need to astound people. You don’t want to come back just as an ordinary person doing an ordinary gig at the Odeon, Hammersmith, or wherever it is. Do you have any idea at this stage, apart from just getting out on the stage, how you shall astound? Is or does it actually come to you in the middle of the night?
Before… I shall probably be a lot fatter than I’ve been. That’ll be my… No, I haven’t any thoughts about that at all. The impact of the show has to be the astounding thing, not… not the dressing of it. You know, dressing of the show is just addressing; it’s, uh, a sort of a perfunctory kind of thing. But the… the content has to astound. I mean, you can dress a show with a trillion dollars or trillion pounds’ worth of, uh, goodies, but if the show is not, uh… uh… substantial, there will be no impact in your… in your memory.
What… what is the most… what is the best thing you’ve done on… on any stage anywhere that still lives with you, that you measure it… uses a measuring stick… best… best… it’s… that’s very hard. One of the most exciting things I did was work with, uh, old Lindsay… Lindsey Kemp back in… um… the… the… uh… where would it be? I can’t remember which theater we did it in, but years ago. It was a combined sort of mixed-media show that was very good, and it didn’t… it didn’t have to be a big, glossy, exciting thing. I mean, it was a small…
But something important to you?
Well, yes. Yes. Right. Now, you’ve just finished making the film called *The Man Who Fell to Earth*.
I beg your pardon.
Uh, one of the… it’s… it’s not an easy film to explain to people who haven’t seen it, and it’s not yet finished, is it?
Um, it’s finished in, uh… in visual; it’s not finished in sound. I’ve got to record the sound. We’ve written a lot of it. It’s… I tell you all I can tell you is it’s a love story more than anything else. It’s very, very sad, very romantic. It brought a lump to my throat watching it, um… and it’s been a gas working on it.
Yeah. How… how sorry… how much of a new… how did… how easily did you take the discipline of filmmaking, which is, um, as we all know, hard?
Oh, quite easily. I’m a very disciplined person, you know. Uh, it was… it was, um… exciting for me to… to work with other people who are as disciplined as I am.
Are you… I mean, are you being absolutely accurate and honest when you say you’re a disciplined person?
Oh, yes.
You impose a discipline on your own music writing, on your own work, dude. I mean, you don’t just get up when you… you know… you know… you know what I’m saying to you. A lot of people in your position… doesn’t mean that you… you make sure that you, um… have breakfast at eight o’clock in the morning, and you are out of the house by half past eight. Uh, discipline is that you, if you, uh… conceive something, then you decide whether or not it’s worth following through, and if it’s worth following through, then you follow it through to its logical conclusion and do it with the best… to the best of your ability. That’s the discipline, whether… whether there are areas in it that are not to one’s liking. You have to go right the way through it and do it, and that’s what I do. And more importantly, not to other people’s liking. I mean, there are often things that if you decide to do as a major star, you’re gonna… you’re gonna get people worked up about.
Yes. Because you don’t appear at the right place at the right time, or… or imagination is drying up, and you need something else to refuel it.
It’s because I thoroughly enjoy looking at myself and looking at the environment that I’m in at any time with the eyes of someone who’s not involved in… in any particular line of the arts. So it comes out as a sort of eclectic, uh… manifestation, you know. So I’m still a fan of… he’s… fan of films, fan of records, fan of rock bands, and fan of yours.
Well, I am a fan of yours.
Well, let’s get back to eclectic manifestations. Now, the film… uh… can we… we’re going to look at a bit of it, uh… and then we’ll talk a bit more about it. Here you are.
Having fallen to Earth, and as you’re adjusting to the Earth’s atmosphere, you gain the attention of a young lady in your hotel room.
I must say, just before you put that on, it’s assumed that I’m, uh… um… an alien from out of space. It’s not necessarily true. All right. And then, when I was 15, I worked in this pharmacy in a hospital, delivering medicines to all the floors. It was a real responsible job, boy.
You’re really hooked on water, aren’t you? One of these days you ought to try one of these…
Am I talking too much? Maybe I ought to go…
Oh, it’s after three. I guess you’re tired.
Well, I’ll just finish this up, and then… then… and then I think I’ll have another one. You know, I really like you, mister. What do you do for a living? I mean…
Oh, I’m just visiting.
Oh, a traveler. Could you help me out, please?
Sure. You know, mister, I don’t think you get enough to eat, if you don’t mind my saying so. I think you’re too thin. You’re very thin. You’re too thin. Do you come from a city?
No, I come from the country.
Ah, I wish I lived in the country. You know, this is a very unhealthy place. Water here is all polluted. They put all kinds of chemicals in it to keep people from getting sick. It’s a very unhealthy place.
I think it just takes getting used to.
Listen, it sure does. Anyway, I wonder… I wonder if you’d mind, Mary Lou, if I arrested now…
All right. Now, I was just leaving anyway. I’ll come back and see you tomorrow, if you want me.
I’d like to see you tomorrow. Perhaps you could arrange to bring me a television… TV.
Nothing easier.
Well, I’ll be seeing you then, Mr. Sussex.
Sussex. I don’t know why, but I’ll never be able to remember that name.
Good night.
Good night. Thank you, Mary Lou.
Thank you. You’re welcome. [Applause]
David, um… that film is not finished; it’s not finally edited and ready yet, but there already is… seeping through… kinds of areas of mystery. A lot of it’s mysterious. Is that quite deliberate?
Yes. It is a mystery, as love affairs generally are.
Is it giving too much away to say that it’s a… dessert… that’s… it doesn’t end too happily either?
It’s a very sad film. It… no, it’s not a… it’s not a happy ending. Did you… I thought Candy Clark… isn’t Candy Clark good?
Very good indeed. Excellent.
Has she worked in films before? Uh… the last thing that she was in was *American Graffiti*.
Yeah. Uh… but… but did you yourself… were you yourself a contributory factor to the film? I mean, to Mr. Roeg’s… stop and say which way do we go? Which way do we move? What do you think? Or were you under total direction?
No, my… under total direction. My… my… my contributing factor was my acting and, uh… persona in general. I’m… um… I’ve got the greatest respect for Mr. Roeg and his work. I… I would not have done the film otherwise.
You’re… are you still into the extraterrestrial bit? Are you still aware of forces apart from satellites that are moving around this… this globe or this planet, or around you, David Bowie, of course?
Yeah.
What kind of eclectic manifestation do you have of this? Um… a mountain or a tree is the manifestation of forces that we are not capable of dealing with.
Do you go to church at all?
No. Just… do I… I pray.
Yes, of course. But do you pray to mountains and to trees, to those physical manifestations, or to some kind of spirit?
I don’t think I would like to get into that over a 20-minute interview.
You wouldn’t. When I come back to England, I would talk to you about that.
Yes, at length.
Fine. But I wouldn’t like to nutshell it as the film.
That’s sensible. Has the film, um… wetted your appetite for making more movies?
No. Funnily enough, what it did do was, uh… increase my appetite for going back to a lot of the bits and pieces I used to do many years ago. Right. Painting, writing, spending free time with myself and my family, getting out of cities and relaxing a lot. No, not relaxing so much as, uh… feeling at ease.
Well, can we… can you… can I let you feel at ease for 50… for a second or two, or we take a commercial break at this end, uh… and we’ll pick… we’ll come back in… in about two minutes’ time. Meanwhile, stage… [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music]
Welcome back, David. But it’s… sitting on… on some strange beach side back of you in, uh… Burbank, Los Angeles. Uh… we’re talking about films and filmmaking. One of the people, I presume you would have liked to have worked with would have been Pier Paolo Pasolini, would I?
Well, you… people… I’ve read that… that in odd… odd interviews you’ve given to people, you found his work exciting.
I can’t think of working with anybody apart from Nicholas Roeg at the moment. I’ve never done a film… I don’t know when I’ll do another film, and for me it’s not a question of getting into films; it was something tangible and… and tactile for me to work in, and it was an experience that I needed. I’m not sure whether I like, uh… the idea of becoming an actor.
Well, you don’t… I presume per se, rather than per may, you are in that kind of privileged position though, aren’t you, David? But you don’t have to make any kind of decision like that, do you?
I have to make as many decisions as anybody else every day. Yes, I do have to make decisions, but I consider myself fairly responsible.
I presume I wasn’t doubting your… your own self-responsibility, but I’m saying you are better equipped than most people to make that kind of firm decision about your own future.
I will do everything… not what you said at all. This is what I mean: if it’s… if it’s… yes, I can make firm decisions. I mean, you’re equipped with… with, uh… fame; you’re equipped with a certain amount of fortune; you’re equipped with, I presume, the kind of advisers who will give you good advice, and therefore you’re not like a girl or a boy sitting in a basement in Notting Hill struggling to get into some kind of proper situation… who wants to be a… natural… wants to be a film star, who wants to get onto the scene.
I was though.
Okay. You remember those days?
Yes, very much. I’m doing all the things I used to do in those days. But you see, that’s what… that’s what perhaps makes you better than you would otherwise be, because you can remember that kind of hard discipline and that kind of hard time, uh… but now you’re in a position to enjoy it.
Yeah.
Are you enjoying today? Are you enjoying this conversation?
I think it’s wonderful. I do enjoy it. Now, I enjoy it a lot. I do. It’s a shame it’s so short, because these days I’m very careful about, uh… launching into… sort of… I’ve noticed that… discuss… it’s only because I like conversation a lot, and it seems such a waste to just, uh… you know, fire away random…
Right. This is lovely though. Do you… I think it’s moving at a very sensible pace.
Good. And also, I’ll tell you what I quite like, which I shouldn’t like. I mean, doing this conversation at a distance of x thousand miles, it’s very odd, but I… I… I don’t mind you not answering questions. I mean, there are about five difficult questions I’ve thrown out to you.
Yeah.
And I’m happy… I’m happy that you don’t give the answers to them, because you’re quite right, the lack of time is the lack of time. Right. You know, since you were on this… on these shores before… also, your missus, your Angie, was… has been a guest on my show and created a reasonable stir.
She was lovely.
I saw it. I… I had a… a copy sent over to the… loveliest, and she was very good, and she wore a big hat with a lot of things on it.
Yeah. And I suspect… is she at this side of the Atlantic now? Is she here?
Is she… in Switzerland. Um… I’m looking for a house for the both of you, because… yes, we shall stay there for a little while whilst we’re touring Europe.
If she’s going to see this program, which is… where three of us… for three of us and for Zoe… Zoe… how do you say it? Yeah. How old is he? How old is he now?
Well, he’s four and a half, coming up for five in… sort of… night.
And does he go to play school or whatever it is?
Yes. Yes.
Is he bright?
Yes.
Is he… does he know… he’s very bright. Does he know… who… he’s a child. I mean, he’s as bright as any child should be at four and a half.
Is he… he’s not a prodigy of any kind.
Thank god. Yet. Yeah. Give him time, baby. Give him time. You know, also, since you’ve been away, or quite recently, the newspapers have been having a bit of a bash at your mother and saying that she’s… she’s a bit tearful from time to time, and that she’s… she’s suffering a certain amount of anguish and that she doesn’t hear from you an awful lot. Is that… wash, or is it real?
That’s really my own business, and that’s how it’s going to stay.
Is it?
Yes. I see you still have a keen sense of rumor, Russell. [Laughter]
Developed sense of rumor. Well, David, we’re coming towards the end of our, um… conversation.
Oh, that’s a shame. I think what we might do is… is end with a bit of music, uh… because I gather that in… and you’re at your end… beautiful downtown Burbank… you have some music with you. I mean, you’re not gonna get up on your feet and do it, but…
No, I wish I… I wish I could actually, but time won’t permit it. But I will… see that… I know what it is. I’m very drunk in this… in what… and the people we’re going to see… we’ll see. Now, I was very nervous, so I… I had a couple of drinks, which I… I never do. I really shouldn’t have…
It’s lovely. It’s very funny.
Does it show?
Oh, yeah. Well, let’s have a look at it. The song is called, uh… *The Shape of Things to Come*.
And David… no, no, of course it isn’t. We’re having a preview of *The Shape of Things to Come*. The song is called “Golden Years,” Mr. David Bowie. We’ll come back to you after you’ve seen it… wrong… added years… years… years… Why don’t you introduce it from that end? [Applause] This is David Bowie singing “Golden Years” from his forthcoming album, *Station to Station*. [Music] [Applause] [Music] are begun [Music] [Applause] opening doors and pulling some strings [Music] time [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Music] don’t yeah… me hear you say life’s taking you nowhere [Music]
Oh, it… very well done. It didn’t seem all that intoxicated to me. You seem to be well in control of that situation.
Oh, that’s my judgment.
Are you a stern critic of yourself?
Yes.
But you’re happy that we should all have seen that, even though you think you weren’t on… in full control of that situation?
Oh, yes, of course. You were wearing a demob suit or something. And that… what… what kind of suit was it?
The suit… I never did… do you know what a demob suit is?
Yes. Yes. The kind of thing people wore when they came out of armies.
That’s right. I mean, a lot of bags around the knees and things.
Yes. Functional. It was a functional suit. That suit was very functional. It was a functional suit. Right. Now, I’ll tell you what, David, we’ve had quite a functional conversation. I mean, you… you have functioned; you’re very good. I liked it though. Well, you functioned at your end, and the satellites function in the middle of the sky, and I function at this end, and you’ve wore a functional earpiece, and you’ve had a functional glass of whatnot at your side, and I hope the functional English functionally enjoyed this. I’m functionally sure they functionally… well, will have done, uh… but I’m gonna hold it to your promise, which is when, um… you do come back, uh… we’ll keep the airwaves open a bit longer.
Most certainly. I’d love to do that.
We wouldn’t appreciate that a lot. We won’t talk about Andrew; we won’t talk about your mother; we won’t talk about Zoe; we’ll talk about extraterrestrials.
Let’s not plan it. The worst thing we can do is plan a conversation. Meanwhile, can us… can we wish you a happy Christmas?
Let’s have a telephone on the show. A phone needs to have… have people.
Yes. Will you do that? Can you do that?
I’d love to.
Well, if we can get satellites across half the world, I think we can get a telephone from Clapham.
I’m sure we can. Meanwhile, that would be wonderful. I’d like to do that a lot.
All right. And you’ll be truthful and honorable and answer every question that’s put to you.
I’ll be David Bowie, which is… which is a useful, unfunctional end to this interview. God bless you. Happy Christmas, and good night.
Thank you. I love you very much, all of you. Ladies, gentlemen… David Bowie… David Bowie from Burbank, Los Angeles. I can now get rid of this piece of equipment and introduce you to something completely… [Music] [Applause] different. [Music]