A Space ‘Oddity’ indeed…

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A Space ‘Oddity’ indeed…

Posted March 20, 2016 by mpcorba (aka Catpeople)

Like most hardcore David Bowie fans, I have spent most of the last two months listening to my entire collection much to the exhausted chagrin of my wife; waiting for the tears to cease, time to pass and the shock to fade. Being on the DavidBowieNews fan site and being an occasional poster there, I wouldn’t say that we Bowieites are dealing with the loss any better, but we certainly are now able to reflect and try to make sense of our own feelings about the artist and the incredible body of work he left behind for us.  As I work my way through his art and develop a new perspective on it, I have realised certain things: his first proper LP was extremely random! ‘Space Oddity’ is a truly curious piece of work – I won’t go into great detail on certain musical aspects which have been covered by better writers than me (I love ‘Bowie: An Illustrated Record by Charles Shaar Murray & Kevin Carr’ – may be out of print) but what struck me most listening to the album once again, in light of losing Bowie, was how truly STRANGE the first album (proper) is.

It is truly a mishmash of the styles that this young energetic, enthusiastic post-mod was trying to develop.  It has no specific clarity, focus or musical style – it’s not quite the vaudeville Anthony Newley parody of much of the first Decca album (also called ‘David Bowie’, bizarrely.) As a whole, the selection of tracks are clearly transitional – however some of that first album’s antiquated production style seeps into the new work and can still be heard. But I suppose the strangest part of the album is how the title track does not FIT with anything else on the album – It seems as thought it were ATTACHED rather carelessly to the album. So what we have are some very strange, over complicated but enjoyable songs like ‘Memory of a Free Festival’ and ‘Unwashed and somewhat slightly Dazed’ where David is throwing in every influence he has at the time (much of Dylan to my ear) but also including the kitchen sink in the desperate hope that some of it will stick with the listener.

The album has various identities: it is even confused about its own name! It was ‘David Bowie’, also cheesily named ‘Man of Words, Man of Music’, which thankfully isn’t used so often now and it kind of settled on ‘Space Oddity.’ Certain tracks are well formed and quite beautiful, such as ‘Janine’ and ‘An Occasional Dream’ but you can hear that this is a young, hungry artist searching for a clear identity – ironic since he would go on to create such powerful, solid identities in a few short years and change Rock ‘n’ Roll. But retrospect is easy – this is David Jones/Bowie in 1969 punching his way through, trying to be heard, hoping that his multitude of ideas will somehow gain affection with his burgeoning audience, moving away from cabaret influences towards a more hippy-centric set of ideas, as Shaar Murray & Carr state: ‘Some of it belonged in ’67 and some of it in ’72, but in 1969 it all seemed vastly incongruous. Basically, David Bowie can be viewed in retrospect as all that Bowie had been and a little of what he would become, all jumbled up and fighting for control.’ The track ‘Wild eyed boy from Freecloud’ is one of few which survives to the Ziggy stage, suggesting the composer felt it had some depth, meaning or quality.

The album artwork doesn’t quite match the musical content either – turquoise and blue dots draw the eye into the Bowie-centred face, brown permed and perhaps attempting to evoke Dionysian male classical beauty. Yet the inner artwork is a disparate and truly bizarre set of drawings – a large fish, astronauts fighting over a flower, mouseman sat at the head of the table, a Buddhist meditating, an alien, Bowie with blonde perm now and a clown hugging an old lady, a la the ‘Ashes to Ashes’ video, ten years later. This latter track picks up the story and gives us an update on Major Tom – more about that musical masterpiece in a later article. It was never going to be a walk in the park trying to work out this particular artist’s oeuvre.

Finally though, it is the title track which is the most mysterious and alluring part of the whole – if it holds together as an album, it is merely from the title and that hit song: from the mysterious, fade in chords of the acoustic guitar and the strange, nasal cockney voice uttering ‘Ground control…’ we are drawn in, curious to understand the story unfolding. Does Major Tom live or drift away, lost? Is he strung out in Heaven’s high? The powerful ambiguity of the lyric shows this is a songwriter with real promise, in this song he makes something memorable and cohesive. All set against the dramatic shifts and dynamics of Gus Dudgeon’s wonderful, at times moving, production work.

As with many long term Bowieites, I had lost some enthusiasm for many well known Bowie songs through over hearing them. They would come on and wash over me – the aural equivalent of an old, comfortable blanket. Such was ‘Space Oddity’ for me, until he died. Suddenly, after January 10, every song has a newly invigorated presence – a fresh power and new depth of meaning. Now this great opener has a resonance that had hitherto been lost on me. In the days following that miserable January morning, the line ‘planet Earth is blue and there’s nothing I can do’ permeated through my mind as I pondered the unexpected loss and fought back tears each day.

Clearly, the title track captures a young songwriter with enormous potential, who produces something truly memorable and beautifully melodic here – the narrative structure is strong and he leaves the listener wanting more, a trick he would use again multiple times to great effect. I wonder how he felt as the track was being recorded and that rich arrangement was being put together. Did he know he was on to something, that this would be the track to kickstart that previously desperate musical career going? Was he deeply excited, did he have stronger faith in his own ability? The ‘Space Oddity’ track shows a creative, original thinking artist who goes on to prove this is no ‘one trick pony’ – in fact it kicks off a career which literally changes the face of Rock and Roll, and sets the bar much higher than the twee hippy rock and glam pop which litters the 70s musical landscape – here we have the beginning of sentient, thoughtful rock music, littered with powerful, intriguing imagery that enraptures that decade and that generation.

Love on ya, Mr Bowie. We miss you deeply, already.