David Bowie

[Mutagen]

I heard "Space Oddity" on the radio on my way to work this morning, and I had to change it because I got kind of overemotional

[ratscabies]

I've been putting it off all day, but at some point, I am gonna play "Heroes" and it will destroy me.

[Daisy Pusher]

Still just in absolute shock about this. The word genius is so often overused. It seems woefully inadequate to call Bowie a genius, but he was. What other musician gave us such a rich, textured range yet remained totally unique and immediately recognizable? Yes, the Beatles were immense, etc, but spanned a short period. For over half a century Bowie has been creating and reinventing his music and it's all been so fucking good. Even the Tin Machine period when I was in college...how many musicians of his stature and gravitas would branch out into something like that?

I was playing Starman for my little girl last night, she loves to sing along with the La La La chorus at the end. She calls him Dabid Bobie (she's 3)

Had just gotten into the office this morning when I learned the news (Pacific Time Zone). All I could do was have a cry and listen to Absolute Beginners over and over on my mp3. If I start listening to Heroes I will be unable to do a thing at work. My colleagues are all "oh yeah, that's so sad" and seem to not understand the magnitude of the Earth's loss to the stars and heavens. RIP.

ETA... Yeah I listened to Heroes. Gutpunched. Hang in there ratscabies. We understand.

[Baby Fish Mouth]

Mark Goodman is also doing a tribute to Bowie on SiriusXM's "The Spectrum" channel.

I listened to "Where Are We Now?" on the way to work this morning and had to pull over because I started crying.

[pathtaken]

I tried to listen to him today while doing my day off chores.
Every breath, expression and nuance heard, real or imagined, was too much for me.
Doing stuff in silence.

[kostgard]

I just read a rather lovely Facebook post from a high school friend where he said that not only did he love Bowie's music, but that he helped him deal with being bisexual. As a teen in the '90s from a religious/conservative family, he was dealing with a bit of self-loathing over the fact that he seemed to get that special feeling about boys as well as girls. At the time, there weren't a lot of resources for people who "went both ways" - especially guys who were bi - and he felt like a total freak. He discovered Bowie through some of the music he was doing at the time at that made him go back and look at what Bowie had done in the past. And he said it gave him an enormous sense of relief that Bowie, someone everyone thought was cool, could openly present himself as bi or blur his gender (whether or not it was just a character or how he truly was didn't matter to my friend - that's the face Bowie was presenting to the public) and people still thought he was cool. He said it may have been a silly or small thing, but being able to tell himself, "Dude. I'm like Bowie" made him feel a lot better about himself.


ETA:

Just read this piece from Ricky Gervais where he talks about how he met and became friends with Bowie, and emailed him on his 57th birthday to tease him. Bowie's response was perfect:

A few years later I emailed David on his 57th birthday. It read: “57? Isn’t it about time you got a proper job? Ricky Gervais, 42, Comedian.” He replied: “I have a proper job. David Bowie, 57, Rock God.”

[Oxynia]

When I was just shy of my 13th birthday, my family came to the US to visit relatives in Boston for a month long holiday. I was miserable because there wasn't much to do outside of play with my own brothers and sister, who I already saw every day back home. My dad and uncle came home one night and surprised us with concert tickets to see Bowie at Foxborough Stadium on his Serious Moonlight tour. It was the last night of our vacation and was the most amazing experience of my young life - not only was the stadium the biggest thing I had ever seen, the show was mesmerizing and I spent the whole evening sitting on my daddy's shoulders because I was too short to see over everyone around us.  I was slapping the beat on his head all night and he loved it. It's one of my favorite memories of us.

Bowie was a lightning rod, I never knew a human being could be so electrifying. He doubled down on the power of theater and was there to have fun. I will never forget that night.

He's always been a staple in my iTunes playlist but I haven't been able to listen to him today. Someday, but not today.

"I don't know where I'm going from here, but I promise it won't be boring."

You were never boring, Mr. Jones.  You're a real Starman now.  Check ignition, and may God's love be with you.

[kostgard]

If you have Amazon Prime, you can stream his last album for free right now. I've been listening today and I think it is excellent, and...yeah. He knew.

The video and lyrics to "Lazarus" leave little doubt on that point.

[LucianaPignatelli]

I've been a hardcore David Bowie fan for forty years. This man was pure brilliance, in so many ways. I'm shattered.

[eclair]

I keep remembering that he just died and tearing up. I haven't brought myself to listen to any of his music yet, old or new. It just seems so unreal. I know he was an actual human with human flaws, I just thought his death probably wouldn't be for a couple more decades.