Chapter Six: Aladdin Sane (1972-1973)

The American sibling of Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane was born on the road as David Bowie embarked on his triumphant first tour of the United States. With his face bisected by his trademark lightning bolt, the character reflects an artist coming apart at the seams. It seemed like everything David had worked towards was coming through, yet he felt more confused than ever. His finances were a mess. His marriage was beginning to disintegrate. He was exhausted — mentally, physically and spiritually. The multiple identities he had crafted originally brought him personal and creative freedom. Now they threatened to tear him in two. As the name suggests, Aladdin Sane is a troubling self-portrait of a man on the edge. To pull himself back from the abyss, he’d had to take his biggest risk to date, and kill off his most beloved creation. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Off the Record is a production of I Heart Radio.
It was forty minutes before showtime and David Bowie was missing.
This was never a good thing, but especially not tonight.
It was the final date of his Ziggy Stardust Tour,
the sixteen month trek that had taken him from the
sleepy English suburbs to America, Japan and beyond. The tour
had begun on the back of a pub. Now he

(00:21):
was playing the hometown hero at London's Hammersmith Odeon Arena.
The show is being filmed for posterity, and high profile
friends like Mick Jagger, Lou Reed and Ringo Star were
there to cheer them on. Thousands of fans had gathered
outside the venue on the Summer's night in July. Many
came dressed as their idol was spiky day glow hair,

(00:42):
shiny sequined pants and dangerously tall platform heels. Their faces
were decorated with glittery disco drew guy makeup and brightly
painted lightning bolts. One of these fans was a thirteen
year old East London schoolgirl named Julie. Waiting outside, she
spotted a pale figure pacing anxiously amid the garbage and
an otherwise deserted alley behind the venue. He looked like

(01:05):
just another Bowie clone, ready for the show. But then
Julie noticed his mismatched eyes, and slowly it dawned on
her this was no clone. She gingerly approached, eager to
offer a few words of praise and thanks. As he
beckoned her over, she quickly realized something was very wrong.
David was worryingly thin and dishoveled. His famous eyes were

(01:27):
filled with tears. He fled his dressing room for a
moment of solitude, but now he seemed relieved to have
someone to talk to for a few precious minutes. The
torment had been building for months, years, even, and he
was desperate to unload. David didn't know who he was anymore.
Was he Ziggy Stardust, David Bowie, David Jones. He called

(01:48):
his latest character a Laddin sane for a reason. He
was heading towards the brink of insanity. A complete physical
and psychological collapse seemed imminent. He could feel it coming.
He was going mad. He in fighter to Julie as
his nicotine stained hands drew another cigarette to his lips.
Everything had gone right, but then all so wrong. His

(02:09):
marriage was all but over. His finances were a mess.
Louis didn't say it. His flirtation with cocaine is wreaking
havoc on his nervous system. Something had to change and fast.
David spied some frantic roadies sent to track him down.
It was time to go. He said goodbye to Julian,
bounded back inside the theater, passed the guards down the hall,

(02:32):
up the backstage stairs to a balcony overlooking the street.
From there, he surveyed the scene, staring out at his
fans waiting outside, the blessed who remodeled themselves and his
image to them. He was a god and he was
about to forsake them. But he had to. He had
to save himself. His manager's and patient Bark brought David

(02:52):
down to his dressing room. He stared in the mirror
as assistance touched up his makeup. The fragile face with
the injured eye. It looked at him like a stranger.
He knew what he had to do. David Bowie was
about to commit murder on the stage. He was about
to kill off his greatest creation, Ziggy Star dust Clock's
ticking lights down Volume Up showtime. Hello, and welcome to

(03:20):
Off the Record, the show that goes beyond the songs
and into the hearts and minds of rock's greatest legends.
I'm your host, Jordan Runtup. This season explores the life,
or rather lives of David Bowie. Today's episode looks at
a Latin Saying, the American sibling of Ziggy star Dust.

(03:41):
The character was born on the road. As Bowie embarked
on his triumphant first pour of the United States, it
seemed like everything he had worked towards was coming true.
Yet David felt more confused than ever. With his face
bisected by his trademark Lightning Bolt, the character reflects an
artist coming apart at the seams. The multiple identities David
araft It had originally brought him personal and creative freedom.

(04:03):
Now they threatened to tear him apart. As the name suggests,
Aladdin Saying is a troubling self portrait of a man
on the brink. It was all David could do to
pull himself back from the edge. Passengers aboard the Queen
Elizabeth the second we're settling into the ship's fine dining
room when a strange figure appeared in their midst David

(04:23):
Bowie had made his entrance in fools Ziggy stardust regalia.
It was a black tie version of one of his
stage costumes, complete with wings protruding from his shoulders. It's
certainly made an impression. Some people gasped, others coughed up
their soup. They're all looking at me, David complained to
his dinner companions. Well what did you expect? Came the reply.

(04:44):
For the remainder of his journey, David took his meals
inside his cabin. It was September. David was en route
to New York to kick off his first tour of
the United States. Rather than take the relatively quick flight
from London, he and his if Angie had opted for
a costly, yet refined week on the high seas. It

(05:04):
was quite literally the only way to travel. By this point,
David had developed a serious phobia of flying. It began
during a recent vacation to Cyprus, when his plane had
been in an electrical storm and struck by lightning. Soon after,
his dead father appeared to him in a dream and
advised him never to fly again. That was enough for David.
If it flies, its death became his familiar mantra. His

(05:28):
fear was so intense that for a time he refused
to stay in hotel rooms higher than the fourth floor.
David's manager, the cigar chomping compulsively fur coake clad Tony
to Freeze, saw David's phobia as an asset. It made
great copy, adding to the eccentrical lure of his most
important client. Rockers like Led Zeppelin and Elton John could

(05:49):
keep their private jets. Ocean liners were a throwback to
the glamour icons of the nineteen twenties and thirties, making
it the ideal mode of transport for his rising star.
And make no mistake, David was a star, even if
no one else knew it. Yet for years, British acts
wanting to crack the United States had to start from scratch,

(06:11):
schlepping around small venues and playing third on the bill
the homegrown American heroes. Eventually, if they were lucky, buzz
would start to build. Tony DeFries planned to skip the
whole toil and obscurity part. David Bowie would arrive on
American shores as an a list. Soon enough, everyone else
would have to catch on. De Freeze insisted that David

(06:32):
would never open for anyone, but always headline. He wrote
outrageous clauses into his performance contracts, demanding the largest grand
piano in the city for each gig. Anything less than
nine ft long would result in the show's immediate cancelation.
If a venue didn't have a private walkway from the
entrance to the dressing room, they would have to construct
the wall so David could remain unseen until showtime. In return,

(06:56):
David was expected to act like a headliner to freeze
book David into weekends at high end hotels so he
could get used to v I P treatment. A big
and brooding Yorkshireman named Stewie George was hired as David's
personal bodyguard, and together they rehearsed sprinting out of venues
into one of three vans left idling outside. They've grown
up with scenes of Beatlemania. Now they were planning for Bowiemania.

(07:20):
So far, only the fab Forward pulled off such an
ambitious Atlantic crossing. Tony DeFries planned to do it again
with Bowie. To announce the upcoming US tour, he flew
over top American journalists from Rolling Stone and Playboy for
an all expense paid Deluxe Weekend. The scribes were wind
and dyed at the Dorchester Hotel before being greeted by

(07:42):
Bowie himself, who encouraged one and all to call him Ziggy.
Lou Reid and Niggy Pop were on hand for an
added dose of chaos before they all trucked over to
the Friars Club to watch Bowie and concert. The cocktails
or Derve's and hotel suite set to freeze back some
twenty thousand pounds, but it was a small price to
pay for column inches A blood of glowing magazine features

(08:04):
made David one of the most talked about performers in
the States, and he hadn't even played a note there.
To aid in his American assault, Defrees set up a
field office in New York City for his newly formed
management company. It was called MainMan. David loved the name, naturally,
assuming that it referred to himself, but it soon became

(08:25):
obvious that Defrees saw himself as the MainMan, which would
lead to some flashes down the line. The expensive offices
in Midtown Manhattan functioned chiefly as an opulent stage set
designed to project strength, importance, and above all success. The
rooms were decorated with elegant leather armchairs and framed portraits
of David. Desks were piled high with expense charges written

(08:49):
on custom MainMan stationary. He looked amazing, but the suggestion
of immense wealth was purely a facade. DeFreeze took a
similar approach with his employees, who were hired more for
their flamboyant sense of style than any professional skills. The
New York man Man office was staffed with an outrageous
cast of freaks from Andy Warhol's factory scene. Tony Zanetta,

(09:12):
who become friends with David the prior year when he
performed in the war Hall stage play Pork, was installed
as Mainman's president. Fellow Pork veteran Lee black shoulder As
was taffed as vice president, and Cherry Vanilla filled out
the ranks as publicity officer. Cherry was the only one
with any business experience, but that didn't seem to bother anyone.
In fact, that was their selling point. They were wild

(09:35):
rule breakers, capable of causing a sensation and looking absolutely
fabulous while doing it. This was much more in mine
with the image to Freeze was trying to convey. The
MainMan staff were urged to act and look like a
million dollars. This involved pretending that they had a million dollars.
They returned loose with company credit cards and encouraged to

(09:57):
pay for lavish meals with enormous groups of in destry insiders.
Man man have their own expense account. At Max's Kansas City,
the late night haunt of the downtown Elite, a fleet
of limousines were kept on constant call on top of
their hundred dollar a week salary. Staffers had their rent paid.
So did a group known as the f O d
s or Friends of David, people who had no tangible

(10:20):
role within the company. This was all part of the
Frieze overarching philosophy. You have to spend money to make money,
But whose money was it? Where was it coming from?
It was a question that nobody bothered to ask. They
were too busy launching a star. In an effort to
build an extra layer of mystique around David, DeFries turned

(10:42):
down nearly all interviews. Instead, requests were forwarded the Cherry Vanilla,
who took a somewhat unorthodox approach to her role as
David's public relations officer. Once she flashed the crowd at
a press conference, another time she bit the rear end
of a female reporter. And then there was the time
she went on American radio and told listeners that David

(11:02):
was not only gay, but a communist to boot. But
war Hally and MainMan staff knew little about David's actual life,
so they felt free to embellish when appropriate, and also inappropriate,
sex was usually a talking point. Cherry Vanilla frequently described
David two reporters as quote the sexual Antichrist. During one
high profile radio interview, she claimed that David made a

(11:25):
point to sleep with everyone who worked for him. The
following day, Mayman offices were flooded with job applications. By
the time he ducked in New York in early September,
the city was buzzing for Bowie. Members of the press
were on hand to cover his arrival. Profiles ran in Time, Newsweek,
and Rolling Stone, the ladder of which included this memorable description.

(11:48):
His hair dyed bright carrot sticks straight up above the brow.
His smooth white skin is stretched from bone to bone
in his face like telegraph wire along poles. He changes
the expression constantly, as wind blowing across a lake. Instantly
a static electricity. Everything about his appearance is extreme. Advertisements

(12:10):
for Bowie's album and tour towered over the streets and avenues.
Brick walls bore chalk scrawls bearing the words Ziggy Rules.
Considering David's toward begun in the back of a pub
six months earlier, this was all pretty far out. David
had some serious business to attend to. As he settled
into his plush suite at the Plaza Hotel, it was

(12:31):
decided to supplement his backing band, now touted as the
Famous Spiders from Mars, with a new keyboard player, and
they had just five days to find one. Mike Garson
came highly recommended, with a background and avant garde jazz.
He logged time backing the likes of Mel torm A,
Nancy Wilson, and Martha Reeves. Now he was eking out

(12:51):
a living in tiny tourist clubs for five bucks a night.
He had begun to think, Man, I think I really
need to go out on the road with a famous
rock star. Soon his wish was granted. That's September, he
got a call from Maine Man asking if he wanted
to do audition for the Ziggy Stardust tour. Garson had
never heard of Ziggy or Bowie for that matter, but

(13:12):
it was either that to go back to teaching piano lessons.
He showed up at the r c A Studios, where
Bowie's guitarist and de facto musical director Mick Ronson plays
sheet music on the piano. Garson's site read it on
the spot, adding jazzy flourishes as he went. He only
played about seven seconds before Ronson stopped him. He had
the gig. Garson would become a crucial component of bowie

(13:35):
sound over the next few years, mastering classical, jazz, pop, gospel,
pretty much everything but rock, and that's what Bowie loved
about him. Garson, who was rumored to have practiced eight
hours a day for ten years, brought a studied intensity
to the band. Bowie referred to the keyboardist, who was
a devout scientologist at the time, as Garson the parson.

(14:00):
After some quick rehearsals, Bowie was finally ready to make
his American debut. It had been scheduled for September twenty
two in Cleveland, the Heartland rock capital, where a local
kid had formed the first US Bowie fan club. Due
to David's no fly policy. The band and crew made
the long trip from New York by bus. De Frieze

(14:20):
had drafted Tony Zenetta to act as tour manager, but
the title meant nothing to him. What does the road
manager do, Zenetta asked the Freeze. Just make sure they
find Cleveland. Came the impatient reply. De Frieze was busy
doing battle with the Cleveland promoter, who had failed to
provide a properly huge baby grand piano. De Frize was
ready to pull the plug on the show. Before the concert,

(14:42):
organizers borrowed a suitably enormous set of keys from the
city's Symphony Orchestra. A sold out crowd of thirty two
thou people packed into the Cleveland Music Hall to watch
Ziggy Stardust live and in the flesh. The screams were
so loud that Mike Garson resorted to stuffing cotton in
his ears in the ends. The audience couldn't contain themselves
and invade at the stage. Afterwards, David met a twenty

(15:05):
one year old fan from acron name Chrissy Hind, future
front woman of the Pretenders. She and her friends show
Feurdom around in her mother's oldsmobile to get a meal.
How's that for some good old fashioned American hospitality. David's
first concert in America had been a resounding success, but
the real test was still to come in New York City.

(15:27):
If he could make it there, he could make it anywhere.
He was booked to play Carnegie Hall. The Beatles had
been the first band to rock the hollowed venue on
their triumphant American debut in nineteen sixty four. Eight years later,
David was hoping for similar luck for all of their
promotional fireworks. His records weren't selling in the States. It

(15:47):
was crucial that he went over this media mecca. The
main man Warhol contingent were tasked with distributing tickets to
the great and good of the New York literati, most
of whom had never even heard of David. Seats were
given to True and Campody, Jackie Kennedy's sister, Lee Razzwell,
Todd Rundren, and the New York Dolls. Cherry Vanilla would
later say, we peddled David's ass like Nathan sells hot dogs.

(16:10):
The show was hyped into the social event of the season.
Andy Warhol was limited to just two tickets and Atlantic
Records Chief Ama Dagon reportedly couldn't get his hands on
any made Man received four hundred applications for the one
hundred press seats available scalpers on Seventh Avenue. We're making
upwards of fifty dollars on tickets with a face value

(16:30):
of six bucks. On the night of the concert, Kleague
lights on the steps of Carnegie Hall lit up the
sky like a classic Hollywood film premiere. The Marquis bore
the words fall in love with David Bowie. It was
a declaration fulfilled. Any semblance of New York cool had
melted away by the end of the show, as newly

(16:51):
minted Bowie fanatics were dancing and Carnegie Hall's historic aisles.
Despite being feverish with the flu, David earned a rapturous
five minute a vation. The press were equally enthusiastic. A
star is born. I've always wanted to write that in review,
and now I can, gushed one reporter. Another declared the
sixties are well and truly over. The publicity led to

(17:15):
an influx of requests from promoters, and soon the eight
date tour swelled to include an additional eight weeks. Bowie
Mania was beginning d C. Boston, Kansas City, Indianapolis, St. Louis,
Salt Lake City. David's torbus barreled down the long stretches
of highway past the ever changing landscape. Cities turned to forests,

(17:38):
which turned to deserts. David was living out his cherished
fantasies of Jack Kerouac's character is in On the Road,
the book that had liberated his imagination as a young boy.
As is so often the case, the fantasy doesn't always
equal the reality. On his first journey to America the
year before, a man in Texas way at the gun
at David for wearing a dress. This trip featured similar

(18:01):
hostilities as he struggled to connect in the South. Members
of the Ku Klux Klan came out in droves to
pick at his gig in Nashville, objecting to David's bisexuality
and supposed Communist sympathies. David arrived at ten thousand ced
arenas in St. Louis, Kansas City and Miami, only to
find that a few hundred people had bothered to turn up.

(18:22):
Ever the pro he gathered the small crowd into the
front rows and performed an intimate cabaret style set just
for them. Dates and Dallas and Houston sold so poorly
that the Freeze had to cancel them completely. Even if
the shows were a bust, they had fun as they
made their way through the American heartland. David and his
band loved to crash the sleepy hotel, cocktail lounges and

(18:46):
full ziggy stardust makeup and costumes just to see the
open mouth stairs of the usual clientele. Sometimes they had
too much fun. One morning, road manager Tony Zanetta got
a frantic call. David was miss sing. The crew was
packed up and ready to go, but their star was
nowhere to be found. A short time later, Zanetta got

(19:07):
another call. It was David. He had no idea where
he was. I'm in a house. There are trees everywhere.
I think I'm in the middle of a forest somewhere. Somehow,
a bell hop at the band's hotel was able to
work out David's location based on that sketchy description, and
disaster was averted. This time. The partying came to a

(19:28):
head in late October when the Ziggy start Us tour
pool in the Los Angeles. By then, the entourage had
grown to forty six people, including an assortment of drug dealers, groupies,
a professional palm reader, and diggy pop. Just for the
hell of it, all were booked into the ultra lux
Beverly Hills Hotel at our sier's expense. Most spent their

(19:50):
days lounging by the pool and ordering huge meals of
lobster thermidor for themselves and random horus they met strolling
Hollywood Boulevard. All were welcome, just send the bill to
our c A Records and Tapes. David liked l A.
It suited his lust for glamour, insatiable hedonism, and compulsive
need for chameleonic character changes. He was surprisingly sober during

(20:14):
this time, wanting to keep a clear head for the
pair of make or break dates at the Santa Monica
Civic Center. His chief outlet was sex. His bungalow at
the Beverly Hills Hotel hosted a parade of local groupies,
visions and glitter and platforms. His latest serious fling was
with Andy Warhol's newest factory girl, nineteen year old Surrender Fox,

(20:35):
who would later go on to marry aerosmith Steven Tyler.
David liked her so much he called her into his room.
The chat when he was in the middle of having
sex with other women. This was quite a compliment. One night, she,
David and Angie had a threesome involving a bathtub, Lady Godiva,
Wig and lots of pearls. Stories of David's seduction are endless.

(20:58):
Once at a party, he's at his side on a
woman dancing with music producer Kim Fowley. David sidle up
to Fouley and politely asked, are you in love with
this woman? Or may I take her into the bathroom?
Receiving no objection, David approached the woman with a well
honed pickup line, how do you do? I'm David Bowie.
I'd like to discuss life at the Universal whatever my dear.

(21:19):
Hand in hand, they went off in search of a restroom.
A gang of jealous drag queens followed in hot pursuit,
all eager for their private moment with Ziggy. David's sexual prowess,
to say nothing of his impressive physical attributes, has been
widely commented upon. He was a romantic, described as a
tender yet aerobic lover and an excellent kisser. To quote

(21:42):
Cherry Vanilla is one time pr manager and occasional romantic partner.
It never felt like we were just having sex. It
felt like we were really making love. He was either
a fabulous actor or a man whose emotions ran deep.
David's voracious sexual appetite was slightly frightening to some members
of his inner circle. He seemed down for at any time, anywhere,

(22:04):
in the limo, in the bathroom, on the sidewalk in
front of the hotel. Back in his days as a
student that promptly TechEd, David used sex as a power
play to capture attention. His newfound fame only amplified this tendency,
and the effect was startling. Cherry Vanilla, who shared a
bed with him on more than one occasion, believed he

(22:24):
was a sex addict. Another intimate would describe him less
charitably in this period as quote screwing everything that moved
and quite a bit that didn't. The crew joke took
on a scary realism one night at his hotel when
a sinister member of the Hollywood show business elite offered
to procure a dead body for his pleasure, still warm
if he liked, David was deeply horrified and rejected the

(22:48):
indecent overture. However, there is the troubling claim of Laurie Maddox,
a member of the so called Baby Groupie's Click of
teenagers that hung around with visiting musicians who roamed the
Sunset Strip Clubland at night, also known as Lori Lightning.
Maddox is perhaps most famous for her tempestuous relationship with
Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page when she was a miner. Prior

(23:11):
to that, she said she lost her virginity to David
Bowie during the Ziggy Stardust tour when she was fifteen
years old. Her version of events is varied considerably over
the years and occasionally features historical impossibilities, leading some to
doubt her story, but she's repeated the general just for
decades and tells her tale with utmost fondness. The way

(23:32):
it happens was so beautiful, Maddox said, I remember him
looking like God and having me over a table. Who
wouldn't want to lose their virginity to David Bowie? To
this day, Maddox claims that her experience with Bowie was
not only consensual, but also a cherished memory, creating a
thorny moral quandary for herself and also Bowie's fans. If

(23:55):
twenty six year old David had sex with a minor,
it makes the claims of his supper was as sex
addiction all the more serious and concerning. Yet Maddox always
rebuffed those who sought to label her a victim. Well,
she admits that her perception is shifted following the rise
of the Me Too movement, She still denies that she
was ever taken advantage of by Bowie. We were friends,

(24:16):
she says, it was all pure fun. It was a
different time in rock and roll. In that era, some
of the world's most famous rock stars shamelessly engaged in
relationships with young girls. Some of these women have no regrets,
while others remained scarred by their experiences. At the time,
it was just an accepted part of the Hollywood music scene,

(24:37):
which was becoming increasingly dark and menacing. As rock and
roll became a billion dollar business, a sense of darkness
has started to creep in the Dayvid's life. There were
days when he could barely rouse himself from his bed.
He often stayed in his hotel room, writing, reading, or
just staring at the television. He was described in this
period as a frail, chalk white figure with almost vampiric tendencies.

(25:02):
Maybe that was the effect David was going for. When
a friend asked why he wasn't soaking up the Southern
California son by the hotel pool, David solemnly replied, all
melt below lows seemed like the logical inverse of his
performance highs, both sexual and musical, but it was also
something deeper. The public persona of David Bowie, overlaid with

(25:23):
even more outrageous siggy stardust alter ego had caused the
boy from Bromley's identity to fracture. He'd later say, in
Los Angeles, I was surrounded with people who indulged my ego,
who treated me as ziggy Stardust, never realizing that David
Jones might be behind it. His biggest fear was coming true.
His grip on reality was starting to slip. With the

(25:46):
curse of his familial mental illness claim him too, like
it had claimed his beloved half brother Terry, David found
himself paying an enormous psychic price for his fame, and
the financial one too. Their stay at the bear A
Hills Hotel cost a hundred thousand dollars, including twenty thousand
dollars in room service bills alone. DeFreeze sole attempt at

(26:07):
cost cutting was the decree that groupies be sent home
without breakfast. The seventy one day tour lost four hundred
and eighty five thousand dollars or seven thousand dollars a day.
The silver tongues Defriese talked our Cia into paying off
the debt, a move that caused the cancelation of the
label's annual Christmas bonus that year. In exchange, our c

(26:29):
would recoup its losses from Bowie's future record sales. In
other words, our ci a would pay now, but Bowie
would pay later. It would take some time for David
to realize that he was footing the bill for this
traveling circus and to freeze increasingly ambitious schemes. Our Cia
didn't have to wait long for new Bowie product, America

(26:49):
did wonders for his creativity. A new album began to
take shape, Inspired by David's cautious embrace of the country
that had embraced him so warmly. His Jubie first visit
the previous year had planted the seeds of ziggy stardust.
Now a portrait of Ziggy's disturbed and paranoid sibling began
to emerge. David had seen the real America from his

(27:11):
vantage point on his tour bus. It thrilled him, but
it also frightened him. When I was a boy, we
were all fascinated by America, he glumily told the journalist.
But now that I'm here, I've forgotten why I wanted
to come. His personal on the road adventure in the
United States of Richard Nixon didn't match up to the
one Jack Carowac had presented. David had expected freedom and opportunity.

(27:35):
He found it, but he also found urban decay, addiction, violence,
and death. If I'm in a very light mood, I
find everything in America so kitch, he explained. It's wonderful
and I love to have it all hanging in my bedroom.
If I'm in a bad mood, I find it terribly
repressive and heavy. He declared the United States to be

(27:56):
the loneliest place in the world, and the people insecure
and in need of warmth. Perhaps the fundamentally shy man
who never got enough hugs as a child, recognized himself
among the Yanks. His thoughts crystallized As he sailed home
to England that December. He spent most of the sea
voyage curled in an over stuffed armchair in his suite,

(28:16):
thumbing through a copy of author Evelyn Walls Vile Bodies.
It was a futuristic novel about a hedonistic society of
bright young things living a life of decadent deprevity and
the eve of an impending World War. Wall's tale of
frivolity on the brink of catastrophe resonated with Bowie. To him,
this wasn't sci fi, but a chilling reflection of reality

(28:37):
as he saw it. If the Ziggy start Us opening
track five years as any indication, David really seemed to
think that the planet Earth wouldn't survive into the eighties.
Setting aside his copy of Vile Bodies, he reached for
the spiral notebook on the small mahogany table at his
side and began to write the words to a new song.
It's my interpretation of what America means to me, he'd say.

(29:01):
It's like a summation of my first American tour, his
schizophrenic impression of the country, to say nothing of his
preoccupation with the mental illness that blighted his family inspired
his new character a Laddin Sane. He was welcomed home
on British shores like a triumphant war hero. Bowie's back
trumpeted the full page ads that filled the music papers.

(29:24):
Shows for his upcoming UK tour dates had already sold out,
and he had big things planned for nine. David managed
to carve out time to celebrate Christmas with his wife
Angie and toddler Zoe at their house, Hadden Hall. It
would be the last holiday they'd spend that their beloved home,
and more or less the last they'd spend together as
a happy family. During the final dates of the Ziggy

(29:57):
Stardust tour, a fan snatched David's way sting bracelet off
his wrist, twin to the one worn by his wife Angie.
The theft was highly symbolic. Barely into its second year,
their marriage was, in David's own words, pretty much over
and all but name they would see less and less
of one another in nine Jealousy played a sizeable role

(30:19):
in the disintegration of their union. They had always enjoyed
an extremely open relationship, but many in their circle felt
that David was overdoing his freedom just a bit. Angie
was inclined to agree. She would later say that David
was quote nailing everything that moved, and characterized him as
having quote the morals of a bisexual alley cat. As

(30:39):
a result, Angie kept her distance. This was generally encouraged
by Bowie and his coterie. They acted more like business
partners than lovers, staying in different suites and generally living
separate lives. For Angie, the tour was nothing but a
string of increasingly humiliating incidents, sometimes in private, sometimes painfully public,

(31:00):
but always involving her husband and groupies. Andie got her
revenge by flaunting an affair with David's bodyguard. Never shy,
they hooked up one night while skinny dipping in the
motel pool. Motel management took a rather dim view of
this sort of thing. David smooth things over before rounding
on Angie. She'd humiliated and before like the night she

(31:21):
performed oral sex on a friend in the middle of
a closed but not empty hotel bar. But this was
the final straw. The next day he booked her a
one way ticket back to England. Aside from special occasions,
and she was never welcomed on as tours again, she
had been banished from his inner traveling circle. The betrayals

(31:41):
weren't just sexual, after all, they were bonded not just
by love and lust, but also by mutually shared ambition.
As far as Andie was concerned, David broke a promise
they had made when they were both struggling and penniless.
The plan was, once they made David a rock star,
they turned their attention to her career, building her up
into a world famous performer in her own right. Andie

(32:04):
felt she'd done her part by styling David, encouraging him,
and serving as a dedicated creative collaborator. But David hadn't
kept up his end of the deal. He was too
caught up in the whirlwind of his own success to reciprocate.
David felt heed outgrowner, Angie felt there wasn't any room
for her. She felt frustrated, even used, so she resorted

(32:26):
to attention grabbing stunts, like sex in a public swimming
pool to assert herself. This succeeded only an annoying David,
who pushed her even further away. Andrew didn't mind the
space at first. Her acting ambitions kept her busy. She
even auditioned for the role of TVs Wonder Woman, ultimately
losing out when she refused to wear a braw for
the screen test. But before long she'd get a call

(32:49):
from David. There was a new problem to solve, a
new door to kick down, a new idea he wanted
to run by her, or he just missed her. Sooner
or later she'd be drawn back into the Bowie orbit
and her plans were put on hold. So the cycle continued,
but it was clear there wasn't room for two prima
donnas in this marriage. In the midst of this marital turmoil,

(33:12):
David re recorded a song called The Prettiest Star, written
three years earlier as a tender ode to Angie. He
first played it for through the telephone as part of
his marriage proposal back in nineteen sixty nine, and released
it as a single soon after. His decision to revisit
the song in late nineteen seventy two, when the relationship
was well and truly on the rocks is a puzzling one.

(33:35):
Perhaps it was his way of apologizing, or maybe it
was his way of saying goodbye. It was an anomaly
on his album in Progress, A Laddin Sane, which was
written mostly while on tour in the United States. In
a loose sense, the record was a sequel to Ziggy
Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, lacking any kind of narrative,
The general theme was Ziggy Goes to America. The record

(33:58):
was a travelog by a stray You're in a Strange Land,
observations from an alien traversing the country in a chartered
Greyhound bus. Each song served as a musical postcard from abroad.
On the track list, place names were included next to
each title, notating the location where each song was composed.
The first of these was conceived somewhere between Cleveland and Memphis.

(34:21):
During a bus ride jam session. Bowie, his old friend
George Underwood, and Mick Ronson beat out an impromptu version
of Bou Didley's I'm a Man, which soon morphed into
an original song called Bustin. The song got new words
a few weeks later, when Bowie visited his tour flings
Surrenda Fox. Over discussions of the author Jeanine, Bowie twisted

(34:43):
the bluesy stomp into gene Genie. He recorded the song
and just one take days later at our c A
Studios in New York, My first New York song, he'd
remember proudly. In just ninety minutes he had his new single,
Another New York Song was watched that man. Inspired by
the American characters who crammed into his suite for a

(35:03):
particularly rowdy party at the Plaza Hotel, the senior minded
David of Evelyn Wall's Vile Bodies passionate, bright young things
partying while the world teetered on the brink of disaster.
Drive in Sunday, on the other hand, takes place after
the apocalypse occurred. David was intrigued one night while gazing
out at the desert vistas from an observation platform on

(35:25):
a train journey through the Southwest. Strange lights on the
horizon gave him visions of a world after a nuclear catastrophe.
David being David, he added sex and media to the plot.
The songs set in twenty three, when humans have forgotten
how to reproduce need to watch old pornographic films as
teaching tools. Panic in Detroit required less imagination. It was

(35:49):
taken largely from the mouth of his friend and MotorCity
native Iggy Pop. When the Ziggy Stardust Tour passed through Detroit.
Iggy kept David up all night by regaling him with
tales from the nineteen sixty seven riots, a time when
teenage revolutionaries joyously discussed the day when the system would
be obliterated by machine gun wielding kids. When Iggy finally

(36:09):
left the room at daybreak, David peered out that the
decayed urban ruined from his hotel suite. Slowly, the lyrics
started to take shape. Cracked Actor was pure l a
a portrait of the sleeves and menace, barely masked by
a thin facade of glamour. The track was written during
David's week in the City of Angels, inspired by strolls

(36:30):
up and down Sunset Boulevard, an open market place for
hookers and dealers to ply their wares. Even more intriguing
to David were prostitutes of the legal variety, older producers,
preoccupied with sex, drugs, and money. They were quite strange, looking,
quite charming, David would recall, but thoroughly unreal. The lyrics
examined their debauched desires and sinister motivations. One only needs

(36:56):
to look at the album's title track, Aladdin saying to
understand the toll his globe trotting venture was taking on
David's psychological equilibrium. He was a man divided. On one hand,
he wanted nothing more than to perform his songs for
increasingly expansive audiences. On the other, the life of a
rock and roll gypsy was beginning to wear on him.
He found himself surrounded by users, sycophants, and drug casualties

(37:19):
whose grasp on reality seemed even more tenuous than his own.
As he would say, there were some very mixed up
people on that tour, including myself, and I didn't like
myself very much at that time. Psychological subdivision through his
many alter egos left them confused about exactly who was
earning this mass adoration. It was clear that Ziggy was

(37:42):
in charge. It was he who the crowd cheered for,
who the interview was clamored to talk to, who the
labels wanted more product from. For the first time, David
began to realize the downside of a hit on the
scale of Ziggy, Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. When
he was effectively a nobody, he could explore creatively to
his heart's content. Now there was an expectation the artists

(38:04):
arch enemy I felt for the first time and the
only time that I was working for someone else, He'd say,
A Laddin. The same is effectively continuation of Ziggy Stardust.
David hated doing sequels, but he seated to the label
pressure in popular demand. The split was apparent in the
album's cover, shot by legendary photographer Brian Duffy. David's face

(38:25):
is bisected by a flashy lightning bolt. Makeup designer Pierre
Laroche borrowed the symbol from Elvis Presley, David's birthday twin,
who used it as a personal logo for himself and
as Memphis Mafia for the King. The lightning meant taking
care of business and a flash. In David's case, it
represented his fractured psyche. Following early sessions in New York,

(38:48):
David entered his familiar creative home at London's Tried and
Studios in January n to complete the album. Recording was rapid.
The day the sessions ended, David boarded a ship bound
for America for another string of US concert dates designed
to top his show from just a few months earlier.
Everything about the nineteen seventy three US concerts were bigger, grander,

(39:10):
and more outrageous. The Freeze had booked venues that were
twice as large as the last tour. David had started
integrating costumes into his performance, bringing the characters of Ziggy
and a Laddin Saying to life with masks and clothes.
He racked up as many as seven outfit changes per show,
sometimes performing tearaway quick changes right on the stage. He

(39:30):
brought along Pierre Laroche to oversee his elaborate makeup, which
took between two and five hours each night to apply.
In addition to the thick lashings of eyeliner and silver lipstick,
David adopted a gaudy silver disc painted in the center
of his forehead, a version of the so called love
jewel worn by his former friend Calvin Mark Lee in
the waning days of the sixties. Even the band was

(39:52):
augmented with the additions of guitarist John Hutchison, a pair
of sacks players, and backing vocalist Jeffrey McCormick, a childhood
friend of day VID's. The expansion allowed David more freedom
to move around the stage, but it also caused friction
with the original Spiders from Mars, who feared that they
were being relegated to the thankless roll of a solo
stars anonymous backing band. The breakneck pace of recording and

(40:15):
touring was taking a toll on intergroup relations. Gone was
the all for one, one for all hippie spirit from
their days sleeping on the floor at hadden Hall. Sessions
for a ladd and Saying had been particularly tense between
David and drummer Woody Woodman's, who had refused to blindly
yield to David's creative whims. But the real schism occurred
on the eve of the tour, when the original Spiders

(40:36):
found out how much new boy Mike Garson was being paid.
It happened in the most painfully awkward way. Woodman's was
thumbing through a magazine and he saw an advertisement for
a flashy Lamborghini. Wouldn't it be great to have one
of those? He daydreamed aloud to Garson. Why don't you
buy one? Garson replied, you must be able to afford
one by now? Would He assured him that it was

(40:56):
still way out of his budget. Garson was confused. After
some hemming and hawing, the men compared salaries. That's when
they learned that Garson was making ten times the salary
of the original Spiders. The revelation led to a full
scale mutiny before the nineteen seventy three tour kicked off
in New York City, Tony DeFries playcated Mick Ronson with

(41:16):
the promise of a main man solo deal, but Woody
and bassist Trevor Bolder were on strike. No pay, no play.
This is a joke, they complained to Defrieze. Even the
roadies are getting more than us. Defrieze snapped back, well,
I'd rather give the money to the road crew than you.
Things were eventually smoothed over, but the damage had been done.

(41:37):
David view the mutinyous tantamount of treason. Relations between him
and the rhythm section were never the same again. David
took the stage as scheduled on Valentine's Day at Radio
City Music Hall. The six thousand seat venue was loaded
with everyone from Andy Warhol and Salvador Dolly to Alan
Ginsburg and Truman Capote. David himself made an unforgettable entrance

(42:00):
by descending fifty feet from the ceiling to the stage
in a literal gilded cage, a propy borrowed from the
Rockett stage show. The audience had a great time, but
the show wouldn't rank among David's favorites. Makeup man Pierre
Laroche had doused him with glitter for the first time,
which mixed with David's sweat and ran into his eyes.
I did the whole show almost blind, he complained. Then,

(42:22):
as he delivered his rock and roll suicide finale, a
fan leapt on stage and planted a kiss on David's cheek.
David was so startled that he fainted, collapsing center stage.
His timing was so impeccable that even the band thought
it was just the new bit of drama for the
song's climax. It wasn't until he was bodily carded off
the stage that they realized anything was amiss. Blinded by

(42:44):
glitter and smothered by fans. As far as almens go,
these were not the best for David's new tour, but
the nineteen seventy three American track generally went off without
much of a hitch. It was the greatest Hits reel,
consolidating the successes of months earlier. He followed back to
radio city shows with an astonishing seven concerts in Philadelphia
plus two in Memphis. Two in Detroit and two in

(43:06):
l A. After taking Hollywood, he continued west all the
way to Japan for a ten date tour. If Ziggy
Started Us was a success in England in the States,
it made an even bigger splash with the Japanese. The
album had been selling non stop in Japan despite almost
no promotional effort, ultimately remaining in the charts for two years.

(43:27):
Though mocked by the highbrow Japanese press, Bowie had earned
a passionate following with teenagers and college students. The attraction
was understandable. Their culture was a major part of Ziggy
Start Us. D n A. David had been drawn the
Japanese styles, colors, and textures while designing Ziggy's costumes, crafting
a look that was in every sense alien to Western audiences.

(43:48):
The clothes, the makeup, the choreography. To the Japanese, Bowie
was a rocked up, larger than life reflection of their
own cultural heritage. They illustrated the point quite literally by
welcoming Dave it with a massive ninety ft poster of
his face, the largest poster in the world at the time,
hung from a Tokyo skyscraper. The tour allowed David to
delve deeper into Japanese drama. He was particularly intrigued by

(44:12):
the theatrical style known as kabuki, a word meaning song, dance,
and art characterized by elaborate makeup, garish costumes, and physical expressionism.
It's easy to see why kabuki would appeal to David
in many ways. It was the Eastern counterpart to the
mime work he'd done with Lindsay Kemp in the sixties,
but kabuki allowed for even greater freedom of expression. Exclusively

(44:35):
male Kabuki actors portrayed both men and women, sometimes in
the same scene, rapidly changing costumes to express this change
of personality. For David, a man who swapped personas like clothes,
this notion was especially compelling. His latest shows incorporated an
ever growing number of costumes crafted by Japanese designer Kansai Yamamoto.

(44:57):
David met up with the Future Fashion Icon upon his
arrival in Tokyo to collect the nine outfits he commissioned
for the Aladdin Same tour. They were kabuki costumes with
a sci fi twist. Many could be torn off with
a dramatic flourish to reveal a second outfit. Underneath. Some
of these were done in more traditional modes, like the
white satin Komono cape decorated with black and red Chinese

(45:18):
letters that spelled out David Bowie phonetically. Less traditional was
the Space Samurai costume, a quilted one piece made of
lustrous black, red and blue fabric and lined with rows
of black sequins. David would call on Yamamoto and at
least one occasion during his stay to repair the damage
to his clothes inflicted by over zealous fans. David was

(45:39):
equally enthusiastic about Japan and its culture. When he wasn't performing,
he explored the country, visiting bathhouses and fish markets, sampling
sake and admiring Kiyoto's famous cherry blossoms. He took in
theatrical performances, fashion shows, and sumo wrestling competitions. He even
went further afield of the outlying provinces, where he marveled

(45:59):
at the into temples and elaborate dance rituals performed by
the villagers. In a rare moment of unity, Angie and
Baby Zoe had come along for the tour. Together. They
attended a tea ceremony at the Imperial gardens. For a
fleeting moment, they were just an ordinary family on vacation.
Zoe would treasure the memories. He would be his last
trip with both his parents. It would also be his

(46:22):
first time seeing his father perform. The two year old
was dressed for the occasion in a tiny kimono. It
must have made quite an impression, as if seeing his
father transform and the ziggy Stardust wasn't memorable enough. The
audiences in Japan were unusually ardent. At one gig, they
stomped so hard that they bent the enormous steel girders
holding up the floor of the venue, which nearly caused

(46:44):
the ceiling of Bowie's dressing room and collapse. David tried
to give as good as he got, assuming that the
Japanese fans couldn't understand the word of his lyrics, He
delivered the most physically demanding shows of his life, activating
his songs with his hands and body. Due in part
to the exertion, he began performing part of the show
and what was essentially a red sequined jockstrap. The sight

(47:06):
of this whipped the crowd into an even greater frenzy.
David was certainly appreciative of the attention, sometimes signing autographs
in his hotel room and to the early morning hours.
With the outpouring of affection bordered on dangerous. Once he
was forced to barricade himself in his dressing room for
hours after a show due to a transport mix up.
But love was simply too much. Emotions reached the breaking

(47:28):
point during the final show of the tour when fans
in Tokyo began to riot. Japanese authorities blamed Angie, claiming
as she intentionally sparked the hysteria by swinging chairs and screaming.
Angie claimed she was trying to rescue young fans from
heavy handed security guards. Regardless, Japanese officials demanded she and
MainMan executive Tony Zanetta turned themselves in the police. Instead,

(47:52):
they fled the country, hopping a flight to Hawaii. Whether
or not she was actually at fault, David was furious
with his wife, declaring her a virtual idiot who possessed
all the tact and finesse of a mack truck. Just
a few years ago, they've been partners. Now there was
an ocean between them, and it still didn't seem like enough.
David took the long way home from Japan, crossing half

(48:14):
the world by ship, rail and even hovercraft before completing
the eight thousand mile journey to England. He arrived home
just in time to learn that the newly released A
Laddin Saying had gone the number one in Britain. It
was the best selling album there since The Beatles had
stormed the sales charts. His older records, even the ones
that had sank without a trace upon their initial release,
were selling in vast quantities. His new single Drive in Saturday,

(48:39):
was peaking at number three. Everything he'd worked for had
come true. David should have felt on top of the world, elated, overjoyed,
but he didn't. He felt lost. David we through a

(49:00):
homecoming party in early May after more than three months
on the road. He was grateful to settle in at
Hanton Hall. Old friends like George Underwood, designer Freddie Baretti,
mime teacher and former Lover Lindsey Kemp and Ziggy Stardust
producer Ken Scott all came out to welcome him back
with wine, chicken and then the Laddin Saying themed cake.

(49:23):
But ultimately David didn't feel much like partying this night.
A year and a half of grueling, repetitive touring he
left him emotionally and physically wiped. His stage costumes were
coming apart at the seams, held together with some tape
and pins. David was in similar shape. He was suffering
from exhaustion and his weight had fallen to barely a
hundred pounds for the first time in his life. He

(49:46):
just wanted to stay at home and watch TV, but
in just a few days he had to go out
and do it all again. Tony DeFreeze had booked him
to play sixty concerts in fifty two days across Britain.
David and the other Spiders grumbled that they were worked
the bone. It was one of the few things they
agreed on. Ever since the pay dispute, the camaraderie of

(50:07):
the band's early days had evaporated. They were no longer
a gang of doerd I rock and roll drugs sharing
a home, a van, on a stage. Mick Ronson was
kept happy with a solo deal on man Man, but
drummer Woody woodman Z and bassist Trevor Boulder barely exchanged
words with David. During their concerts in Japan and the States.
They had initially boycotted these new English dates until Mick

(50:29):
Ronson begged them the return of the fold. They agreed,
but were noticeably absent from David's party. It's doubtful they
were missed. One person who did attend was Tony Visconti,
David's friend and former Hadden Hall housemaid. They had seen
little of one another since Visconti had produced the frustrating
Sessions for The Man Who Sold the World three years earlier.

(50:50):
He found David a change person. I recognized him, but
he really wasn't the same man he'd remember. He was Ziggy.
David had created an alter ego, and it had completely
taken over his life. Like a cancer. It grew and grew,
threatening to kill of the host audiences, journalists, label executives,

(51:10):
even his own entourage. They all wanted Ziggy, not David Jones.
So David simply played Ziggy at all times. He became
lost in the fantasy. The doppelganger and myself were starting
to become one and the same person, he'd recall. Then
you start on the trail of chaotic psychological destruction. David
was locked in a battle for his identity and his soul.

(51:33):
He was insulated from normal daily life by a coterie
of handlers, security guards, and assorted sycophants, all of whom
treated him like an alien in need of constant protection.
As a result, David lost touch with reality. He began
to doubt his own sanity. The madness that he spent
all his life trying to keep it bay now felt
dangerously close. The UK tour did little to elevate morale.

(51:56):
It got off to a rough start when David was
booked to be the first rock act to play Earl's Court,
a massive exhibition hall traditionally used for fairs and trade shows.
All of the eighteen thousand seats had sold out in
three hours, making it David's biggest audience to date. It
should have been a triumph, but the gig was a disaster.
The band's inadequate sound system, coupled with the poor acoustics

(52:18):
of the venue, ensure that almost no one could hear
the music. Poor seating arrangements meant that few could actually
see David's elaborate stage show either. This, combined with a
lingering smell from a recent horse competition, made for a
less than optimal concert experience. The show had to be
halted midway through his hundreds of raucous fans stormed the stage,

(52:38):
kicking and punching each other as they went. Boie pleaded
for calm while drunken revelers fought and urinated in the aisles.
He and the band hid backstage for more than fifteen
minutes until order was restored. Routiness became something of a
theme at his recent concerts. A show in Glasgow made
headlines when couples were caught having sex in their seats

(52:59):
as He's saying, Oh, you pretty things. David thought this
was fabulous, but he was less than thrilled in Brighton
when fans tore out an entire row of theater seats,
resulting in David's permanent band from the venue. David caused
damage to himself at another gig when he took a
flying leap off a five foot speaker, only to face
plants on the stage. He performed the encore confined to

(53:21):
a chair, singing a cover of chuck Berries round and
round through the pain of a sore ankle. Well David
was sacrificing his body on the stage. Tony Dufries was
scheming yet another trip to the United States, David's third
and less than a year, he claimed to have thirty
eight North American dates lined up, with plans to double
the number. He also had gigs and far flung regions

(53:43):
like China and Russia. He claimed the proposed concerts would
be even more elaborate than anything Broadway had ever seen.
In fact, they would challenge the laws of physics. David's
technical director dreamed up a method to cover the stage
with a giant two layered plastic bubble gases pumped into
the bubbles double wall could make Bowie seemed to grow

(54:03):
larger or smaller, then turn him shades of orange, blue,
or red. At least that was the story Tony de
Freeze put around, But he was faced with a problem.
For all his talent for getting good press, the Freeze
had violated the first rule of show business, always leave
them wanting more. David's many trips to the States had
all but eliminated demand to see him. American seats were

(54:26):
going unsold, and promoters worried about making a return on
their investment. As main man executive Tony Sinetto would explain,
david stardom was more in the press. It didn't translate
into real numbers. The American tours had never made any money.
They increased David's fame, but decreased his bank account. This
has been de freeze planned from the start, but the

(54:47):
spending was spiraling out of control. The dinners, limos, first
class hotel suites. It all added up to say nothing
of the astronomical production costs of the concerts themselves. Recent
tours made back barely a quarter of what they spent.
David's refusal to fly limited the number of shows he
could do to recoup expenses. Our c A Records, still

(55:08):
furious at footing the bill for the last US ROMP,
refused to underwrite another tour. Main Man didn't have the
resources the amount the tour themselves. The organization was hemorrhaging money,
losing upwards of a thousand pounds a week. Bowie himself
certainly didn't have the cash. Despite his stardom. He was
forced to borrow money just to survive. Once he and

(55:30):
Angie arrived home to find their door padlocked shut by creditors,
Little Zoe was sent to stay with friends just to
ensure he got fed. Simply put, the price of touring
was just too much, too much money, too much energy,
too much of everyone's sanity. David just didn't have anything left.
His enthusiasm for the road was rapidly growing thin as

(55:52):
he felt like a slave to his manager's ambitions. We're
gonna do another tour of America this year, he sighed
to one journalist. I might die, but I have to
do it. Tour or no tour. A showdown between David
and Ziggy was imminent. It boiled down to a choice.
Would he do what was expected, demanded, even or would

(56:12):
he satisfy himself and his own creative curiosity Aladdin saying
had been the closest David had ever come to repeating
himself creatively. Would David remained the singing Martian forever? Would
he continue cranking out spacey pop tracks for the rest
of his career. For David, the thought was untenable. He
was bored to death of the whole Ziggy concept and

(56:34):
eager to write for a different kind of project. He
had to move on. It became clear that he had
the phase out Ziggy before Ziggy phased him out. In
times of crisis, we returned to our base instincts. The
survival skills and coping mechanisms set in places frightened children
desperate to protect ourselves through fear, we become who we were.

(56:59):
As David struggle for spiritual balance, a memory revealed itself,
barely on the threshold of his consciousness. He was a boy,
maybe four or five, in his Brixton childhood home. He
was screaming that he was dying. His parents leapt into action.
Ordinarily they were so stoic and still, but in this

(57:19):
moment their faces were twisted and worry. For once David
knew they cared, he felt their love. An ambulance came
tearing up the sleepy lane, drawing neighbors to their windows
to see what all the fuss was about. At the
Jones house. They mirrored his parents concern. Of course, David
didn't die that day. Doctors found nothing wrong, and that's

(57:42):
because there wasn't physically. But the stunt had given David
exactly what he needed. It suspended all expectations and responsibilities
in his everyday life, and it brought him the attention
and sympathy that he craved. After that, the ambulance made
frequent trips to the Jones residence. Another false alarm came,
the inevitable grumble, but it wasn't completely fake to David,

(58:07):
it was a genuine cry for help. The words were
simply beyond him. Now an adult, David found himself having
similar thoughts. What if he died, or rather, what if
Ziggy stared us died? David would kill him off or
perhaps just retire him? Best to keep his options open.

(58:27):
It seemed the perfect solution to all of David's personal
and professional headaches. In the short term, it would excuse
him from the upcoming American Tour, which was shaping up
to be a poorly attended financial disaster. By canceling these
dates for creative reasons and not economic ones, he could
save face. It wouldn't look like a failure, quite the opposite.

(58:47):
It would bolster his reputation as an unclassifiable artistic enigma,
restlessly evolving before his audience's very eyes. Who else would
abandoned their star making persona which was, as far as
the public knew, wildly successful. The move made him look
daring and adventurous rather than exhausted and overexposed. Retirement was

(59:07):
a stroke of public relations genius. It offered David creative
freedom and the well deserved rest. The Frieze loved the
idea the Beatles had retired from the road during the
peak of their career, why not David. Arrangements were made
for Ziggy's Final Bow, which would occur on the final
date of their UK tour, a sold out gig at
the Hammersmith Odean on July three three. The plan was

(59:32):
top secret and kept strictly between David and de Frieze.
Not even Angie was told of the retirement, an indication
of just how estranged she and her husband had become.
Mick Ronson was one of the few to be given
a heads up, but he was sworn to secrecy. The
rest of the band wasn't informed that after three years
of living together, traveling together, and reaching the highest echelons

(59:54):
of rock fame together, their services with David were no
longer required. Legendary documentary and d A. Penny Baker was
hired to capture the proceedings on film. Our c A
also sent a mobile recording unit for a proposed live album,
ensuring there were no second thoughts. News of the retirement
was leaked to a handful of trusted journalists at the

(01:00:16):
last possible moment. Headlines trumpeting David's retirement were headed to
the printing press as the audience were still taking their seats.
The crowd was packed with huge names including Mick Jagger,
lou Reid, Ringo Star and Tony Curtis, and also a
young girl named Julie. Guitar god Jeff Beck appeared as
a special guest on Jeane Genie and Round and Round.

(01:00:38):
Other than that, the show was mostly business as usual,
just another gig as far as the band was concerned.
But David had asked the musicians the way to beat
before launching into their trusted finale rock and Roll Suicide.
Being the last night of the tour, they figured David
would give a little speech marking the occasion. They had
no idea what was about to happen. They were about

(01:00:59):
to be fired in the most public manner imaginable. Having
thanked the road crew in the band, David paused, cowed
by the gravity of what he was about to do,
and then he plunged the knife into his most successful
creation and into the backs of some of his closest associates.
Of all the shows on this tour, this particular show

(01:01:20):
will remain with us the longest, he said, because not
only is it the last show of the tour, but
as the last show will ever do thank you. The
spiders shot quizzical looks at one another as they struggled
through the lengthy end of Rock and Roll Suicide. Did
David say something about retiring? It was hard to hear
over the dismayed cries of the crowd. Trevor Boulder mouth

(01:01:43):
to Woody Woodman's he sacked us. That's when it's sunk
in what he considered storming off in the middle of
the song, but somehow managed to keep his composure and
play through. After taking their final bows, they looked in
vain for David, desperate for some kind of explanation, but
he was gone, vanished, nowhere to be found. The press

(01:02:05):
reaction to David's news was monumental. Headlines across the globe
blared variations of bowie bows out. Most reports quoted a
main Man press release issued the day after the concert,
which dramatically stated that David was quote leaving the concert
stage forever. It would take weeks before it became clear
that it wasn't David himself who would never perform again,

(01:02:27):
but Ziggy. By that point a few cared to make
the distinction. The impending US tour had gone up in smoke.
David was free almost a year to the day after
his star making appearance on Top of the Pops. David
had carried out the self emilation for told in the
Ziggy Stardust narrative, a real life rock and roll suicide.

(01:02:49):
Ziggy had transcendent fantasy, becoming so real that he threatened
to consume David. Through the act of killing Ziggy, David
put the master stroke on his most enduring work of art,
but it also meant saying goodbye to a part of
himself and life as he knew it. After that night,
the Spiders would never play together again. Within months, David

(01:03:12):
and Angie would leave Hadden Hall. Their long time home
was now overrun with fans. Some of these well wishers
just wanted a hello. Others broke off door knobs and
shingles as souvenirs. A few even found their way inside,
prowling the halls in search of the object of their desire.
David couldn't stay. He had a family to think about,

(01:03:34):
but even that seemed tenuous as he drifted further and
further from Angie. It's telling that David's next musical endeavor
was a covers album called Phin Ups. It's a collection
of British pop songs from the mid sixties, a time
when David was struggling to find his musical voice with
an endless stream of failed bands. Revisiting these hits from

(01:03:55):
his frustrated youth allowed them to rewrite his own history
as a full blown superstar. By laying claim to these songs,
he could recast them in his own image and retroactively
make himself a part of the London rock scene that
rejected him all those years ago. It gave him a
sense of closure. One by one, the links to his
past were severed. The future was wide open. Some would

(01:04:21):
say that David's retirement was a business decision, a hackey
and opportunistic show business trope, but his true feelings about
Ziggy were far more complicated. David would say of his creation,
He's a monster and I'm Dr Frankenstein. He's my brother
and God I love him. His death hit him hard.

(01:04:42):
After taking his final bows at the Hammersmith Odean, David
returned to his dressing room, collapsed on the vanity and wept.
He wept for Ziggy, for his disintegrating marriage, for his
half brother terry, institutionalized and lonely for his father dead
far too soon, and for himself. Then his tears turned

(01:05:05):
to rage. He uncorked the furious emotions that he bottled
for years, and they erupted out of him in a
violent frenzy. Chairs, tables, lamps, windows, wine bottles, and flowers
all were kicked, thrown and spat on. Then he turned
the violence on his real target, himself, clawing his neck
and face. When it was all over, he stared into

(01:05:27):
the shattered mirror. His mismatched eyes that stared back at
him were bloodshot and his cheek was bruised. Ziggy Stardus
was dead. David Jones was alone again. For him, that
was the scariest fate of all. Off the Record is

(01:05:47):
a production of I Heart Radio. The executive producers are
Noel Brown and Shan t. Tone. The superbusing producers so
Taylor Skyn and Tristan McNeil. The show was written and
hosted by me Jordan Runtag and edited, scored and sound
designed by Tristan McNeil. If you liked what you heard,
please subscribe and leave us a review. For more podcasts

(01:06:10):
from My Heart Radio, visit the I Heart radio, app,
Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Thanks so much for listening to Off the record. We've
reached the midpoint of the season, so we're gonna take
a brief pause in the story. Next Monday, we're gonna

(01:06:31):
have an interview with Ken Scott, co producer of Ziggy Stardust, A,
Ladin Saying, and Hunky Dorry. Throughout the course of his
legendary career, he's also worked with the Beatles, Elton John
and Pink Floyd, among many others. You won't want to
miss this. We'll be back to the next chapter of
David Bowie's life on Monday. Mark J.