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Review
‘Spitz…attempts to bring the private man back into fuller view. This he achieves with novelistic flair and much insight’ (David Buckley MOJO )
‘Spitz concentrates on the complex evolution of Bowie’s music to deliver an evenhanded, critically thorough, while still reverential, life of the Thin White Duke.’ (Publishers Weekly )
‘A breezy, well-lit portrait of the ever-enigmatic rocker…Spitz’s encyclopedic knowledge and obvious appreciation for Bowie’s work separate this book from countless cookie-cutter rock stories.’ (Kirkus Reviews )
‘Spitz concentrates on the complex evolution of Bowie’s music to deliver an evenhanded, critically thorough, while still reverential, life of the Thin White Duke.’ (Publishers Weekly )
‘A breezy, well-lit portrait of the ever-enigmatic rocker…Spitz’s encyclopedic knowledge and obvious appreciation for Bowie’s work separate this book from countless cookie-cutter rock stories.’ (Kirkus Reviews )
Product Description
David Bowie is one of the most protean figures in rock music, one of the ten highest-selling acts in British pop history, and a subject of perennial fascination even when artistically lying low. It is a decade since the last major biography, and now Marc Spitz considers afresh Bowie’s remarkable life and music. From south London beginnings immediately after the war, Bowie embarked on a life of endless self re-invention: first he took the surname of an American frontiersman and joined the nascent sixties R&B scene in London among bands like Manfred Mann and the Stones. By the early seventies he had become the androgynous, white-faced waifs of Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane. Then there was the lounge-lizard classiness of the Thin White Duke, followed by his pensive, austere Berlin period, and subsequently the raucous racket-making aberration of his Tin Machine phase. Along the way he became a distinguished film actor in The Man Who Fell to Earth and Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence. But now that Bowie, happily married to Iman, is into his sixties, has he said goodbye to his musical career, or is he just biding his time before another yet another unexpected and wrong-footing renaissance? One thing is for sure: this succession of alter egos has always been symptomatic of a restless musical creativity and endless quest for innovation. His astonishing run of canonical albums, from The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust through Young Americans and Low to Scary Monsters, and countless classic tracks of which Changes, Sound and Vision and Space Oddity are just a taste, span psychedelia, glam-rock, ‘plastic soul’, electronic and industrial influences to disco, pop and even heavy metal. Now, Marc Spitz has talked to those who know or have worked with Bowie to produce an even-handed, thoroughly researched and quirkily readable portrait of an enigmatic and elusive individual, for whose recent musical silence we are all the poorer. (201006)
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I thankfully did not buy this book, rather I borrowed it from the local library! I wanted to post a review to stop anyone else wasting their cash on it!
This bio is a mish mash of other bio's the author had read, badly edited so that the same phrase (or cliche) often appears in a sentence twice. Even more infuriating though is when he occasionally tells you about a meeting Bowie had with some no mark, then has forgot that the two had met already by the next paragraph...
Perhaps the publisher wanted the book put out quickly, so there was no time to reread prior to print, but it makes for a long and difficult read. Nothing new is revealed anyway, so don't put yourself through it as I have just done!
Avoid!
This bio is a mish mash of other bio's the author had read, badly edited so that the same phrase (or cliche) often appears in a sentence twice. Even more infuriating though is when he occasionally tells you about a meeting Bowie had with some no mark, then has forgot that the two had met already by the next paragraph...
Perhaps the publisher wanted the book put out quickly, so there was no time to reread prior to print, but it makes for a long and difficult read. Nothing new is revealed anyway, so don't put yourself through it as I have just done!
Avoid!
Format:Hardcover
I've read probably ten books about Bowie over the years, and apart from Nick Pegg's 'Complete Bowie' (which isn't a biog as such) this is the only one I could recommend - and I would, strongly. This'll be the last general biography I read of the man - it's just not gonna be outdone. I was kinda sad to see how quickly this got bumped off the shelves in the shops in favor of the newer-by-a-few-months Trynka book ('Starman'). That book reputedly 'concentrates on the Ziggy', which says it all for me. Pick this one instead.
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
In short - this book is a lazy-boy rewrite of everything that's been written before. I was lured into buying it from it's promise of new news! What's he doing now - not tomorrow, yesterday, it's happening now! But, hey - there is nothing new to say or, is this book a better read in telling the same story than all the others that went before it. The style of prose is definitely rock-mag American and that is not a good thing! Best buy to learn something about Bowie and his music is Nick Pegg's. He can tell you a thing or two you probably didn't know!Complete David Bowie
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