Not so much the music, more the fashions that triggered my parents – a little, they weren’t especially censorious about it. They got used to my dancers’ leg-warmers (FAME! I’m Gonna Live Forever! [twirl kick twirl smash]) and using a long silky ribbon as a belt. Sartorially, my peak years. (So far.)
My dad worked at the local concert hall in Wolverhampton and Ziggy Stardust was my very first concert. I must have been about 9 years old and Ifound it very unnerving, hardly knowing what to make of it! How I wish I could go back and watch it again. This was such a lovely post to read.
Thank you, Deborah. I thought I'd already replied to your comment – sorry for the delay. That must have been a really strange and immersive experience, going to that concert at nine years old. I can see why you wish you could go back and see it from an adult's perspective. Is your dad still around? I wonder what he made of it.
It was more the other way around with my parents - I was a bit like Saffy from Ab Fab as a teenager! However, I loved Let's Dance and Labyrinth and am now a big Bowie fan (with some good fancy dress pics to prove it!) He was one of a kind. I can't listen to the Blackstar album though as it makes me too sad! Great piece Wendy 😊
Thanks, Faith. Blackstar is really sad. I have to be in the right mood to listen. There was a terrific documentary on after he died about the album and the related Lazarus stage show. I found that profound.
I love that you had Saffy from Ab Fab teenage years. I had huge respect for Saffy!
Thank you Wendy. It’s been such a dismal day. Bowie was/is my number one hero and I still feel he is deserving of that title. His whole philosophy on life was brilliant and it’s good to be reminded of that right now.
I love the photo of you and your brother and his recollections of the hair.
I saw him twice too. Once on the Glass Spider Tour in Mcr in 1987 and then again a few years later at Milton Keynes. Both joyous as I loved him so much.
Love this. 8 stone 7! I remember how tiny his costumes were when I saw them at David Bowie Is. My parents had eclectic tastes and liked some of the stuff we listened to. Mum used to play Atomic (Blondie) really loudly when she Hoovered. She always said she wanted it played at her funeral. It was playing when the curtains went round her coffin.
Oh, that is great that your mum wanted Atomic at her funeral, Steven. That makes me smile. We had Annie’s Song by John Denver at my mum’s – more in line with her easy listening tastes. And Bring Me Sunshine from Morecambe & Wise for my dad.
Yes, Bowie was so lean! I was struck by those vital statistics, too.
Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. But then I’m a little biased, sticking with him through thick and thin (and Tin) from the early 70s to now. Lovely memories Wendy. What I needed to read today. Thank you.
Thanks, Mike. I had almost completed this yesterday, and it's helped take my mind off world events to finish it today. Glad it brought back good memories. Did you see Bowie live?
Thanks, Mark. You saw him twelve times?! Amazing! He really was unique.
I thought it was so funny that the magic ingredient for Bowie’s hair was the anti-dandruff stuff she used to set old ladies’ hair in her salon! Who would have guessed? (I wonder if that’s what Margaret Thatcher used? Her hair was unflinching.)
You got so much for £1 membership , ah the good old days, love DB also, when I was younger I used to belt out starman and my current favourite is 5 years. Incredible your mum had kept everything in the loft.
Yes – what a bumper pack of goodies! Glad you’re a fellow fan. Five Years is a brilliant track. If I put on any track from that era, I can still sing along (almost) word perfect.
The loft was a mammoth task (as was the whole house), but I was glad to find those early mementos up there. I still have some bags to go through. I’m sure there’ll be more writing prompts among them!
Wendy, I think it's wonderful that you still have all this memorabilia. I was never a huge Bowie fan; growing up in Switzerland in an international environment which was nevertheless, at the time, very much influenced by America, as there was a huge US ex-pat community in Geneva, and many of my schoolmates were American. Also, there weren't many concerts in Geneva, so less exposition to that "edgy" art/music. It was all very Levis!!!! haha! We listened to Queen of course, and there was a jukebox in the student lounge that had all sorts of great stuff: Boston, Aerosmith, REO Speedwagon, Styx, Elton John, Supertramp... Fleetowood Mac had a huge influence on my musical taste, as did Bread (the perfect mushy make-out music!), the Eagles... I never joined a fan club until.. omg this is REALLY embarrassing until I became obsessed with Gary Barlow and Take That in my thirties!!! I even travelled to a fan club party when Gary Barlow went solo, and felt like a fish out of water!!! Hilarious. I used some of the memories of that fan club party in my romcom, Just Like a Movie, which is based on my other even bigger crush (again late thirties! I'm weird!) Ricky Martin. His fan club is called Caliente's Chicks (in the book his name is Emilio Caliente), and they are larger than life and hilarious. Oh, and we listened to Foreigner when I was a teenager, especially in the car going to school, and my mother would get frazzled because we'd be singing URGENT URGENT, EMERGENCY really loud! My parents loved music, my uncle was a big music journalist in London so we all knew what was cool. My father is Italian, so I also had Italian music, like Adriano Celentano, and Alan Sorrenti, and Umberto Tozzi (Ti Amo, remember that one?)... Oh, I love this post and could riff forever on music...but I'll buzz now! lots of love, Cesca
Thanks, Cesca. This is brilliant and giving me another nostalgia rush. I think Bread's album (Bread!) was the first one my brother bought with his pocket money. I knew every word! Elton John, Supertramp and Fleetwood Mac – yes! I finally saw Fleetwood Mac at Isle of Wight Festival in 2015 when they were back together with Christine McVie. That was fantastic.
I do remember Ti Amo, yes! And I know you mentioned before your father's link with David Essex, who my best friend was a massive fan of.
Bowie's was the only fan club I ever joined.
Thanks for sharing your own musical and fan club memories!
Love this Wendy! You brought me back to the 70s! I would have joined that fan club with you girl, if I had known of it. My first trip to England was (I think in 1972) the same year Ziggy Strardust was born. I listened to Starman with my British cousins and I too was hooked. I think I could still sing those lyrics today, though not well! I purchased the album, brought it back to the U.S. and showed it off to anyone I could convince to listen. Soon after, all of the U.S. would know of David Bowie. I secretly felt like the coolest girl ever, to be the first among my peers to hear of Bowie- as if I discovered him. hee hee. And the photo of you in that sweet 70s dress with your brother, looking very Bowie-esque is precious. xo
Thanks, Andrea and thanks for sharing your own Bowie memories. Brilliant that you discovered him in the UK. Yes, I can imagine that gave you status, being the cool kid who introduced Bowie to your friends in the US!
I made that lilac dress in Needlework class. It was the most complicated sewing project I ever did. I was so proud of myself when it actually fitted!
This could have been written for me - in fact, after reading this, I think you ARE me, lol!
I was such a huge Bowie fan and my adoration never stopped. I was lucky enough to see him perform live two times: once in 1978 and then in the eighties during the Serious Moonlight tour which strangely, contained my least favourite material but still - such a performer, and so charismatic. (That HAIR, my God!!) My friends and I used to analyze lyrics, track down references etc. We all felt that "Time" was especially scandalous with those references to "wanking." I also loved Bryan Ferry and Roxy Music at the time - the Seventies in Britain was basically the BEST for music, in my opinion.
And, Top of the Pops! Such a highlight for Thursday night - and there was almost always a girl swaying near the stage wearing a top hat covered in tiny mirrors LOL! Thank you so much for this very welcome antidote to an otherwise very depressing post-election day ... P.S. You might relate to what I wrote here about Bowie a number of years ago: https://www.speranzanow.com/?p=718
Thanks, Sue. I'm glad it's brought a bit of light to this depressing day.
Thanks for the link to that wonderful tribute you wrote after he died. That's terrific. Interesting that your older brother tried to skewer your interest, whereas mine was mesmerised by him (at least in his early incarnation as Ziggy).
Yes, I pored over lyrics and wanted to know the background to his creativity.
And yes, Roxy Music! I remember listening to their first album with my friend Vicki and we found them so cool. Ditto Blondie. Ditto Patti Smith.
Top of the Pops captured a lot of incidental fashion on film in its audience shots. In fact, I noticed that with the Starman footage, when it pans out to show the audience dancing. Really quite funny.
I was also at Milton Keynes in 1983, to see the Serious Moonlight tour. Mind you, it was a very hot day, and I got fed up by being surrounded by thousands of people and I retreated to sit under some trees, miles away from the stage. I stayed there the whole time and read 'Slaves of New York' by Tana Janowitz. It was about that time that I realised - I really didn't enjoy going to gigs.
It was really hot, Chris, I remember that. And then chilly as the evening wore on. I came down with a cold. I prefer gigs where I can see and hear properly. At festivals I'm always stuck behind a bunch of tall dudes.
How wonderful to find your fan club membership memorabilia. Fun to read and I could relate. It reminded me of this essay on Bowie's Starman here on Substack a while back: https://www.songsthatsavedyou.com/p/no10-starman-david-bowie The playlist to my adolescence is shared around the world!
Thanks, Jill! And thanks for that link. I hadn't read that piece before.
Listening to some of his tracks while writing this piece has transported me to different moments of my life. His albums from my adolescence are still the most evocative, but I've always been interested in his music and admired the way he never stood still.
A great post, Wendy, that brought back so many memories. I also heard Bowie from the LPs of older brothers (along with the Stones, Leonard Cohen and then the Starnglers). My parents didn't particularly enjoy the music, but saw the whole thing as part of having so many teenagers in the house.
Thanks, Jeffrey. Good that your parents were tolerant. After Bowie, my brother moved on to Northern Soul music and then Pink Floyd. I also found new favourites when babysitting neighbours’ children. Next door had Neil Young’s After the Gold Rush, which I listened to on repeat. The other family I babysat for had a lot of Leonard Cohen and Fairport Convention, perfect for an angsty teen.
My parents did not share my love for Metallica, Soundgarden or Rage Against the Machine, but we were united in our love of soul music (the Commitments soundtrack was a huge hit, especially when my brother started playing drums in a Commitments-esque band in the early 90s).
Thanks for commenting, Fiona. I think it's usually healthy if there are different influences across the generations, as long as there's some level of tolerance – it ends up broadening your own tastes as you grow up. Sounds like you had pretty cool parents, Fiona! I'm glad mine introduced me to classical music, Glenn Miller and church hymns, even if they were perplexed by pop and rock music. My brother was very into Northern Soul, so I get a nostalgia rush whenever I hear anything from that era.
Yes, from my parents I inherited their love of folk music, old time music hall numbers, musical theatre, church choral music and trad jazz. Very eclectic!
Not so much the music, more the fashions that triggered my parents – a little, they weren’t especially censorious about it. They got used to my dancers’ leg-warmers (FAME! I’m Gonna Live Forever! [twirl kick twirl smash]) and using a long silky ribbon as a belt. Sartorially, my peak years. (So far.)
I laughed so loud at your leg warmers I woke my dog.
I can picture the scene!
My dad worked at the local concert hall in Wolverhampton and Ziggy Stardust was my very first concert. I must have been about 9 years old and Ifound it very unnerving, hardly knowing what to make of it! How I wish I could go back and watch it again. This was such a lovely post to read.
Thank you, Deborah. I thought I'd already replied to your comment – sorry for the delay. That must have been a really strange and immersive experience, going to that concert at nine years old. I can see why you wish you could go back and see it from an adult's perspective. Is your dad still around? I wonder what he made of it.
It was more the other way around with my parents - I was a bit like Saffy from Ab Fab as a teenager! However, I loved Let's Dance and Labyrinth and am now a big Bowie fan (with some good fancy dress pics to prove it!) He was one of a kind. I can't listen to the Blackstar album though as it makes me too sad! Great piece Wendy 😊
Thanks, Faith. Blackstar is really sad. I have to be in the right mood to listen. There was a terrific documentary on after he died about the album and the related Lazarus stage show. I found that profound.
I love that you had Saffy from Ab Fab teenage years. I had huge respect for Saffy!
Thank you Wendy. It’s been such a dismal day. Bowie was/is my number one hero and I still feel he is deserving of that title. His whole philosophy on life was brilliant and it’s good to be reminded of that right now.
I love the photo of you and your brother and his recollections of the hair.
I saw him twice too. Once on the Glass Spider Tour in Mcr in 1987 and then again a few years later at Milton Keynes. Both joyous as I loved him so much.
The fan club details are wonderful.
Thanks, Margaret. It has been a dismal day, and it was a relief to escape into writing (and Bowie's music) for a while.
Glad you got to see him twice. Every tour (and every album) was different. He was always evolving.
Digging out that photo took me back. I remember making that lilac puff-sleeved dress in needlework!
Love this. 8 stone 7! I remember how tiny his costumes were when I saw them at David Bowie Is. My parents had eclectic tastes and liked some of the stuff we listened to. Mum used to play Atomic (Blondie) really loudly when she Hoovered. She always said she wanted it played at her funeral. It was playing when the curtains went round her coffin.
Oh, that is great that your mum wanted Atomic at her funeral, Steven. That makes me smile. We had Annie’s Song by John Denver at my mum’s – more in line with her easy listening tastes. And Bring Me Sunshine from Morecambe & Wise for my dad.
Yes, Bowie was so lean! I was struck by those vital statistics, too.
Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. But then I’m a little biased, sticking with him through thick and thin (and Tin) from the early 70s to now. Lovely memories Wendy. What I needed to read today. Thank you.
Thanks, Mike. I had almost completed this yesterday, and it's helped take my mind off world events to finish it today. Glad it brought back good memories. Did you see Bowie live?
Very sadly no. But I do have every one of his albums! And some writing on him which I’m still working on.
Never caught him in Ziggy mode but was fortunate enough to see him twelve times, and twice at Madison Square Garden, before the end.
Can’t over state just how much of an influence he was on me. No pop star like him ever; either before, then, or after.
And I envy your treasure trove of fan club memorabilia, Wendy!
PS I had the same trouble with my hair as your brother…ha-ha! Suzi Ronson could have sorted me out!
Thanks, Mark. You saw him twelve times?! Amazing! He really was unique.
I thought it was so funny that the magic ingredient for Bowie’s hair was the anti-dandruff stuff she used to set old ladies’ hair in her salon! Who would have guessed? (I wonder if that’s what Margaret Thatcher used? Her hair was unflinching.)
You got so much for £1 membership , ah the good old days, love DB also, when I was younger I used to belt out starman and my current favourite is 5 years. Incredible your mum had kept everything in the loft.
Yes – what a bumper pack of goodies! Glad you’re a fellow fan. Five Years is a brilliant track. If I put on any track from that era, I can still sing along (almost) word perfect.
The loft was a mammoth task (as was the whole house), but I was glad to find those early mementos up there. I still have some bags to go through. I’m sure there’ll be more writing prompts among them!
Oohhh , I can’t wait to read more from you about what you find.
Wendy, I think it's wonderful that you still have all this memorabilia. I was never a huge Bowie fan; growing up in Switzerland in an international environment which was nevertheless, at the time, very much influenced by America, as there was a huge US ex-pat community in Geneva, and many of my schoolmates were American. Also, there weren't many concerts in Geneva, so less exposition to that "edgy" art/music. It was all very Levis!!!! haha! We listened to Queen of course, and there was a jukebox in the student lounge that had all sorts of great stuff: Boston, Aerosmith, REO Speedwagon, Styx, Elton John, Supertramp... Fleetowood Mac had a huge influence on my musical taste, as did Bread (the perfect mushy make-out music!), the Eagles... I never joined a fan club until.. omg this is REALLY embarrassing until I became obsessed with Gary Barlow and Take That in my thirties!!! I even travelled to a fan club party when Gary Barlow went solo, and felt like a fish out of water!!! Hilarious. I used some of the memories of that fan club party in my romcom, Just Like a Movie, which is based on my other even bigger crush (again late thirties! I'm weird!) Ricky Martin. His fan club is called Caliente's Chicks (in the book his name is Emilio Caliente), and they are larger than life and hilarious. Oh, and we listened to Foreigner when I was a teenager, especially in the car going to school, and my mother would get frazzled because we'd be singing URGENT URGENT, EMERGENCY really loud! My parents loved music, my uncle was a big music journalist in London so we all knew what was cool. My father is Italian, so I also had Italian music, like Adriano Celentano, and Alan Sorrenti, and Umberto Tozzi (Ti Amo, remember that one?)... Oh, I love this post and could riff forever on music...but I'll buzz now! lots of love, Cesca
Thanks, Cesca. This is brilliant and giving me another nostalgia rush. I think Bread's album (Bread!) was the first one my brother bought with his pocket money. I knew every word! Elton John, Supertramp and Fleetwood Mac – yes! I finally saw Fleetwood Mac at Isle of Wight Festival in 2015 when they were back together with Christine McVie. That was fantastic.
I do remember Ti Amo, yes! And I know you mentioned before your father's link with David Essex, who my best friend was a massive fan of.
Bowie's was the only fan club I ever joined.
Thanks for sharing your own musical and fan club memories!
Love this Wendy! You brought me back to the 70s! I would have joined that fan club with you girl, if I had known of it. My first trip to England was (I think in 1972) the same year Ziggy Strardust was born. I listened to Starman with my British cousins and I too was hooked. I think I could still sing those lyrics today, though not well! I purchased the album, brought it back to the U.S. and showed it off to anyone I could convince to listen. Soon after, all of the U.S. would know of David Bowie. I secretly felt like the coolest girl ever, to be the first among my peers to hear of Bowie- as if I discovered him. hee hee. And the photo of you in that sweet 70s dress with your brother, looking very Bowie-esque is precious. xo
Thanks, Andrea and thanks for sharing your own Bowie memories. Brilliant that you discovered him in the UK. Yes, I can imagine that gave you status, being the cool kid who introduced Bowie to your friends in the US!
I made that lilac dress in Needlework class. It was the most complicated sewing project I ever did. I was so proud of myself when it actually fitted!
I’m proud of you for making that dress too. It’s lovely and it reminds me of the Betsy Johnson flouncy florals that I revered in the 70s.
Ooh yes, just looking at Betsey Johnson vintage dresses and see what you mean, Andrea!
This could have been written for me - in fact, after reading this, I think you ARE me, lol!
I was such a huge Bowie fan and my adoration never stopped. I was lucky enough to see him perform live two times: once in 1978 and then in the eighties during the Serious Moonlight tour which strangely, contained my least favourite material but still - such a performer, and so charismatic. (That HAIR, my God!!) My friends and I used to analyze lyrics, track down references etc. We all felt that "Time" was especially scandalous with those references to "wanking." I also loved Bryan Ferry and Roxy Music at the time - the Seventies in Britain was basically the BEST for music, in my opinion.
And, Top of the Pops! Such a highlight for Thursday night - and there was almost always a girl swaying near the stage wearing a top hat covered in tiny mirrors LOL! Thank you so much for this very welcome antidote to an otherwise very depressing post-election day ... P.S. You might relate to what I wrote here about Bowie a number of years ago: https://www.speranzanow.com/?p=718
Thanks, Sue. I'm glad it's brought a bit of light to this depressing day.
Thanks for the link to that wonderful tribute you wrote after he died. That's terrific. Interesting that your older brother tried to skewer your interest, whereas mine was mesmerised by him (at least in his early incarnation as Ziggy).
Yes, I pored over lyrics and wanted to know the background to his creativity.
And yes, Roxy Music! I remember listening to their first album with my friend Vicki and we found them so cool. Ditto Blondie. Ditto Patti Smith.
Top of the Pops captured a lot of incidental fashion on film in its audience shots. In fact, I noticed that with the Starman footage, when it pans out to show the audience dancing. Really quite funny.
Thanks for sharing your memories.
I was also at Milton Keynes in 1983, to see the Serious Moonlight tour. Mind you, it was a very hot day, and I got fed up by being surrounded by thousands of people and I retreated to sit under some trees, miles away from the stage. I stayed there the whole time and read 'Slaves of New York' by Tana Janowitz. It was about that time that I realised - I really didn't enjoy going to gigs.
It was really hot, Chris, I remember that. And then chilly as the evening wore on. I came down with a cold. I prefer gigs where I can see and hear properly. At festivals I'm always stuck behind a bunch of tall dudes.
How wonderful to find your fan club membership memorabilia. Fun to read and I could relate. It reminded me of this essay on Bowie's Starman here on Substack a while back: https://www.songsthatsavedyou.com/p/no10-starman-david-bowie The playlist to my adolescence is shared around the world!
Thanks, Jill! And thanks for that link. I hadn't read that piece before.
Listening to some of his tracks while writing this piece has transported me to different moments of my life. His albums from my adolescence are still the most evocative, but I've always been interested in his music and admired the way he never stood still.
Crikey, Bowie came to Milton Keynes! Lucky you to see him
It was a massive concert., Ruth! There's a nice article about it here. Might add it to the notes.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-65988402
that's brilliant, thank you for sharing
A great post, Wendy, that brought back so many memories. I also heard Bowie from the LPs of older brothers (along with the Stones, Leonard Cohen and then the Starnglers). My parents didn't particularly enjoy the music, but saw the whole thing as part of having so many teenagers in the house.
Thanks, Jeffrey. Good that your parents were tolerant. After Bowie, my brother moved on to Northern Soul music and then Pink Floyd. I also found new favourites when babysitting neighbours’ children. Next door had Neil Young’s After the Gold Rush, which I listened to on repeat. The other family I babysat for had a lot of Leonard Cohen and Fairport Convention, perfect for an angsty teen.
My parents did not share my love for Metallica, Soundgarden or Rage Against the Machine, but we were united in our love of soul music (the Commitments soundtrack was a huge hit, especially when my brother started playing drums in a Commitments-esque band in the early 90s).
Thanks for commenting, Fiona. I think it's usually healthy if there are different influences across the generations, as long as there's some level of tolerance – it ends up broadening your own tastes as you grow up. Sounds like you had pretty cool parents, Fiona! I'm glad mine introduced me to classical music, Glenn Miller and church hymns, even if they were perplexed by pop and rock music. My brother was very into Northern Soul, so I get a nostalgia rush whenever I hear anything from that era.
Yes, from my parents I inherited their love of folk music, old time music hall numbers, musical theatre, church choral music and trad jazz. Very eclectic!