Chris S-S wrote:Didnt Little Chris burrow and live under the front garden of No 3 via the basement?
yes, that's right
Dominic wrote:...David Bowie...
it was Alison (Steve's sister) who insisted i listen to "Hunky Dory" having overheard me made a disparaging remark about a lyric on the inner sleeve of Space Oddity which i'd just (mis)read -- from the first 2 chords of "Changes" i was hooked -- i think i got to 3 of the Ziggy shows (including the first night at Hammersmith, tho it was at Lewisham that i got right to the front, just a few feet away from the stage) -- (i later saw "Young Americans" and maybe also "Diamond Dogs" while i was in NYC)
the concert i got all the GR tickets for was Aladdin Sane at Earls Court Olympia, which was different from the other shows i'd seen -- it was a much bigger place, and they didn't allow everyone to rush to the front, which is what usually happened at the smaller venues -- anyway, Bowie had just come back from Japan and had changed styles (again) and wore a succession of fabulous costumes
a bit of a story to getting the tickets -- i went up to Earls Court with Seamus without any doubts in my mind, even tho it was only a couple of days before the event -- we got to the ticket office and there was a big sign saying "no more than 4 tickets per person" and there was a queue stretching right round the block, and it looked like tickets were going to run out long before those at the back of the queue would get to the counter -- so i saw this guy walking past on the other side of the 6 foot wire fence who obviously had something to do with the show, and called him over and told him i needed 40 tickets (just like that) -- he looked at Seamus and myself and was obviously a bit doubtful... it must be admitted we weren't very impressive... i was barefoot, torn jeans and dirty t-shirt etc -- so i explained that we from a squat in Twickenham etc, and he said wait there, and 5 minutes later he was back with 40 tickets! later i saw some pictures of Mel Bush (who was promoting the show) and it looked to me very much like the same guy... which didn't surprise me at all...
i was flowing with the Bowie vibe at the time (like when i painted the zig-zag on the outside of the door to the room in No 7, and everybody thought i'd copied it from the cover of Aladdin Sane, tho i did it before i'd seen the album (before the album even came out i think) -- i still go out of my way to listen to DB whenever he's on radio, which happens from time to time) -- he's always interesting to listen to -- he was one of the first musicians to embrace the net and put his own
web site together -- there's also an excellent Bowie store in Second Life (selling mainly glam clothes) which i visit occasionally
lots of fabulous live Bowie vids at youtube (maybe a couple of thousand?) -- some of my favourites are the outtakes from the 1973 recordings made at the Marquee (for showing on US TV), including -
"in his early shows he'd sing directly to individuals in the audience (he was often within touching distance of them), which explains some of his expressions while singing -- it was utterly disarming and quite magical, cos we all knew he was singing to us, personally, not to some anonymous crowd"