Enough about Bowie

Do one OP.

If the passing of Bowie isn’t culturally significant enough to stir the media for hours/days – then nothing really matters.

With all due respect – get a **** grip.

What was it you were all saying before? Oh aye, if you don’t like a topic or want to read about it, restrain yourself and don’t click on it.

Irony is a beautiful thing sometimes 🙂

I will take this any day over the news blackout of “Diana TV” when she died. All she ever did was marry well.

I don’t remember any of these people ever talking about Bowie when he was alive.

So you use your Facebook time-line to determine what is important in the world? Wow!

I have favourite bands but I don’t bang on about them all the time. In fact, some of them will never be known to friends who have the displeasure of following me on FB as I never mention them.

I never mention sunsets either, but it doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy them.

I’ve never been a huge Bowie fan but I recognise his importance to modern culture. Plus, some of his music became the soundtrack to my youth, especially around Live Aid and the bits he did with Queen.

It makes a change to turn away from all the disasters for a short while and celebrate the life of someone who made a massive positive contribution to society as we know it today.

So you use your Facebook time-line to determine what is important in the world? Wow!

Not sure where I ever said that it what the need is for such a snidey little dig.

I suspect there are lots of people who genuinely were touched by his music or his style – I suspect there are some people who are jumping on a bandwagon a little bit. They’re free to do that, it doesn’t particularly bother me – just makes my FB feed a bit dull to read when I don’t have that much personal interest. I can also recognise his cultural significance but he’s never meant much to me.

There’s a bit of ‘Bowie anecdote’ top trumps going on too IMO.

http://www.tonyblairoffice.org/news/entry/tony-blair-pays-tribute-to-david-bowie/

https://mobile.twitter.com/polly/status/686638323272519680

…and so on.

Not clicking on that! I’ve managed to avoid the inevitable Hameron tribute too thank god.

Whining about the coverage hatdly reduces it now does it.

https://mobile.twitter.com/polly/status/686638323272519680

4 EVA IN R CRCZ.

Whining about the coverage hatdly reduces it now does it.

Insightful.

Please, please, please don’t let this mean we are going to have a Bowie tribute concert, on the BBC, with Adele, Sam Smith, and Ed Sherran covering the songs and telling us how formative he was to their music.
Quality pop music died with Bowie, all we have left now is garbage (although Elton can still hit the high notes in Vegas).

Quality pop music died with Bowie

that’s a daft thing to say.

Quality pop music died with Bowie

Bowie hasn’t produced pop music in 30+ years.

With all due respect – get a **** grip.

You can do one too

Bowie hasn’t produced pop music in 30+ years.

I agree. But he was the last of the greats, so it’s more a symbolic moment.

all we have left now is garbage

I’d say they were more rock than pop.
RM.

OK I suppose this is a lovely coming together of people but count me officially baffled by British society right now.

This is starting to get a little bit weird IMO. Reminds me of Diana-mania.

hels – Member

All she ever did was marry well.

Depends on your definition of “well” really.

I don’t mind a bit of reminiscing/tributes and all that if it is done well.
There was a great article on the news last night that explained his life, his music, his influences and how he influenced stuff around him.
I didn’t ‘grow up’ with Bowie music or culture as an influence. I’ve never been a fan of his music, don’t own any of his albums & probably never will, but I can appreciate the impact it must have had at the time and the influence it had on music of the time & since etc.

But, the BBC yesterday lunch time were clearly out of ideas. They interviewed a woman who was the daughter of someone who used to have something to do with Bowie. God knows why they had her on for interview. Every question was met with “well, I don’t really know about that, but I’m sure my Dad had a great time working with Bowie”, “I was too young and not really involved, but yeah, I think my Dad had a wild time working with Bowie”, “I didn’t work with him myself so I don’t know, but my Dad worked with Bowie a lot”……

This was coupled with ‘famous tweet tributes’ from the likes of Pharrell Williams, Tony Blair, Kanye “I’m the greatest rock artist ever” West and Louis Tomlinson (of 1-D fame, I believe)……real insightful stuff like “He was a legend…”

Do we need any of that? Did it add anything to the day? Nope, but the media obviously felt they had to fill every available inch of coverage with something to do with him.

Do we need any of that? Did it add anything to the day? Nope, but the media obviously felt they had to fill every available inch of coverage with something to do with him.

Careful, you’re not allowed to display even mild disapproval of things like that or the grief-police will be onto you!

It was all I heard every time the radio and tv news came on yesterday.

He made some brilliant music (well a few good songs), but not recently, and it was all a little bit weird to be honest. People my age (late 20’s) and younger now are just trying to seem cool by pretending to like his music, clamoring to re-post some profound emotional Bowie meme on facebook – **** off!

The thing that really, really bugs me though is BBC news outlets quoting celebrities thoughts on the death of other celebrities, just reading out their tweets etc – what a total waste of air time.

It was the comparison on Radio 4 to Nelson Mandela that got me last night – “Mandela may have freed South Africa, Bowie freed our minds…” FFS

The BBC is going OTT on Bowie as a cultural catalyst. Bowie’s best music is great, the changing personas never really added much to his act, other than being a great way of generating media interest.
And at the end of the day it is popular/mass culture, here today, gone tomorrow, but the BBC seems to want to elevate what is essentially mass entertainment to the level of art, alongside Shakespeare and Dante.

People my age (late 20’s) and younger now are just trying to seem cool by pretending to like his music,

Some aren’t pretending, they actually really like it.

With all due respect – get a **** grip.
You can do one too

There there petal, it’s all right, come get a hug…

It was the comparison on Radio 4 to Nelson Mandela that got me last night – “Mandela may have freed South Africa, Bowie freed our minds…” FFS

I dunno, I’d slay slimjim comes a close second on the hysterical hyperbole scale.

People eulogising a bloody terrorist sympathiser 😈

Patronising bell eh? Who’dve guessed

I agree. But he was the last of the greats, so it’s more a symbolic moment.

Phil Collins is still with us!

Jersey vines wife would not let him cycle into work yesterday because he was to upset!!!!!.I don’t think I would ever get tired of punching that useless ****.

the-muffin-man

Phil Collins is still with us!

It was the comparison on Radio 4 to Nelson Mandela that got me last night – “Mandela may have freed South Africa, Bowie freed our minds…” FFS

There might be some logic there. Bowie (and others like him) have contributed to changing the modern western mindset to one where racism and homophobia (among other things) are seen as being not very nice.

Mandela would never have “freed” South Africa without the widespread disapproval of apartheid in the western world.

And nobody outside South Africa would have heard of Nelson Mandela if it hadn’t been for that 1984 pop song by the Special AKA.

badnewz – Member

the BBC seems to want to elevate what is essentially mass entertainment to the level of art, alongside Shakespeare

OTOH I imagine critics at the time said Shakespeare was mass entertainment and shouldn’t be compared to ye greates Mystery Plays

OTOH I imagine critics at the time said Shakespeare was mass entertainment and shouldn’t be compared to ye greates Mystery Plays

True enough, Thomas Bodley initially didn’t want any play texts in his oxford library, and Shakespeare was obsessed with earning money and attaining the status of gentleman, rather than being known as a mere playwright.

But in terms of artistic achievement, I think comparing the output of a popular musician with the output of one of the greatest writers is always OTT.

And at the end of the day it is popular/mass culture, here today, gone tomorrow, but the BBC seems to want to elevate what is essentially mass entertainment to the level of art, alongside Shakespeare and Dante.

It means more to me (and a hell of a lot of other people) than Shakespeare or Dante.
Who’s to say Bowie’s, or any other “popular” music won’t last as a cultural experience as long as Shakespeare has?
It certainly is an art form.

And that ^ , as well as what is broadcast by the BBC, is the ideas of one person, just like you expressing your view that it is throwaway is the view of just one person. Who is “right”?

I can sympathise with the OP, it’s getting silly now, probably due to the fact it came on suddenly and caught the regular news media by surprise, hence the papers being full today. It knocked me sideways yesterday still can’t quite reconcile my inexplicable emotional distress over it.
However I think unless you to coin a pathetic phrase, ‘shared the journey’ through the late sixties, when remember homosexuality was still illegal and men dressed as women a total anathema, into the early seventies when we all broke free from the constraints of the past, guided by the likes of Bowie, Marc Bolan,Roxy and that whole arts college driven counterculture of the period.
His genius if you can call it that was to have changed and often lead the times and that his music was so enduring accompanying us through the eighties into the nineties. He also influenced and collaborated with so many others, so all in all I think we should cut the world some slack for grieving his loss, there certainly aint too many around who are going to replace him.

Remember when Bowie said Britain could do with fascist leader?

Oh, tehlolz!

(Well, if Lemmy having Nazi memorabilia was worthy of comment when he died…..)

And look at that, a quick peruse of a few major news websites and it’s back to business as usual, with only a couple of small Bowie pieces.
I hope you all survived the trauma of the news celebrating someone’s achievements.

I’m so much happier now looking at murder, terrorism, striking doctors and other depressing treats…

CaptainFlashheart – Member
Remember when Bowie said Britain could do with fascist leader?

Oh, tehlolz!

No, can’t say I do, so when might that have been? When we were being lead quite literally into the dark of a three day week, by a child molester?

i grew up in the post Bowie period, so have no blinding sense of Nostalgia about him. Let’s be honest, he was a bit crap, so had to make up for it by being weird.

kinda like Timmy Mallet.

(except Mallet’s a better actor)

even Radio 6 have turned the Random Music Generator back on and are only dropping Bowie into every other conversation and every few tracks now.