BBC 6 Music are cock-a-hoop about finding a 'lost' radio show that David Bowie knocked up forty years ago to plug his then current album Pin Ups - a perfectly sculptured and segued homage to 60s London. Talking about his version of I Can't Explain, Bowie has this to say about The Who:
'...but the biggest buzz was back at The Marquee. They dressed weeks out of date, but they did all the right stuff – Martha & The Vandellas and all that. A lot of action on a night. They were our band, The Who.'
That's right, The Who's fashion sense was so ancient they dressed weeks out of date; Pete Townshend must have been hanging his head in shame. I love the way Bowie put a sax on the song Townshend freely admits to nicking off The Kinks.
David Bowie - I Can't Explain (1973)
I love that: 'dressing weeks out of date..'
ReplyDelete(I try to dress *years* out of date; that way one can stay fashionably modern.)
Doesn't he sound very right-cockney-barrel-o'-monkeys on that, by the way?
Probably where the phrase 'that's so last week' originated.
DeleteWhen 'Pin Ups' was released, the track-listing might as well have been sourced from the 1860's as the 1960's, so 'old fashioned' did we initially deem it in the classroom. I remember a palpable sense of betrayal simmering amongst my peers that our very own intergalactic space travelling pop star was playing, gulp, old time music from way back in ancient history.
ReplyDeleteThat's right, he was covering songs made just six years earlier. I first bought it on Musicassette - now that's ancient.
DeleteBy their own admission, The Who were rekitted to appeal to the Mod masses - so always playing fashion catch up, Whereas 'clean living under difficult circumstances' came naturally to the Small Faces - always ahead of the boutique beat...
ReplyDeleteOn a similar riff - have you ever heard ubermod Marc Bolan talk about the sixties scene, saying Beatle collarless jackets were basically Pierre Cardin designs, and already out of date when they became 'the rage'
George Harrison summed it up in 3 minutes 50 seconds in A Hard Day's Night. By his own admission he was quite prepared for that eventuality.
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