Bowie & me (2002) - How David Bowie changed the face of modern music | 60 Minutes Australia

[Music] he rose to fame as a fabulous illusionist of rock ever changing always outrageous and more bizarre by the money [Music] these days David Bowie has morphed again this time into a new more down-to-earth role that of a happily married middle-aged dad is it true that you found very fond of changing nappies oh it's absolutely the gospel yeah can you count the number of nappies you've changed yes cuz my wife I thought she couldn't count the number of times it is a bit like that with me I think I'm there for her when it's walking and talking I mean I I read to her all the time and I kind of try and introduce it to new things and get her excited about stuff you know but well both my wife and I do that but I'm much I'm much happier in the capacity as mentor for Boeing the marriage to supermodel iman is a second lives in New York with the Somalian born beauty and their baby Alexandria sure his lyrics still dark but at 55 Bowie is rich comfortable and in remarkable health for one who was once so hopelessly addicted to cocaine and alcohol now you haven't believed us every life what's what's the trick Oh dad dad's my mum's jeans but is it true you haven't had a drink who you haven't taken our yeah 20 years absolutely I'm a clean machine yeah very coffee is really a tough one and and and more recently I've kind of not cigarettes on their headwear that was that do you know what that's tougher than that isn't whoa nicotine forget about it professionally as well as personally David Bowie is a survivor [Music] he's been performing now for nearly four decades with no inclination to retire [Music] he's just launched a new album heathen and while many of his old rock peers have faded away Bowie's music and style is still contemporary and endlessly emulated and analyzed as a writer are you often amused by the way people deconstruct the lyric and find a meaning in it that you didn't maybe oh sure yeah it's do you accept it if it's a good reader protected I do frankly I mean sometimes the interpretations I've seen on some of the songs that have written a lot more interesting than the the input that I thought such as no I don't want to take the mystery away yeah for man who's helped change the face of modern music David Bowie had fairly uninspiring beginnings growing up in bleak and battle-scarred post-war Britain the London was just this terrible tragic looking wasteland who desolation images for life yeah yeah yeah it was I think it probably did influence a lot better than writing in that way it's interesting you know when I went to when I first went back to have a look at the World Trade Center area that was the one thing that that struck me about it is that um both oh my god it looks like London East End you know when I was a kid that's what it looked like when I was about 7 then it brought it all back what London was like it in that particular time and it was gray and it was it was a pretty poor place in in those days like so many of his generation Bowie was seduced by all things American most importantly by the music when I heard Little Richard I'm reminiscing just set my world on fire I thought wow this is what's this got to do with me or London or but I want a piece at that that's really fantastic and I saw the sax lineup that he had been wearing and I thought I'm going to learn the saxophone him when I grow up I'm gonna play in his band so I sort of persuaded my dad to get me a kind of a plastic saxophone and that the hire-purchase plant we you know sort of those I purchased plans he had in those times HP HP yeah and about what three Bob a week or something for a saxophone I'm really that sort was was really my Stein's it was a great investment it was yeah it was good of dad [Music] ground control to Major Tom in the course of events was one song that changed David Bowie's life commencing countdown engines on the release of Space Oddity in 1967 saw his career liftoff [Music] but it was the landmark ziggy stardust album of the early 70s that launched bowie into the stellar orbit of rock superstar so began crazy drug-fueled ride who was to redefine modern music [Music] longed to play the strangely androgynous Bowie invented glam rock up launched heavy metal in disco and even inspired [Applause] [Music] you take back the 70s you shall rather you didn't just remember I only just got ya you shocked parents and they were disturbed about the kids watching the transgender thing now those same kids have kids and they're worried by all the antics of Marilyn Manson yeah I think actually the war is a slightly different these days I think either they're not so you know rock and roll doesn't have the same currency now a second ID then I think the the biggest frightening now is the disturbing lack of interest in among certain proportion of younger people a lack of interest in no curiosity in what's going on a kind of a the the idea the fashion the fashionable dumbing down of a generation I think is more of a worry because I remember it it's not like oh that's an old fuddy-duddy well but actually when I remember when I was a teenager I felt much the same I mean I still get really pissed off when people were just like purposefully dumb it seemed and didn't have an interest in this and I fell out with many musicians with the same reason and I don't need to don't want to you know and it was like well then go away [Music] he survived the worst successes of the rock-and-roll lifestyle but only just when it was all over bowie landed with a fat hopelessly addicted to drugs and alcohol it almost self destroyed it's a bit like taking a chance on a rocket ship you know it might be and I can't avoid the fact that some of it was terribly exciting but it was it's if you get on that rocket is very likely to explode under you and you'll die you know but it's so it's the kind of you know you're taking a real chance by doing it the writer Norman Mailer said that alcohol gave him as much as it took from him do you feel the same about drugs that's an interesting point that could well be true there's reluctantly as you have to admit it I think it can open up channels of imagination that maybe were close to you but the interesting thing is that once they are open if you got your wits about you can keep them open while Bowie beat his drug habit there is another enduring problem he's been unable to overcome a simple fear of flying there why does this fit into your life it allows me to just write about space as opposed to going into it how did you how did you get here how did you get to Paris if you don't like flying I've got the train mate what do you feel as the plane takes our Tara I don't know the actuarial figures I mean you're a you're a business I know these days you know that it's safer Diana Devane and to drive a taxi across I know isn't it ridiculous it's absolutely ridiculous I guess with you know the the confluence of recent events have really sort of indicated to me that as if I've got the chance to take the boat then I will I see things things having made his musical mark Bowie went on to explore new creative frontiers he became an actor and quite a good one [Music] meanwhile Bowie continues to win over a new generation of fans my nine year old son wanted me to be home I said I can't I've got one more interview didn't today when he said there well who is it and I suppose nobody you've ever heard David Bowie and then he said David Bowie that's really cool a nine-year-old actually this that there is a generation that kind of know about labyrinth yeah this is the kid spill my main millions are brought up to me in the mum so this is jerath from labyrinth [Music] David Bowie is now rock royalty but unlike his contemporaries Sir Bob Sir Paul Sir Elton and Sir Mick he's happy to grow old gracefully without a gong what about a knighthood do you think you might get not I'm very much doubt it I think or some bad boys of the night I think I've made my feelings about it very clear I'm just an individual who doesn't feel that I need to have somebody qualify my work in any particular way I'm working for me [Music] David Bowie is at peace with himself after decades of publicly confronting his demons and in the end overcoming them he seems happy to be a private person and musically this elder statesman Iraq is happy to suit himself I think it all comes back to being very selfish as an artist I mean I really do just write and record and what interests me and I do approach the the stage shows in much the same way it's the old adage I mean you can't please all the people all the time you know you just don't try it so I have to please myself first and if I'm happy then my presumption is there's going to be a certain amount of people that will be happy too but I think that's my way of working now it's all about me [Applause]

Channel: 60 Minutes Australia

Views: 415,175

Keywords: David Bowie, Charles Wooley, 60 Minutes, 60 Minutes Australia, Bowie, David Robert Jones, Iman, Space Oddity, Hunky Dory, Ziggy Stardust, Labyrinth, Rock, Punk rock, Mary Angela Barnett

Id: UCwXFqf-Y98

Length: 12min 13sec (733 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 03 2018