Bowie: A Biography - JFK247

had the notion to fashion together the songs he’d
written in the spring and summer of 1971 into a
loose narrative about a doomed rock star messiah,
a character he would actually embody onstage and
before the media, one wonders if, like anyone might,
there was a moment where he said to himself, “Oh,
no, I’ll just go the safe route and release a proper
album. Maybe I will get lucky and have another big
chart hit,” or if he could have imagined just how far
he would take this new persona—all too far, as it
happened; he actually became Ziggy for about a
year. Nobody had really done this kind of thing
before. Mick Jagger sang “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” in
the first person. John Lennon did the same with “I
Am the Walrus,” but both those alter egos ended
when the recording sessions ended (and anyway,
the Walrus was Paul). Alice Cooper had a bit more
fidelity to his stage transformation but he didn’t really
sing about being Alice Cooper very frequently. There
was no context. And Peter Gabriel, then of Genesis,
could put on a fox head, but when he took it off, most
everyone resumed yawning.
The sleeve itself might be a hint. Bowie is still
David Bowie, not Ziggy, on the album’s cover. He is
blond and, despite the flu, looks as dewy-fresh as he
does on Hunky Dory’s cover. Ziggy, the saturnine
mutant with the red rooster cut, would grace the
covers of the next three albums (Aladdin Sane, Pin
Ups and Diamond Dogs). On Ziggy Bowie wears
no theatrical makeup, only a clinging blue jumpsuit,
open almost to the navel. On the front sleeve, he