Bowie: A Biography - JFK247

Bowie makes a devil sign as he serenades a
Euro-trash blonde and yet another would-be
MainMan star, gender-bending Amanda Lear, on
“Sorrow.” “Space Oddity” feels like an oldie among
Pin Ups’ new-oldies. The high point of “I Can’t
Explain” is sure, sultry backing vocalists the
Astronettes dancing in slow motion. Marianne
Faithfull appears in a nun’s habit and duets with
Bowie on Sonny and Cher’s classic “I Got You,
Babe.” She sounds like Natasha Fatale from the
Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons. She returns later for
two more numbers, her signature song the Jagger-
Richards penned “As Tears Go By” (also given the
Natasha treatment) and a Cabaret-indebted wedge
of cheese called “20th Century Blues.” The Troggs
make an insane appearance as well. Watching a
bootleg of 1980 Floor Show, one wonders if they
were placed on the bill to make Bowie look that
much prettier. They resemble cave children. Lead
singer Reg Presley appears genuinely demented.
After the Troggs, the event’s last act, a Spanish
flamenco group named Carmen (which Tony
Visconti was then producing), somehow makes
absolutely perfect sense.
The show was broadcast on U.S. television show
The Midnight Special, one of the weirder moments
in seventies TV (and this is an era that includes
Lidsville, Circus of the Stars and “Next Stop
Nowhere,” aka the Punk Rock Episode of Quincy). “I
remember watching it,” says Camille Paglia. “He
had one costume with the two hands coming from