Bowie: A Biography - JFK247

I
remember seeing the “Let’s Dance” video world
premiere on MTV. I would spend full days laying on
the cool, white-tiled floor in my grandparents’
house, which was situated on the eighteenth hole of
the Woodlands Country Club in Fort Lauderdale.
Between 1981 and 1988, I watched MTV seven
hours a day. I wanted my MTV. It showed me how to
live, or at least how to look. I bought a pair of army
pants with ties at the ankles and lots of pockets for
the storage of ammunition (I put Jolly Ranchers in
them) after seeing Joe Strummer in the “Rock the
Casbah” video. Pants weren’t much of a
commitment, of course. You could take them off
and put on another pair, maybe some Guess or
Girbaud jeans. Bowie’s new videos made me
commit. I had not been motivated by Billy Idol,
Dale Bozzio, Nick Rhodes, Terri Nunn or any of the
other great blondes of the day to dye my own hair,
but when I saw Bowie tapping his toe while
strumming his guitar against the wall in that sweaty
café, something clicked over in my brain and I
found myself standing for the first time in hours. I
got a ride to the Eckerd drugstore in my
grandfather’s car and endured the full blast of the
air conditioner and the Mantovani cassettes, which
made the molecules slow and the ride feel three
times as long. I found the ladies’ hair products aisle
and bought a bottle of something called Sun-In,
because the poster in the display featured a woman
whose hair resembled Bowie’s as he danced the