In January Angie's second book, 'Backstage Passes: Life On The Wild Side With David Bowie' was published in Britain by Orion. Among the fantastic and unsavory items in this book were that :
* Bowie was in fact Jack the Ripper
* Bowie was the one who wrote 'Achey Breaky Heart'
* Bowie invented AIDS
* Bowie caused the Cuban Missile Crisis
* Bowie was stockpiling weapons of mass destruction
* Bowie had sexually abused muppets on the set of Labyrinth
* Bowie planned to never tour Australia again
and
* Bowie had inhaled
When asked why she left these things out of the first book she said that she had forgotten, and then blamed that on Bowie too.
American composer Philip Glass didn't read the book. But what he did do in March was release 'Low Symphony', an LP based on David Bowie's 'Low'. Glass described Low as 'a bunch of notes and stuff', and said about his symphony, 'music is really complicated, I always wanted to be a bricklayer'.
On April 15th Bowie released his first solo album for six years, 'Black Tie, White Noise'. Co-produced by Nile Rodgers, it featured Mick Ronson on guitar during 'I Feel Free' and Reeves Gabrel on guitar during 'You've Been Around'. On the album were Barry Campbell on bass, Sterling Campbell on drums, Nile Rodgers on guitar and Richard Hilton on keyboards. The title track is a return to Bowie's pro-racist ideals, calling for whites to tie blacks up and torture them with noise.
This album would be one of Bowie's most personal, it included a piece written for his marriage to Iman (Lucy Can't Dance), a piece about his brother's suicide (I Know It's Gonna Happen Someday) and a piece about frogs (Jump They Say).
New Musical Express - After listening to this album I feel that I now know Bowie, I feel that I know what is going on in his mind, absolutely nothing.
Rolling Stone Magazine - It may be somewhat misleading, I did skip tracks 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14, but I think this album is really good.
The first single from the album, 'Jump They Say' was about the the resentment held by frogs of the way other animals traverse their environment. From April to May it would recieve much airplay and become Bowie's first hit single since 'Absolute Beginners'. By 'hit' what is meant is 'did fairly ok'.
The entire LP was successful in Europe, but in the US it hit a snag. The newly formed Savage Records collapsed mid way through the launch, and though it was hoped 'Black Tie, White Noise' could be rescued from the rubble, it was unfortunately smothered by a saxaphone and several tons of trumpets.
On April 29th Mick Ronson died in London due to liver cancer. The cause of which may or may not have been due to excessive fellatio simulation through the use of a guitar as a phallic symbol.
And so it came to pass that BBC TV would produce a serial adapting Hanif Kureishi's novel, 'The Buddha Of Suburbia' for television. It would also come to pass that they would ask Bowie to record a sountrack for this serial. 'We passed it to him because he was really good at doing stuff, he was cheap and he just happened to be wandering around the studios stealing stuff. So it would keep him out of trouble.'
That was in September. By November 1st the LP 'Buddha of Suburbia' was released by Arista. It was more experimental than recent recordings by David and seemed to call back to his Brian Eno days. A new phase perhaps of David's career where he would retrace previous steps, adding new experimentation to a mix of what had been discovered and nearly left behind. Either that or he was really really drunk.
The four-part series of 'The Buddha of Suburbia' commenced on November 3rd and there was some controversy in the press over the sex scenes in it. Everyone blamed David for 'getting the BBC all hot and bothered' through his new album. 'Sex and the church' was played backwards and some thought that maybe the phrase - "Cardboard Ducks Are Drinking Tea" - could be heard. Provocative if true.
Leaving that behind him in a hurry Bowie's next job was to compere the Concert of Hope where he screamed to the audience, 'We're doomed! We're all doomed, there is no chance at all for us!! I only hope we die painlessly!'. Bowie had mistakingly thought he was compering the Concert of No Hope.
The Concert of Hope was held at Wembley Arena, and despite being startled by Bowie's prediction of apocalypse the audience was only mildly alarmed. The concert starred Mick Hucknell, George Michael and k.d. lang as part of World Aids Day. A celebration of AIDS which the Princess of Wales supported. 'I think if we can get more people like Bowie to support AIDS, then the sky is the limit for how far this disease can go'.
On December 10th a 'Black Tie, White Noise' documentary was shown on BBC-1. The documentary was a special put together with exclusive interview footage and performances filmed at the Hollywood Centre Studio on 8th May. Unfortunately this meant the cancelling of a special TV-Fundraiser for starving kids in Africa. As compensation it was beamed on a large TV screen to those starving kids along with free 'Black Tie, White Noise' posters.