At the 11th annual induction dinner Madonna and David Byrne were his presenters. The only noteworthy incident being when Bowie had his eye out on one of Madonna's pointy bra-cones. He spent the rest of the night with his eye hanging from it's socket again, but people were getting used to this.
Then in February it was back to the Outside Tour, although when it rained it was inside. Along with him all this time were Reeves Gabrels on lead guitar, Gail Ann Dorsey on bass, Zachary Alford on drums, Mike Garson on keyboards. Featuring prominently in the early dates were Carlos Alomar, Peter Schwarz and George Simms. The musicians didn't know if they were coming or going.
Actually some were going. Before arriving in Japan on 4th June Bowie said "Ta-Ta" to Alomar, Schwarz and Simms and dropped them out of the plane over the Pacific Ocean. It is rumoured that they were persistantly making fun of his eyes.
Bowie toured Japan from the 4th to the 13th of June. Cancelled Russia's 15th and 16th dates because he "couldn't be buggered", and played on the 18th in Moscow. From the 20th June to the 21st of July he would travel through Europe playing his concerts and apologising for the lateness of the second Eno Album.
Le French Paper - Ze Bowie, hopped onto ze stage and was immediately pumping ze zounds of Hallo Spaceboy. With each beat he said "sorrysorrysorrysorry". By now we should 'ave at least 15 new Eno albums. Ze French are angry!
All in all the Outside Tour took in 26 Countries and Bowie made 92 performances, at one point it looked like he'd tour Antarctica. But not Australia, as Australia was the forbidden country.
David and his crew then went straight into the recording studio. The Glass Studios in New York were where Bowie would spend most of his time from late July onwards with Mark Plati, Reeves Gabrels, Gail Ann Dorsey, Zachary Alford and Mike Garson. All pointers pointed to the fact that he was recording another album, as that is what normally happens in recording studios. David elaborates :
'We were fresh, we were zinging, we had all these new sounds we discovered on the tour. Pow Wap Bam, we were excited. Zow Wip Wee! In your face! Yeah!'
On August 9th the film 'Basquiat', in which Bowie played Andy Warhol, was premiered in the United States. In playing Andy Bowie had actually worn some of Warhol's actual wigs which gave him that authentic Warhol hair look. The performance of the wigs was roundly applauded.
New York Times - ...and as for Bowie's wigs performance. Four stars. The wig stayed on the whole time and did it's job well, staying white and being hairy.
Time Magazine - ...his wigs were remarkably subdued and glued to his head. Never came off the whole time. Best wig performance this year!
On 11th September history was made when the single 'Telling Lies' was released over the internet. 300,000 people downloaded the song, but it may have been that the same person did it 300,000 times because his Real Download program kept stuffing up. Bowie announced that, 'Forever in history now, whenever someone thinks of the date September 11th, the first thing that will come into their heads is the release of my single on the internet'.
October 19th saw David popping up at the Bridge Benefit Concert performing songs such as Aladdin Sane, The Jean Genie, I Can't Read, Heroes and Let's Dance. Many bridges spanning many a river was saved by this event. Many people who heard Bowie say that he would never again play his old hits became aware that David was capable of telling 'Big Ones'.
To promote his upcoming album he appeared on VH1's 'Fashion Hour : David Bowie'. He talked about the upcoming release, 'Earthling', talked about how the backlog of 32 Eno albums were coming 'very soon, I promise!' and how as a child he had gone on adventures with aliens and lived with a pirate king. He then went on to announce that he was starring in a new movie with Marilyn Monroe and was running for president of Albania.
'Telling Lies' was released by BMG on 4th November. Very very apt.