The 50th Birthday Concert took place at Madison Square Garden in New York, with special guests including Frank Black, Robert Smith, Billy Corgan, Foo Fighters, Lou Reed and a bunch of other people who were not so special. The highlight of the concert was definately the bouncing eyeballs, which reminded the audience of how important eyeballs were in todays society, and Gail Ann Dorseys lovely long flowing hair.
At the end of the concert Bowie was presented with a big birthday cake with 'Happy Birthday David Bwoie" written on it. Apon seeing the error David ran offstage screaming and crying. 'You ruined everything!' he cried 'My birthday is ruined! It's not fair!'.
On January 20th 'Little Wonder' came out in Europe. Yes, 'Little Wonder' was gay and was not afraid to admit it, at least in Europe.
Then on February 3rd 'EART HL I NG' came out in Europe, no doubt encouraged by 'Little Wonder'. It came out on February 10th in the USA. When David saw the horrendous typographical error that made Earthling into Eart hl i ng he ran away screaming 'You ruined my album! It's not fair! Everything is ruined!'.
'EART HL I NG' was produced by David Bowie, Mark Plati and Reeves Gabrels. On the album were what was becoming a regular collaboration on stage : Reeves Gabrels on guitar and alto sax, Gail Ann Dorsey on bass, Zachary Alford on drums and Mike Garson on keyboards. It was recieved warmly by the press as it had just been removed from the oven.
Rolling Music Weekly - Apart from the unforgivable typo on the cover it's rather good
New Musical Stone - I thi n k it's rat he r goo d. A litt le bit nu tt y, bu t not t o o nut ty.
With a new album behind him, and a new tour in front of him, David decided to sell himself. After a few attempts on street corners to no avail he turned to the stock market. On February 12th Bowie Bonds came into existence. It was not a new type of Bowie endorsed glue, it was a bunch of 10 year 7.90% coupon bonds backed by Bowie's back catalogue of songs and also backed by his friend Bloggo down the road who vouched for him.
For this Bowie recieved 55 million dollars up front on all future royalites. All the bonds were bought by Prudential Insurance Co who really didn't believe in sharing, greedy greedy greedy.
'Little Wonder' came out in the USA on February 25th after spending some time unhappily married in a heterosexual relationship.
By now April had rolled around, and David had contacted old friend and producer Tony Visconti after 14 years of forgetting about him. 'What are you doing in 5 years time?' Bowie asked, 'Nuthin' Visconti replied, 'ok then' said Bowie.
On April 14th 'Dead Man Walking' was released and given a reprieve from death row.
THE SECRET GIG was then organised and held in Dublin. THE SECRET GIG was a rehearsal for the upcoming Earthling World (minus Australia) Tour and everyone seemed to know about THE SECRET GIG. THE SECRET GIG happened on May 17th and was enjoyed by all who had come in responing to advertisements in all the paper telling everyone about THE SECRET GIG.
Then EMI bought all of Bowie's early albums for 28 million dollars, which was quite a mistake because they learned that they could purchase them for $24.95 at the local Trax store down the road. For those who are aching to know, this happened on May 21st.
The Earthling Tour began on June 2nd (No aliens allowed). The fist concert was at 'Flughafen Blankense' in Lubeck Germany. All reports said that it was Flughafen good.
Das Lubeck - Flughafen good.
NACHRICHT! - Flughafen good.
Der Sonne - Flughafen good.
On stage as usual were Reeves Gabrels, Gail Ann-Dorsey, Zachary Alford and Mike Garson and they all did their usual things. Support acts were The Prodigy, Rage Against The Machine and some others that are not worth mentioning really.
Oh, here's something new. The long anticipated "The Deram Anthology" was released on 9th June prompting American President Bill Clinton to finally declare "War on Deram Compilations".
This tour wound through Europe until August 14th, Bowie's hair turning more and more carrot coloured as it went. 'I was inspired by Carrot Top, a comic genious'.
From September 6th to October 18th the Earthling tour went from city to city across Canada and the USA. Americans would frequently sneak up behind David and go "boo!" which promted him to release another single called 'I'm Afraid of Americans'. The popular video of this song featured Trent Reznor chasing Bowie around the place in Benny Hill fashion.
Winding up the Earthling tour was a visit to Latin America from October 23rd to November 7th. Bowie saw that it was good, so on the 7th day he rested.