David Bowie - Ashes To Ashes (studio version in music video + live in Paris, 2002)

[highplainsdem]

[BigmanPigman]

1. What timing!

Last night/early AM when I couldn't sleep I pictured this video and forgot some of the lyrics. It drove me crazy until I googled them and the video (the one on the top), sang along and was finally able to resume my sleeping. HBO showed a Bowie special on Jan. 8. It was very good and it described the making of this video.

"Ashes to ashes, funk to funky, we know Major Tom's a junkie"

[highplainsdem]

3. LOL! It's so frustrating when you can't stop thinking about

something you want to check till you finally go online to google it. I'll sometimes make a note to check it later and hope that will let me set it aside for a while.

This song, and the video, are really interesting.

A couple of videos about both:

Tony wrote about this in his autobiography, too, but I don't have time to type that up at the moment.

[ProfessorGAC]

10. Read & Watched

Edited: meant to reply to your post 9.
The first article seems a bit pedantic & excessive in length, but ok.
2nd one I liked better.
I so liked that flanged piano sound (no, I didn't know how they got it) I programmed a Yamaha DX-7 to reproduce it.
Never played the song; just wanted to see if I could get that sound.

[highplainsdem]

13. That's cool, that you were able to duplicate the sound on a synthesizer - and that

you liked it well enough to spend time figuring it out even though your band never did the song.

I love little details like the ones Tony provides.

[quaint]

2. Paris, cool.

[highplainsdem]

4. My favorite performance of "Heroes" was at that show:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/103466510

[quaint]

6. Oh yes! High energy and excitement.

[Easterncedar]

5. Weird and wonderful

The brilliant British tv series Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes play off the Bowie videos. Anyone else see those shows? I really love them. Being late to Bowie, I went backwards, found the series first and had to look up the music videos to catch the references. Worth the trip!

[highplainsdem]

8. I saw both the British and American versions of "Life On Mars." Haven't

seen "Ashes To Ashes."

[Easterncedar]

11. Ashes to Ashes is great

Kelley Hawes goes back years after the first series ended. Most of the same squad remains. Philip Glenister’s character becomes in large sense the focus. And it all makes sense in the end.

[highplainsdem]

14. I'll have to get BritBox for Ashes To Ashes (and probably watching Life On Mars

again first). They do have a special now, only $1.99/mo for the first two months: https://www.britbox.com/us/promo-terms

[Easterncedar]

12. What did you think of the American Life on Mars? Haven't seen it.

[highplainsdem]

15. I liked it, especially for Jason O'Mara and Harvey Keitel, but

I believe the general consensus was that it wasn't as good as the British series. IMDb user reviews average 7.5 for the American series and 8.4 for the British.

Unfortunately, even to stream it, you'll have to pay per episode. 17 episodes.

It was canceled after just one season (which still had one more episode than the combined seasons of the British show, but each American episode minus commercials was about 20 minutes shorter). But they managed to use the ending they'd been planning on for the longer series they'd hoped for.

However, a lot of people hated the ending. The Brits working for WatchMojo hated it so much they included it on their list of "Top 20 Awful American Remakes Of Great British Shows" on YouTube (Life On Mars US is #10) even though they admitted they'd liked the show up to the final episode. IndieWire called it TV's most bonkers series finale - https://www.indiewire.com/2019/04/life-on-mars-tv-series-finale-oral-history-1202054509/ - but overall they were sympathetic. Both the IndieWire story and the WatchMojo video have spoilers, of course. WatchMojo's critique gives away the ending of both series. But before that complaint, WatchMojo said, "Initially, Life On Mars looked to be making a name for itself on American shores. It was a respectable nod to the BBC classic, remade with energy and passion, and featured great acting, production values and music. And then, the ending happened."

[ProfessorGAC]

7. One Of My Top 5 Fave Bowie Songs

The atmospherics are awesome on this song.

[highplainsdem]

9. This song gives me goosebumps at :41 in that video.

The start of the first of two bridges. Not sure exactly why, but Bowie's voice there really gets to me.

Amazing lyrics, too, and of course that surreal video...

Ran across two detailed discussions of the song:

https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2017/10/06/555850186/how-ashes-to-ashes-put-the-first-act-of-david-bowies-career-to-rest

https://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/ashes-to-ashes/


Did you see the second video I posted in reply 3? Tony talking about how they used an Eventide flanger?