Douglas Laman Gets A Tune-Up (Entry #4): The Rise and Fall Of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars

DOUGLAS LAMAN GETS A TUNE-UP

ENTRY #4: The Rise and Fall Of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars by David Bowie

Douglas Laman Gets A Tune-Up is a new weekly series wherein Douglas Laman listens to an album of music he's never fully listened to before (though he may have heard one or two songs from it) and writes up his brief thoughts on it.

There have been a lot of great artists. There have been a lot of artists who emotionally connected with people. But no singular individual has had such a profound impact on the world like David Bowie did. Here was a guy that wasn't content to sit inside the box in any aspect of his life whether it was his sexuality, conforming to gender norms or his catalog of music, the cornerstone of his entire career. His tunes communicated a sense of pulsating rebelliousness, an inability to conform to the norms that matched perfectly with the man belting out such songs. Want a classic example of that iconic spirit? Look no further than his 1972 album The Rise and Fall Of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.

It's a mouthful of a title to be sure but it's an appropriately distinctive moniker for an equally one-of-a-kind collection of tracks. The album begins with Five Years, a song that has David Bowie looking at the world around him and all of the various people that inhabit it, including the "fat people, the skinny people, the nobody people, the somebody people". It comes off as a Bowie-tinged form of existentialism as he contemplates the existences of those around him, including one fellow he swears he saw "...in an ice cream parlor...[who] didn't think he was in this song." It's a unique way of looking at the world which pretty much sets the stage for the distinctive spirit that courses through the entire album.

Once we get to the third track, we get two back-to-back doses of Bowie songs I'd heard previously. Moonage Daydream and Starman were so great to hear again, they're both these tunes that utilize cosmic concepts and ideas to touch upon these more intimate concepts. Starman, in particular, strikes me as not only one of my favorite Bowie songs, but also an interesting rumination on a being of greater power called the, well, Starman, whose existence is passed on among the human populace as a legend of sorts. What kind of messages does this Starman have human beings pass on throughout the eons? That message is "Let the children loose it...use it... [and] boogie", a call to let the youth discover themselves through joy, making mistakes and dancing.

That kind of call to let the younger people just be themselves and embrace their differences is a recurring message across Bowie's discography (that subtext becomes overt text in pieces of music like the also excellent Changes) and that's one of the many reasons why his work managed to resonate so much with teens in the 70's, 80's and every decade since. Many pieces of pop culture try to connect with teenagers and their worldview but Bowie was one of the few to really provide solace and comfort to this age group thanks to him being more open to confronting LGBTQA-oriented themes in his music that resonated with so many LGBTQA teenagers struggling to accept themselves. Individuals like LGBTQA teens and adults that society turned a blind eye to were the ones Bowie's music was particularly made for

That very theme that made David Bowie such an important artist to millions crops up throughout The Rise and Fall Of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars and even ties into the use of science-fiction and cosmic elements in the album. The vast cosmos have tantalized the human mind for centuries as something rife with uncharted potential, who knows what's out there beyond our own planet? Bowie calls upon those kinds of elements of space to further the way this album brings identification and hope to the disenfranchised. Not only does he recognize in his music the troubles his listeners are going through on Earth, he offers hope by gazing unto the stars and enchanting the listener by way of calling upon cosmic concepts that remind listeners of the vast potential offered up in planets and stars unknown. Who knows what's out there? Maybe acceptance, maybe friendship, maybe anything your mind can conjure up. Bowie's music sure shows the kind of power a good imagination can conjure up.

But enough with the larger themes presented in Bowie's work and recurring sci-fi motifs, what about the rest of the songs on the album? Well, it's a rollicking great collection of tracks from the musical master that concludes with three particularly strong tracks. The first of that musical trio is Ziggy Stardust, a tune with tremendous guitar work and lyrics that recall his time with the titular guitar player while the next of the three is Suffragette City, a whiz-bang tune with the kind of lyrics that are just fun to sing along too, it's the kind of track I could so easily see people blaring out of their car cassette players while driving around the city on a particularly memorable Saturday night back in the 70's.

And then the album concludes with one of my favorite songs of the entire album, Rock N' Roll Suicide. It's a slower paced song after two edgier rock songs and also one where the undercurrent of acceptance that flows through Bowie's work becomes more overt in a beautiful way as he comforts an individual whose feeling lost, alone and afraid. Bowie's vocal delivery is so tender and so kind, you can practically feel his hand reassuringly patting you on the back as he harmonizes that "You're not alone!"  That final verse where he implores the person he's speaking to to"Gimme your hands, cause your wonderful" conveys the kind of sympathetic air that few songs can truly achieve. But man alive, does Bowie ever hit that specific emotion with incredible skill. It's a beautiful track full of vibrant empathy that encapsulates the qualities that make The Rise and Fall Of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars and David Bowie's entire career so impactful; he understands how the alone, the weary and the distraught feel, he's been where they are and he expresses their experiences and offers hope to them by way of glorious rock n' roll and tremendously well-made lyrics. All of those elements that make David Bowie an eternal legend can be found in The Rise and Fall Of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars in spades.