So, somehow we’ve made it 23 days into Music March and I haven’t posted about David Bowie. I’m not sure how this happened – but I’ma blame COVID-19 because I’ve decided to blame that for all my woes today.

So, David Bowie. Anyone who knows me well knows I’m lowkey obsessed with David Bowie. I love his music. Labyrinth was one of my favorite movies as a child (which, I feel explains a lot about me as an adult). He’s my style icon. My friend used to joke that while other parents will sing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” to their kids, I’ll be singing “Changes”. (She isn’t wrong.)

I write this from my kitchen table where a giant Ziggy Stardust poster hangs as a centerpiece to the decorations here. I have a keychain with David Bowie’s mugshot for my office keys. My favorite coffee cup is my Hark A Vagrant “Glam Breakfast” mug that my brother got me for my birthday. When I still had a desk, I kept a postcard of him on the wall in front of me. The Ziggy Stardust album cover was my phone background and lock screen for years. I’ve named many of my electronics after Bowie characters (My current phone is Thin White Duke).

I’m not one to cry over the loss of celebrities, but I did feel his loss. When he died, no less than three people texted me that morning to see how I was. He was a creative spirit who seemed to ignore the rules and boundaries. I loved his various personas throughout the decades and the characters he gave us – the people he sang as and the people he sang about – there is something for everyone.

Bowie’s music always feels both of an era and timeless to me. It’s so easily covered by modern artists. (Nirvana’s cover of “The Man Who Sold the World” may be my favorite cover of all time.) It’s pop and rock and a little something else that he brought to the music. It wasn’t punk but somehow it felt like it was. I can’t pick one favorite song – I love them all. The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars album is one of the best concept albums of all time in my opinion. Every song on there is perfect. Together they tell a story, but they all stand strongly on their own as well. Crafting an album like that takes skill. But his other work also fits into this idea – like he was crafting a world, creating these characters and telling their stories to us through song.

One of those characters was of course, the iconic Major Tom. There’s something about the way he sings about Major Tom in “Space Oddity” and then years later again in “Ashes to Ashes,” which makes the character so sad to me, but so real at the same time. Nothing is quite like “Space Oddity”; it’s one of those songs that takes you on a journey but instead of giving you a happy ending, you are left to wonder what will become of him. It can be taken literally as a song of a man lost in space, but it also has that metaphorical aspect of being lost even when you’re not.

Ground Control to Major Tom
Ground Control to Major Tom
Take your protein pills and put your helmet on
Ground Control to Major Tom (ten, nine, eight, seven, six)
Commencing countdown, engines on (five, four, three)
Check ignition and may God’s love be with you (two, one, liftoff)

This is Ground Control to Major Tom
You’ve really made the grade
And the papers want to know whose shirts you wear
Now it’s time to leave the capsule if you dare
“This is Major Tom to Ground Control
I’m stepping through the door
And I’m floating in a most peculiar way
And the stars look very different today
For here
Am I sitting in a tin can
Far above the world
Planet Earth is blue
And there’s nothing I can do

Though I’m past one hundred thousand miles
I’m feeling very still
And I think my spaceship knows which way to go
Tell my wife I love her very much she knows

Ground Control to Major Tom
Your circuit’s dead, there’s something wrong
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you “Here am I floating ’round my tin can
Far above the moon
Planet Earth is blue
And there’s nothing I can do”

“Space Oddity” by David Bowie

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