RIP David Bowie

[Dartzap]

Just awoke to the news that David Bowie has died following a 15 month fight with cancer.

Talk about a shit new year for music!

[Jub]

Wow, that's some shit news right there.

He was a timeless artist who really didn't seem to outwardly age. I knew he wasn't young, but I would never have placed him at 69.

I guess it was time for Ziggy Stardust to go home.

[The Grim Squeaker]

The second piece of music I ever heard (on the day/night after I was born) was "Space Oddity".
RIP.

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 hear And I'm floating around my tin can
Far above the Moon
Planet Earth is blue
And there's nothing I can do

[Hillary]

Very sad. A true innovator and one of a kind.

And cool as fuck with it.

[Jub]

Hell, even Tin Machine was actually pretty good if you can get past the fact that David Bowie is the lead singer?

[Borgholio]

[Guardsman Bass]

Damn. It's being said a lot, but it just felt like he was immortal somehow - it's hard to imagine him dead.

[Raw Shark]

Quoting a bi college friend here: "Bowie in Labyrinth made me realize that boys gave me funny feelings like girls when I was 17."

R.I.P.

[Elheru Aran]

"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..."

"I will sit right down,
Waiting for the gift of sound and vision
And I will sing, waiting for the gift of sound and vision
Drifting into my solitude,
over my head"

Ziggy returns to the Stardust. I'm going to miss him.

[Ziggy Stardust]

There will never be another person even remotely like him.

Later this month his last album will be released. Based on the two singles that have been released so far (Blackstar and Lazarus), it is no less interesting and innovative than his early work.

[SpottedKitty]

Damn. It's being said a lot, but it just felt like he was immortal somehow - it's hard to imagine him dead.

<nod> Like Lemmy from Motörhead — they just seemed to be indestructible, and now they're going.

<sigh>

[TithonusSyndrome]

It happened about 45 years too late to prevent him from raping a 12 year old Lori Maddox, but better late than never I suppose.

[Broomstick]

OK... I see someone has shown up to shit on a memorial thread as required by internet by-laws...

I grew up hearing his music, even if I was never a hardcore fan, and his impact will be felt going forward. I hope his family gets the privacy they want at this time.

[Guardsman Bass]

About what I expected, to be honest. I suppose at least he didn't try and kidnap her and rape her, like Jimmy Page.

[TithonusSyndrome]

Or stump for Enoch Powell at some concert long after he'd left office, like Eric Clapton. Seriously, boomer icons are the biggest pieces of unrecognized shit in our culture.

I'm not trying to be "edgy" and shit on everyone's feelings for the sake of it here, but the honest truth is that maybe 0.0001% of people who know who David Bowie is, also know that he raped a tween. This isn't like pointing out the obvious about a problematic public figure for the sake of being contrarian, this is calling out a rapist for literally decades of getting away with it in the court of public opinion without so much as even a murmur of a trial. I'm not going to climb into your house with a giant magnet and erase all your Bowie media, most of which I like myself; but letting this go unspoken for any length of time longer is hard to see as anything other than irresponsible.

[Broomstick]

As I said, I was never a hard-core fan so it's probably why I don't know about this, but I thought Lori Maddox was raped by Jimmy Page, not David Bowie?

And I also have to ask if this was a situation somewhat like when Jerry Lee Lewis married his 13 year old cousin - wrong by our standards, but legal in the time and place he did it. Which doesn't make it OK, but is different than if he had abducted her, beat her, and kept her locked in a room.

(Yes, I'm aware with Page and Maddox there was accusations of kidnapping and lock the girl up)

Part of the problem, of course, is that these guys were so massively popular, lusted after, and fucking rich they got away with a lot of shit that unknown ordinary people with little money never would have escaped jail time (or worse) for doing. Add in that rape, statutory rape, slutty behavior, and so forth were seen a lot differently back in the 1960's and 70's and yeah, a lot of nasty shit happened that isn't tolerated anymore.

[TithonusSyndrome]

Lori Maddox is probably a perfect example of how male sexual interest can be heightened by the interest and/or "possession" of another rival or contemporary male, because before she was abducted and detained illegally by Jimmy Page or raped by David Bowie, Lori Maddox had already been stat raped by Iggy Pop. Leaving aside all the stat business, no woman can possibly inspire this kind of derangement no matter her age.

[Hillary]

Do you actually have any proof that this happened, TS?

[Guardsman Bass]

I googled it. Maddox has said that Bowie took her virginity, when she was in her early teens (he would have been in his twenties). It would have been statutory rape even back then in California, which had an age of consent at 18 since 1913.

Honestly, there's no hard feelings about it. In fact, I bet that once things settle down for a few days, we'll start getting the more critical takes on Bowie's legacy - probably including the Maddox situation. I'd be interested to see if there are more stories like that, since that would be more troubling than one incident.

[LadyTevar]

Now that the dirty laundry has been aired, let's drop it here.

[LadyTevar]

The news is saying now that Bowie knew about his cancer for 18months, and he deliberately wrote his last album as a final farewell to his fans.

[Isolder74]

RIP David Bowie

[Terralthra]

Lori Maddox is probably a perfect example of how male sexual interest can be heightened by the interest and/or "possession" of another rival or contemporary male, because before she was abducted and detained illegally by Jimmy Page or raped by David Bowie, Lori Maddox had already been stat raped by Iggy Pop. Leaving aside all the stat business, no woman can possibly inspire this kind of derangement no matter her age.

Her word is that she first had sex at 14-15, and that she lost her virginity to David Bowie. Not twelve. Statutory rape, certainly, and definitely criminal, gross, and wrong. By the same token, the same man fifteen years later threatened to fire any roadie on his tour who was caught with an underage "guest" backstage. So, like many problematic people, it certainly seems like he made serious, harmful mistakes in his youth and grew up to be a more ethical man over time.

[Ziggy Stardust]

Or stump for Enoch Powell at some concert long after he'd left office, like Eric Clapton. Seriously, boomer icons are the biggest pieces of unrecognized shit in our culture.

I'm not trying to be "edgy" and shit on everyone's feelings for the sake of it here, but the honest truth is that maybe 0.0001% of people who know who David Bowie is, also know that he raped a tween. This isn't like pointing out the obvious about a problematic public figure for the sake of being contrarian, this is calling out a rapist for literally decades of getting away with it in the court of public opinion without so much as even a murmur of a trial. I'm not going to climb into your house with a giant magnet and erase all your Bowie media, most of which I like myself; but letting this go unspoken for any length of time longer is hard to see as anything other than irresponsible.

That 0.0001% figure is ludicrous. I've been a huge Bowie fan for more than 15 years, and I'd literally never heard this story before now. Lori Maddox is far more closely associated in terms of pop culture memory with Jimmy Page, and even that isn't exactly common knowledge. The vast majority of people who know who David Bowie is literally only know about him from the handful of songs of his that are played all the time, and his movie roles, and know of him as a guy that dresses funny.

I mean, you're talking about the actions of a girl who isn't even remotely famous as if everyone somehow knew who she was. Hell, when you search her name the very first article that appears on Google is the interview you linked to, which isn't a super reputable source (I at least have never heard of that sight). And the rest of the hits on the first two pages of Google are about her and Jimmy Page, with no mention of the Bowie story. (And, hell, none of those sites are reputable, either. The only remotely trustworthy piece I can find is an article in the Independent that only mentions her relationship with Jimmy Page). In fact, except for the fact there are photos of her, I can't even find any proof she actually exists.

So acting like this random interview with a virtually unknown girl on some minor website are somehow common knowledge is either being intentionally duplicitous or being outright deluded.

[Terralthra]

Um...the obscurity was his point. He was saying that of people who do know David Bowie, only perhaps one in 100,000 know of his having committed statutory rape with 14-15 year-old groupies.

As for the reputability....there's an interview with her where she describes what happened. That seems pretty incontrovertible.