David Bowie in Manchester Square 1965
Posted on March 13, 2008
Filed Under Images
David Bowie was born David Robert Jones on 8 January 1947 in Brixton, south London.
He first caught the public’s attention in the autumn of 1969 when ‘Space Oddity’ reached the top five of the UK singles chart but this was only after a few years of flirtation with the London music scene.
In 1963, having moved to more suburban Bromley he joined The King Bees. He is also to be in a number of other bands in the ’60s, such as The Konrads, The Manish Boys, George And The Dragons, and, most famously, The Lower Third.
However, his first appearance on British TV came, aged 17, in 1964, when he was defending his choice of growing long hair. In the same year, Davy Jones And The King Bees released the single “Liza Jane’ which didn’t chart.
David regularly appeared at London’s legendary Marquee club, at this venue, David and The Lower Third supported The High Numbers, later to become The Who.
In 1966, now named, David Bowie joined the trendy British label, Deram, in 1966 – made famous by The Moody Blues. ‘Rubber Band’ was his strange first single on this label, and the B-side, ‘The London Boys’, related to drugs, peer pressure, and teenage angst.
Other tracks recorded at this time also, included ‘Sell Me A Coat’, ‘When I Live My Dream’, ‘There Is A Happy Land’, ‘Karma Man’, ‘The Laughing Gnome’, ‘Love You Till Tuesday’ and ‘Please Mr Gravedigger’.
“I never got the feeling from David that he was ambitious. I remember he’d buy antiques if he had a hit, when he should have saved the money.” – Marc Bolan.
All was to change in 1969, David’s father died and had to sort out his dad’s estate at the tender age of 22. This was also the year Bowie first met his future wife Angie. He had a small role in the film, ‘The Virgin Soldiers’, and ‘Space Oddity’ reached number 5 in the UK charts – the week man first walked on the moon.
No idea about where the above picture came from. Why Manchester Square? All I know is that EMI’s headquarters were there at the time, the site of the “famous up the stairs” shots of the Beatles was taken in 1963 and again in 1969 that adorned the Beatles Red and Blue compilation albums.
Comments
9 Responses to “David Bowie in Manchester Square 1965”
Leave a Reply
-
Latest mu-sik headlines
Site designed by
Subscribe
Nice and interesting article about David, and such a great photograph you posted..was wondering if you were the one who modified it.
Yes, that was me, Ernesto
Thats a nice photo treatment, and such a great photo too! Good bit of history on the guy too :]
You should post the original too so we can have a look at the before and after.
my time with mobbing was very hard. Music like this saves my soul!
Hard times to remenber!
Perfect, perfect, perfect!
Brixton is such a great area and has produced so many musicians – I mean, two members of The Clash and David Bowie, among others, certainly isn’t shoddy. Cool image there
David Bowie – Space Oddity
How can such florid, solid and exciting things to write?
My mind is not conceivable. Especially in the beginning of his career
That is good enough to be an album cover. Perfect for the 60’s.
I nice little piece on Bowie. You write well and a nice photo treatment too. I read Stardust: The David Bowie Story in high school… I’ve been a huge fan ever since.