David Bowie: the avatars of a transformist<

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A chameleon.It was the recurring photo that accompanied the career of David Bowie.His laudators rented a rock star who knew how to reinvent herself constantly, like Bob Dylan, to whom Bowie paid tribute from the album Hunky Dory (1971);His detractors, infinitely less numerous, criticized an opportunist.

Like any "deeply superficial person", according to Andy Warhol's expression, this dandy treated the sound as much as the image, its wardrobe as its songs.It is enough to listen to his confusing discography to be convinced, note that one cannot establish for his countless heirs - who go, in the worst case, new romantics of the 1980s to Lady Gaga by passing, fatally, by Madonna.

Neowagnerian in his approach, Bowie was the demiurge of a total art, merging Rock’n’Roll, Cabaret, Theater, Mode and Design.And the one who knew the most masterfully, in the world of pop, to give his musical research a visual form: each of his metamorphoses illustrated a musical mutation.Illustration in five stages.

Post-hippie

A child of rock, David Robert Jones distinguishes himself from his contemporaries by trying himself on the piano and the saxophone, before connecting an electric guitar.David Bowie, the pseudonym he chose in 1965, will never be a conventional rocker, rather a sounds and an image manipulator.Passionate about science fiction, the London suburbs became visible in the summer of 1969 with the song Space Oddith, a symphonic folk inspired by 2001: the space of space, by Stanley Kubrick.She introduces one of the singer's first avatars, Major Tom.At the time, already, Bowie doesn't really know who he is.A constant indecision which he will make a strength.His music is still dominated by the acoustic guitar, a harmonica or a pastoral flute, and hints of psychedelism.

But it is above all his outfit that draws attention.Appeared for the first time on television in 1964 as president of the company for the prevention of cruelty towards men with long hair, the young man displays his androgynia by wearing a dress and a beret on his frieze, attractingHomophobic sarcasm.It will be necessary to wait for his third album, The Man Who Sold the World (1970), that Bowie really heard his modernity.Dark, close to the hard-rock of Black Sabbath, the object is considered today as a precursor of Gothic and grunge.

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Alien du glam rock

In January 1972, Bowie caused a scandal by announcing his bisexuality. This time he wears the short, complexion and brush hair - while long hair has become synonymous with virility - a tight combination and "platform boots". Punk before the hour, he balances the hippie years and hardens the sound with the help of guitarist Mick Ronson. In competition with Marc Bolan, the man behind T. Rex, for the throne of king of glam rock, he lets his double triumph, Ziggy Stardust, an alien which he will immediately "suicide" on stage, after having him Flanked by an evil brother Aladdin Sane ("A Lad Insane", "a crazy guy"). It was still in Kubrick, this time that of Mechanical Orange, that he borrows the imagery of Ziggy Stardust and his Spiders from Mars. More original is the Japanism of extravagant creations of the stylist Kansai Yamamoto and the scenic gestures imported from the Kabuki theater. Having become sovereign of a Beatles orphan Britain, Bowie must now conquer America, where he emigrates.

Thin White Duke

The fascination for Germany and totalitarianism emerges during the tour which follows the album Orwellian Diamond Dogs (1974), with a scenography inspired by Metropolis, the film by Fritz Lang.Pure malt English rocker, Ronson is replaced by the Puerto Rican Carlos Alomar, who draws the sound towards funk.After blurring the barriers between the sexes, Bowie tries to energize the musical borders between genres.There is a cold and disembodied "plastic soul".

In Philadelphia, he recorded the album Young Americans and adopted disco before all the others.After the glam eccentricities, Bowie opts for the chic clothing, symbolized by the advent of the Thin White Duke on the Station to Station album (1976): an ideologically doubtful character, of a blonder and an Aryan pallor, cocaine toCountry and evolving under pale neon lights recalling the staging of Leni Riefenstahl under the Nazi regime.Her music reaches heights of inventiveness.With Low, the first part of the Berlin trilogy, she practically invents the New Wave, with a lot of synthesizers, while the punk explosion has not yet occurred.The composition method is revolutionized by the random approach to the minimalist musician Brian Eno."A new school school school," said Bowie, who was not lacking in self -mockery.

Star video

Man of images, Bowie could not miss the revolution of the video clip.In 1980, that of Ashes to Ashes put in orbit the album a new masterpiece, Scary Monsters.But, as for most of its peers, the 1980s will be cruel: dominant technology, inspiration at half mast.With Let’s Dance (1983), Bowie also becomes a rock aristocrat for adults, fraying with Queen (the Hit Under Pressure) and Tina Turner.

Postmodern

After having tried without success to blend into the anonymity of a group, Tin Machine, Bowie takes an electro turn with Black Tie White Noise, in 1993, then specialized in the industrialist (Outside, in 1995, leaving inTour with Nine Inch Nails) and the jungle with Earthling (1997).Jeuniste?No, it is more simply in the spot.As the United Kingdom believes again to dominate the world again with the House and Britpop of Oasis and Blur, it drags in a coat in the colors of the Union Jack, designed by Alexander McQueen.

Failing to upset the music scene, the return to classicism which prevailed since Heathen (2002) perhaps indicated that David has simply become Bowie again.Until this ultimate Blackstar, released on January 8, recorded with jazz avant-garde musicians.The musician had offered himself a last miracle: still surprising his fans on the day of his 69th birthday.

Bruno Lesprit

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