They'd gone along to see David Bowie in Dunstable. Great fans of Bowie they were, and Jim had almost to pinch himself when he first heard such a grand person was actually coming to that place. He hated it. Privately his mother confided that he found it difficult to make friends at work.

    That Wednesday night he was there, though, clutching his copy of the new David Bowie album, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust, which he hoped David would autograph after the show. He was wearing his red scarf, flung nonchalantly over his shoulder, and his red platform boots.

    His hair was long down the back but cropped fairly short on top so that it stuck up when he brushed his fingers through it. He hated that it was dark brown. He'd promised himself that when he eventually split to London he'd have it done bright blond. He was just turned 19.

    Phil was one of the first to arrive at the Civic Hall. He'd stood in the queue for an hour and a half to get a ticket, so when he was inside he rushed quickly to the front and stood beneath the stage. He waited patiently while the Flamin' Groovies went through their set. He was to say later, in fact, that they were quite super, but after all, he'd really gone to see Dave, hadn't he?

    He was so excited Phil can't remember exactly what Bowie came out wearing, but towards the end of the performance it was certain that the outfit was white satin shirt and trousers, the legs tucked into glistening, thick-soled white boots. He looked like Vogue's idea of what the well-dressed astronaut should be wearing. Dare it be said? A delicious space oddity.

    A lesser hunk of glamour might have been upstage by guitarist Mick Ronson with his maroon sequined jacket, red lipstick and hair dyed peroxide as a fifties starlet, but though oohs and aaahs were directed his way, teenage hearts went fluttering out to David; for can anything dim the splendour of this ravishing creature whom all Britain is learning to love?

    The newspapers were to report subsequently that this performance was one of the major turning points in David Bowie's incredible success story. The man from United Artists Records, who knows what he likes, was quite sure of that. He said afterwards that DB was definitely the biggest thing around.

    To those who had seen his act before this year the format was not new. That's to say he started the set rockin' like a bitch before cooling down somewhat with 'Changes', a song of mixed tempos, and then the darkling, apocalyptic message of 'Five Years', which owes something lyrically to Lou Reed ('I think I saw you in an ice-cream parlour drinking milk shakes cold and long.') And then the acoustic passages with Mick Ronson ('Space Oddity' and 'Andy Warhol') culminating in a solo version of 'Amsterdam', a febrile account of rough trade, as delightfully coarse as navy blue serge.

    'Now some golden oldies for you.' He announced the number as written by Jack Bruce and Pete Brown. All his fans, of course, needed no telling. 'I Feel Free', ripping out of the stereo PA system, choreographed by the flickering strobe lighting, it's not what you do, it's the way you do it. My, how they clapped and whistled.

    The band returned for an encore. It was 'I'm Waiting For The Man'. But something rather strange was happening up there on stage. During the instrumental break Bowie began chasing Ronson around the stage, hustling him, trying to press his body close. The attendants at the exits looked twice to see if they could believe their eyes. The teenage chickies stared in bewilderment. The men knew but the little girls didn't understand. Jeees - us! It had happened.

    It should be recorded that the first act of fellatio on a musical instrument in the British Isles took place at Dunstable Civic Hall. How do you top that? You don't. You get off stage.

    After the show was over, scores of people were still milling around. Over the loudspeaker system Hunky Dory was playing. The autograph hunters were crowding round the dressing-room door, but he wasn't seen to emerge. Moist-eyed boys still hung around. After a while, Jim and Paul left the place together.

    In the studios of San Francisco's KSAN-FM, he assures an incredulous DJ that his last album was, very simply, a collection of reminiscences about his experiences as a shaven-headed transvestite.

    In Hollywood, at a party staged in his honour, he blows the minds of arriving hot-panted honeys with Edy Williams hair, welcoming them lispily in his gorgeous gown before excusing himself so he can watch Ultra Violet give interviews from a milk bath at a party held a few blocks away in her honour.

    Although he is the creator of one of the year's most interesting albums, The Man Who Sold The World, he remains mostly unfamiliar.

    But perhaps not for long. The 24-year-old songwriter/singer/theatrician/magnificent outrage from London will undertake his first performing tour of this country (due to visa difficulties he was not allowed to play in public during his February visit) in April.

    "I refuse to be thought of as mediocre," Bowie asserts blithely. "If I am mediocre, I'll get out of the business. There's enough fog around. That's why the idea of performance-as-spectacle is so important to me."

    He plans to appear on stage decked out rather like Cleopatra, in the appropriate heavy make-up and in costumes that will hopefully recall those designed in the thirties by Erté.

    He says he will also interpret his own works through mime, a form in which he's been involved at several points in his career, most notably when he wrote for, acted in, and helped produce the Lindsay Kemp Mime Company of London: "I'd like to bring mime into a traditional Western setting, to focus the attention of the audience with a very stylized, a very Japanese style of movement."

    Bowie assures us that he has already put that idea into practice with gratifying results: "About three years ago, at the Festival Hall in London, I did a solo performance of a twenty-minute play with song that I wrote called Yet-San and the Eagle, which is about a boy trying to find his way in Tibet, within himself, under the pressured of the Communist Chinese oppression. I might bring it over to some of the bigger places I work in America. It was very successful - everybody seemed to understand and enjoy it."

    He is not overly concerned with American audiences' lesser experience with and consequent less receptivity to theatrically-enhanced musical performances: "Should anyone think that these things are merely distractions or gimmicks intended to obscure the music's shortcomings, he mustn't come to my concerts. He must come on my terms or not at all.

    "My performances have got to be theatrical experiences for me as well as for the audience. I don't want to climb out of my fantasies in order to go up on stage - I want to take them on stage with me."

    Bowie contends that rock in particular and pop in general should not be taken as seriously as is currently the fashion: "What the music says may be serious, but as a medium it should not be questioned, analysed, or taken so seriously. I think it should be tarted up, made into a prostitute, a parody of itself. It should be the clown, the Pierrot medium. The music is the mask the message wears - music is the Pierrot and I, the performer, am the message.

    "Tell your readers that they can make up their minds about me when I begin getting adverse publicity: when I'm found in bed with Raquel Welch's husband."

    Called the Hype, the group consists of Bowie's producer, Tony Visconti, on bass, John Cambridge (of Juniors Eyes), on drums, and Mick Ronson on guitar.

    David and the group appear for the first time at Hull University tomorrow (March 6), then London's Regent Street Polytechnic (7) and Royal Festival Hall (12).

David Bowie would and has, partly as a protest against the pretentiousness and insincerity in some quarters of the music business.

Explained David last week over the almost overwhelming din of a lunchtime ale house:

    "I deliberately chose the name in favour of something that sounded perhaps heavy because now no one can say they're being conned. Especially nowadays there's a lot of narrow mindedness among groups or at least behind the organisers who claim to be presenting free music for free people but I don't see how they can because they're so hypocritical in everything else. I suppose you could say I chose Hype deliberately with tongue in cheek."

David's last record was the ultra dramatic "Space Oddity" which was a good reflection of the extent to which his imagination will stretch. In some ways the conception of the song was so simple (dealing with the disastrous shortcomings of an astronaut) that you wonder why it hadn't been done before. It is more than probable five or six years ago "Space Oddity" would have been given an icy reception and even banned as being sick. The disc was in fact banned in the States.

    "I was pleased that the record was a success but getting a hit wasn't so very important and I honestly can't see why it was so popular."

The last statement could only be put down to modesty and David is a very modest character. He has refused to allow himself the easy way out of becoming bitter towards the business. "Space Oddity" at last brought him deserved recognition after several attempts at getting a hit but now that charts hold little attention for him.

What then does the future hold for his new release with Hype "Pretty Star?"

    "I think a lot of people are expecting another 'Space Oddity'" said David, "and 'Pretty Star' is nothing it. I'm sure this is why the BBC aren't plugging it. Everyone wanted another song with the same feel as 'Space Oddity' but as I'd done it I didn't see the point of doing it again.

    "The song served its purpose but I hope I'm not going to be expected to write and record a whole lot of stuff that is so obvious as 'Space Oddity'."

I remarked that it had taken some time for "Space Oddity" to start making an impression on the charts - a statement which had David nodding vigorously.

    "Yes," he agreed, "it took about three or four months to catch on and the release had been held back about three months before that. The only reason I can think of is that the record company were waiting to cash in on the American moon landing. It was banned in the States because they thought it was in bad taste and even might upset some people."

This is something which David stoically makes no apologies for.

    "All my songs are very personal and I combine this with an exaggeration so the meaning is clearly brought home to the listener. A lot of my compositions are very much fantasy tales. I like Marc Bolan's songs very much because I think he obviously feels the same way."

The conversation then swung once more to the intriguing Hype.

    "I'm very happy with the band," says David. "I have Tony Visconti who has played bass on nearly all my records, John Cambridge, who used to be with Juniors Eyes and Mick Ronson on guitar and I play 12 string guitar.

    "Although we're all happy with the set up, I can't see it becoming a really permanent thing. I want to retain Hype and myself as two separate working units whereby we can retain out own identities.

    "The gigs we've done so far have gone better than I expected. We played the Roundhouse recently and it was great. The Roundhouse audiences seem to be something apart from the usual blasé London audiences.

    "We've had these costumes made by various girl friends which make us look like Dr. Strange or the Incredible Hulk. I was a bit apprehensive about wearing them at the Roundhouse gig because I didn't know how the audience would react. If they think it's a huge put on the whole thing will backfire but they seemed to accept it which was nice.

    "The best audiences I know of are up north where they really appreciate you. In London the audiences are very aware that they are living in the place where it's all supposed to be happening so inevitably they have this cool attitude they'll try and sell you anything from a pair of trousers to your own car."

    David had much more confidence and stage presence with this backing group, and as his songs are suitable for grooving to as well as just listening to, the brightest hope could well change categories.

    This show was a disaster. The volume on Mick Ronson's lead guitar was so high that not only did he block out David's singing but also completely overpowered John Cambridge's drums. The volume also cleared the seats in a direct line with his speaker.

    That magic that makes for greatness is there but suppressed, sometimes even hidden. If my ears ever recover I expect to see David plus Hype in a few months time... shining through.

    As for Bowie's growth as an artist, the highlight of the album comes when he stops the band and asks, "Isn't there one damn song that can make me break down and cry?" With any other pop singer in the world, you'd know that he or she wanted to be taken seriously. With Bowie, you just believe that he half does and half just says what he thinks he's supposed to. Which isn't bad, but only the way it is.

    The majority of this album was recorded at Sigma Sound in Philadelphia, home of the East Coast Soul Sound. The strangest thing is that the most successful and the most soulful track on the album, "Fame", was recorded at Electric Lady Studios in Manhattan. Written by Bowie and a new collaborator named John Lennon plus Carlos Alomar, it sounds very much like the Average White Band's "Pick Up The Pieces". Once you've heard it, it sticks with you and while you listen to it, it's really quite difficult to stay still.

    But back to those distorted vocals. The second worst track on the album is "Across The Universe", that classic tune from the Beatles' Let It Be album. Usually I love the way Bowie interprets other people's material, but this is just hideous. Even Lennon standing at his side playing guitar was not enough to intimidate him into a better performance.

    On the whole this is a very successful experiment for David Bowie. It is certainly much better than many of his other experiments. If fact, if he does decide to stay with this for more than one album I imagine he will become quite excellent at it. (Of course the progressive world will suffer the loss of a major creative force if he does fall into the top 40 soul music format).

    He pauses; a set of neatly manicured and varnished fingernails - "All my own work," he chuckles - reach up to administer a delicate flick to his nose. Already, though still flesh and bone, David Bowie gives a distinctly futuristic, otherworldly feel.

    It might seem strange that someone as young as he is, and enjoying so much success, should be so concerned about age and decay. "I'm always worried about it," he grins ambiguously. "Think of the pain involved."

    He would love to be put on ice before he got really old. Kept alive until a new age, "Walt Disney's done it. He got them to freeze him until they've found a cure for the illness which was killing him. Anyway, think of the fun waking up in 200 years time. There'd be so many new things to look at and find out about." He winces; changes tack radically. "Of course, more likely there'll be nothing to look at at all. It'd be nice though to know how exactly it did all turn out."

    Nobody has created such a stir as Mr. B, Old Aladdin Sane himself, since the turn of the decade. He's the most provocative figure in modern music. Listen to his records. Watch him perform. Read what the press have to say about him. Where does that leave you? Confused probably. And intrigued. Actor, poet, clown, and, of course, songwriter, as with that great enigma of the sixties, Bob Dylan, he recedes from your grasp, even as he reveals himself. Now you see him, now you don't. Roll up, roll up, I give you the new Wizard of Rock. What he has over the all the other rock superstars is a real mystique. Sheer class. He is able to generate powerful images, to promote a sense of myth, like no other modern star.

    It's mostly due to the fact that he has always been at least equally as interested in theatre and films as he has in music. And also because he's always refused to allow himself to be bound by the images he generates. This is at least part of the reason why he recently decided to retire from live performances after his last date on his U.K. tour.

    He needs to involve himself with many different things. Record production, films, theatre; he's always said that he never regarded himself primarily as a rock star. That it was only a mantle he assumed for convenience sake to get himself to a position where people would take notice of what he did. Now he's in that position, now that the public as a whole recognise his abilities, he can expand and explore further a whole range of activities.

    Not that he intends to stop recording. Almost immediately after the tour he left for France to record his new album "Pinups." But he's not a musical technician; he's a performer, a writer, an instigator. "I always knew from an early age that my role in life was to lead; not follow."

    He never had any intention of flogging himself round the world year in, year out, like the conventional rock musician. He's an original, and knows it. His guitarist and fellow-arranger musically, Mick Ronson, platinum blonde and skinny, points out: "Dave's always making up chords and sequences of his own. That's why his songs sound so different." Nothing daunts Bowie from trying his hand at the new. His chequered career is an excellent indication of that.

    "Something's got to happen. It's all very sterile at the moment. I mean, few young people go to the theatre. Rock's replaced it. It has the energy which modern theatre has been striving to find, but can't. It is the new theatre, really. But, let's face it, most rock artists don't know what they're up to; they don't know how to use it. They've lost their way."

    Certainly, Bowie is one of the few performers who seem capable of giving rock a new, fruitful direction, away from the arid, self-indulgent instrumental meanderings and macho posturing of the so-called 'progressive' faction. His live performances exhibited a subtlety and control which rock them beyond the range of the average rock audience. This explains why his admirers cover such a broad cross section of age groups and attitudes, and, for all his 'fag' image, nowhere is he loved more than in traditionally 'earthy' working class cities like Glasgow, Liverpool, Leeds.

    It's probably true to say that he's one of the few people to really touch the pulse of this insane age we live in. When you buy a Bowie album you are not just coughing up for the songs and the sound, you're taking an aura, a life-style back into your homes. And in a society as deluged by image and sound as ours is, the distinctiveness and individuality of Bowie's work is as refreshing as a raindrop in the Sahara. Right.

    That's why he has had so many imitators. All across the country on his last tour, boys, and girls, men and women were turning up in their Bowie make-up and garb. The zig-zag from Aladdin Sane sleeve, and the gold studded spot in the centre of the forehead which Bowie used throughout the tour were to be seen flashing from all parts of the auditorium.

    In Guildford, there was even a security guard, called Brian Burchett, an antique dealer by regular trade, who sported a Ziggy hairdo and heavy eye make-up, which belied the obvious power and muscularity of his physical frame. "He's a very beautiful person," said Brian after meeting David backstage. "He's so friendly and considerate." What, some may ask, is it all coming to? When even the men, the 'real' men with broad masculine physiques are camping it up. "It's all coming out into the open," grins David, "and I love it."

    No one's too sure what Bowie will do after he's recorded his new album, and Bowie isn't saying too much about it, although he does expect to involve himself in a film in the near future. He's being wooed at the moment by the likes of John Schlesinger, director of 'Midnight Cowboy'. His ambition is huge. You can feel it in all he does.

    Yet he has the discipline to ensure that he takes each step one at a time, even if some of them are frighteningly gigantic ones. Whatever he does, everyone's eyes will be on him, watching for any signs of weakness. Bowie knows it and enjoys it. It's all part of the game. "I'm a tightrope walker. Always have been. That's the only way I know how to live."

    No matter whether it's night or day, bright or dull, one of his pupils remains the same size! And it often looks a reddish colour. Many of his fans think it's always been like that - but Music Star has found out the real truth about this peculiar Space Oddity!

    For the first time, David tells all!

"When I was fourteen I fell in love with a girl. I can't even remember her name now - but at the time I was crazy about her!
"Only trouble was, my best mate had a bit of a soft spot for her, too.
"I was the winner. Quicker off the mark, I suppose! I moved in before he'd even made up his mind how to approach her...
"Anyway - next day I was at school boasting to my mate about what a Casanova I was and he became terribly annoyed.
"In fact he threw a punch at me! It caught me in the eye, and I stumbled against a wall and on to my knees. At first he thought I was kidding - it wasn't a very hard punch. But it had obviously caught me at rather an odd angle.
"At first they thought I'd lose my eye - I was scared stiff. But in the end it turned out that only one of the muscles that control the pupil was damaged. That's why my eye never changes size.
"For quite a while I was very embarrassed about it. Although I could see very well out of the eye, it made me self-conscious.
"But as I've grown older I've got to like it. It makes me feel different - distinctive!
"As far as the guy who hit me's concerned, he's still one of my best friends. He's a charming, honest person and not at all violent.
"He played in a group with me, too - the Bo Street Runners, we were called. Then he made a couple of singles as a soul singer before becoming a professional artist."

    David's friend still feels bad about the affair sometimes.

"I'm sure David doesn't think about it nowadays - but every time I see him again after a long break, I'm reminded of what I did to him, all those years ago!" he told us.

    And now, the man who made Space Oddity, The Man Who Sold The World, Hunky Dory, Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars and Aladdin Sane is putting a new album into orbit. It's called PIN-UPS and will be released in mid-October. Make sure of your copy by ordering now at your local record shop.

    RCA Records and Tapes

    Bowie's representative, Dai Davies, later told NME this week that Bowie "wishes to apologise to the 1,000 people who were turned away from the Croydon Greyhound on Sunday because of over crowding. He intends to play another gig in the area as soon as possible."

    This should be out on May 25 provided Bowie and RCA can iron out the differences over a small matter on the cover in the meantime.
    Bowie's spoken introduction Future Legend sets the scene - a devastated city with "fleas as big as rats," "rats as big as cats" and "peoploids." Then comes the title track and it seems as if we're in for a natural follow-up to "Aladdin Sane" with touches of Watch That Man and not a little Stones influence.
    But thereafter the mood changes and it rapidly becomes clear that the only other Bowie album with which this has much in common is the greatly under-rated "Man Who Sold The World." It's eerie, bleak, but compelling listening and undeniably brilliant. It contains some of the best music Bowie's ever written and he's never been any slouch as a tunesmith. The lyrics too house some great lines.
    After Diamond Dogs comes a loosely-knit suite of three songs Sweet Thing, The Candidate and Sweet Thing (Reprise). It embarks in neo-Brel style before veering off in a more whimsical direction and returning with Bowie working right at the top of his range. All very strange and disquieting. Rebel Rebel closes off the side.
    The second half is far more immediate, opening with an insidious toe-tapper Rock 'n' Roll With Me, perhaps the most obvious choice for a single. If that one lulls you into a false sense of security, the next We Are The Dead snaps you right out of it with cold calm report from beyond The Styx.
    Then comes the one that for me is the guvenor of the whole album - 1984. It's the ultimate in song construction with a shuffling verse complemented by a beautiful chorus - tasteful, classy, seemingly effortless. Big Brother is the production number of the album and, in a way, the twin of its predecessor. Then the work closes with Chant Of The Ever Circling Skeletal Family, which returns to the mood created right at the beginning.
    Bowie's contributed more to the instrumentation on the album than past ones and done himself proud. Tony Visconti shares the kudos for production. Despite the excellent contributions of the supporting players on "Diamond Dogs" it remains very much Bowie's LP and without doubt the finest he's made so far.

    *** F.C.

    Although Bowie is financing the project, his commitments with his "Diamond Dogs" show in America will preclude him from taking any active part in the making of the film.

    "Yeah, I've got one pin," said David Bowie.

    Well, it turned out David was in luck then. If he went to a little town in Missouri at a certain time, he would be able to see in a seemingly empty field a fully-equipped flying saucer repair shop at work.

    It was one of those fascinating things you learn at a Bowie soiree. This evening the gathering was rather intimate. There was Corinne, David's charming personal secretary, who ducked out early due to exhaustion (although another participant gossiped that she had someone interesting waiting for her in her hotel room).

    There was a tired newspaper reporter trying to get a question in edgewise now and then. There was Ava Cherry, the effervescent, razor-thin, husky-voiced black singer and dancer with white bleached hair who was part of David's backup vocal group on his "soul" tour. There were three more young black ladies, members of Ava's "gang" when she was growing up, whom she invited over now that she was back in her hometown for a night.

    There was a nice young roadie who had just resigned from David's crew for some mysterious reason, which David wanted to find out about. The roadie had brought along two local friends, a guy and girl, and the guy was the flying saucer man, who had actually seen UFOs, both in flight and on the ground.

    And, of course, there was Mr. Bowie himself, somewhat tired from the energetic performance he had given to a packed audience less than an hour before. He looked relaxed in a loose-fitting, uncolourful overall outfit, and although his eyes seemed weary and his voice was a bit hoarse, as the conversation twisted and turned among the subjects of music, extraterrestrials and political conspiracies, he gradually grew animated and energetic, jumping up to make a point, stalking around the hotel suite while listening to someone else, dancing while seated on a chair and singing along as he played tapes of his forthcoming soul album.

    "I used to work for two guys who put out a UFO magazine in England," he told the flying saucer man. "About six years ago. And I made sightings six, seven times a night for about a year when I was in the observatory.

    "We had regular cruises that came over. We knew the 6.15 was coming in and would meet up with another one. And they would be stationary for about half an hour, and then after verifying what they'd been doing that day, they'd shoot off.

    "But I mean, it's what you do with the information. We never used to tell anybody. It was beautifully dissipated when it got to the media. Media control is still based in the main on cultural manipulation. It's just so easy to do. When you set up one set of objectives toward the public and you've given them a certain definition for each code word, you hit them with the various code words and they're not going to believe anything if you don't want them to.

    "That's how the Mayans were ruling South America thousands of years ago. That's what the media is. That's how it works. The Mayan calendar: they could get the crowds to go out and crucify somebody merely by giving them a certain definition, two or third words, primed in terms such that they could tell what day the people would react and how they would react... I sound like a subversive."

    The reporter protested that he knew the media all too well and they weren't organised enough to carry off any kind of conspiracy or manipulation.

    "It's seemingly disorganised," replied David. "It's not disorganised, because I've been in the media as well. I used to be a visualiser for an advertising agency, and I know exactly what - I mean the advertising agencies that sell us, they are killers, man. Those guys, they can sell anybody anything. And not just products. If you think agencies are just out to sell products, you're naive. They're powerful for other reasons. A lot of those agencies are responsible for a lot of things they shouldn't be responsible for. They're dealing with lives, those ad agencies."

    Somehow to make a point about how humans are all manipulated, David bought up Hitler's Germany and said that Hitler, too, was controlled. He wasn't really the man in charge. The reporter asked how as that possible when Hitler's personal military mismanagement probably cost the Germans the war.

    "Oh he was a terrible military strategist," said David, "the world's worst, but his overall objective was very good, and he was a marvellous morale booster. I mean, he was a perfect figurehead. And I'm sure that he was just part of it, that he was used... He was a nut and everybody knew he was a nut. They're not gonna let him run the country."

    But what about losing the war, asked the reporter. Was that part of the plan too?

    "No, that's not what I said," said David, exasperated. "I said I don't believe that he was the dictatorial, omnipotent leader that he's been taken for."

    At this point, the flying saucer man broke in to try and help put things in perspective. "I think that you have to look at it as the same thing as your band," he said to David. "You'll sing, out of a zillion notes, you'll sing X amount. But you are the figurehead of the band. You're the main man. Hitler was the main man of his entourage."

    David seemed somewhat taken aback at being put in the category as Hitler. "Yes... well, I'm the leader, the apparent organiser and what-not, but the product which takes place is a contributed product, and responsibility lies with the whole lot, and the direction is on many shoulders."

    "The responsibility lies in you," maintained the flying saucer man, sounding like a Nuremberg prosecutor.

    "No it doesn't," David protested. "Once you get out there and start working actively, the responsibility's on everybody's shoulders."

    "Yes, but with the public -" began the saucer man.

    "Exactly!" interrupted David. "That's what I'm saying, man. It works like Hitler but the actual effect was produced by a number of people, all working their own strategies of where it was going to go."

    At this point the tension suddenly broke. David and everyone in the room broke into laughter at the seriousness with which a rock and roll star and some acquaintances of one evening were presuming to figure out the way the world ran. Everyone lightened up, and David put on tapes of the new album on an elaborate studio tape deck that RCA had delivered to his suite. Ava Cherry sang her parts, and David sang his, along with the tape, which was full of exciting soul type music, taking David a step farther in the direction he started on the "David Live" album.

    After listening to four numbers, Ava and her girlfriends persuaded David to leave with them. Ava knew a millionaire who lived not far away in a modernistic mansion full of strange delights. David gulped down another cup of coffee, with cream and sugar, put on a striking green coat - it looked like mohair - and followed them out of the suite.

    It was 2.30 a.m., and the sluggish night crew of the small but elegant hotel barely looked up as the red-haired rock star and four giggling black girls made their way through the lobby to the waiting limousine.

    Mr. Ralph Hoy says he was unable to re-let the flat in Beckenham, Kent, for nine months and "then only at less than its true market value."

    As I reached the bottom of the final staircase, Bowie stood at the top - apricot-haired, his lean face serious and clutching a handyman power drill. Zoom... zoom! One second an unsmiling David was playing cowboy with the drill as a gun and me as the target... the next he was smiling, giving me a kiss on the cheek and apologising for the mess. "Sit down," he said, giving me a gentle nudge towards a cosy bed of giant cushions in the middle of the floor. "Don't mind if I wander around a bit and carry on working, do ya?" I didn't - it was fascinating to watch such a genius-mind concentrating so hard on a job like picture hanging. And while he worked I sat cross-legged in front of the crackling log fire, glad of a chance to slide off new shoes that were as painful as they were pretty. And glad too, of a little time to gaze around.

    At the far end of the room a bright patch of light shone from the attic windows in the high ceiling down to the wooden floor. Rays of New York light which managed to peep through David's jungle of creeping, crawling potted plants hanging like a greenhouse of greenery suspended from the sky. And I thought back to a conversation I had heard just minutes before when someone was on the phone arranging an appointment for the "plant doctor" to visit. Now I knew why the greenery looked so healthy...

    So did David, come to that. Eyes clear (even though he had been up for two days and nights working), skinny but fit, alert and so interested in knowing all about the things he had been missing during the year he had been away from England. "Only don't talk about the films you've been to see," he smiled. "Or we'll never get to talk about anything else." So I asked what David had been up to since he left England - apart from the amazing Diamond Dogs tour which wowed American for seven months.

    "Well, I've written some films," he smiled, obviously pleased to back on his favourite subject so quickly. "I've written nine films," he added just as a matter-of-fact after-thought. "Nine?" I asked. He looked surprised. "Yes," then with a mischievous laugh, "if nothing else happens, at least I'll have all these portfolios of art work to show." He picked up a big black zip-around case, the kind models carry their photographs in, and handed it to me.

    Inside was a picture story so fascinating that David had drilled another dozen holes before I surfaced. They were David's visual ideas of what his films would look like on screen - more than that, he had gone back to the very early days of filming when each camera shot was planned and drawn as art work before the actors and crew were even hired. So that was exactly how David had gone about his first film. He had scripted it and then drawn his impression of each and every camera shot.

    Now he was busy deciding the answer to an important problem - who he would like to play which part. But he did make one definite decision - he had no plans to be in the film himself. "I don't think I want to be a film star," he smiled, a dazzling film-star smile. "I really want to concentrate on directing." He also wants to shoot his film in England. "I'd really love that, to come home and do the film there. But I musn't talk about it, I get really homesick if I do, ya know." He laughed, but his eyes said that it really did upset him to think too much about England and the fans he had left behind. So instead we talked about New York, which out a big grin on his scrubbed, sculptured face.

    When David does venture outside his front door - which isn't often when he has a project to finish - he heads for the junk shops where he can rummage around for hours without being spotted. He covers the give-away hair the a large, gangster-style fedora and goes bargain hunting. And on the day I called, a bright sunshine day in March, he had come back loaded with finds.

    "Look at this comb I found in the ten cents box," he beamed, holding up a beautifully vulgar black and white plastic tail comb. "It's a genuine 1950s and it was only ten cents. I could have bought huge boxes of stuff for just a few dollars. It was just amazing." He sat down at last and stretched a lean arm towards some magazines. "And these are actual 1930s magazines. Just look at this..." he pointed to some black and white photos of a streamlined thirties lounge. "It's exactly the room we have downstairs, the same windows, everything." In my mind I cleared away the furniture from the picture and cleared away the collection of Zowie toys I'd been careful not to step on when I arrived and realised that David was right. The rooms were forty years apart, but identical. "It isn't easy finding good things like these magazines in all that junk," said David. "I guess I'm, just a good shopper," he laughed.

    Just then the clomp of someone coming up the stairs caused a few silent seconds as well waited to see who it was. Pat Gibbons, one of David's management team, greeted everyone with a smile on his face and an advanced copy of David's new album under his arm. Everyone gathered round to see. David looked pleased, he liked it. And so did everyone else. "The only thing is why does it open like this - this is bad," he showed Pat the wavy edges of the cover where the sides gaped open instead of fitting snugly together to give the album some protection. Pat assured him that it was only because this copy had been rushed through for David to see and it would not be like that for the actual album. David nodded and was happy. He looked back at me and asked if I'd heard the tracks for Young Americans... this was some weeks before the album was released and until that moment only David and the people closest to him had heard his final choice of tracks. So I knew how special that offer was. As I said I really would love to hear it, he jumped up, found the one-and-only-copy and turned the volume full on. Then, as I sat and listened, he started wandering again, giving me the occasional glance to see if my expression reflected any thoughts on what I was hearing. I was beaming...

    When the album was finished David strolled back and sat down. I told him I had never heard an album with so many potential singles on it. He looked really pleased... not like a superstar used to compliments and expecting praise for his work, but like the sensitive artist David is, doing everything possible to create something special, something he hopes people will enjoy.

    As David stretched out, relaxing for the first time since I had arrived, his secretary Corinne, came to remind him that he had a fitting with his tailor. He was having something beautifully Bowie-made for his appearance at the once-a-year Grammy awards the next weekend when he to be one of the award presenters. He had just fifteen minutes to change before his driver arrived. So I packed up my things, handed over a pile of English magazines I thought he might like to read and squeezed my feet into the offending shoes.

    "When can you come back?" - How about Wednesday afternoon? Three o'clock all right? Downstairs the doorbell rang and a minute later someone buzzed through to say David's car was waiting. So off he scooted, up more stairs to his bedroom to shower and get ready. "See ya Wednesday," he smiled. "Ooh and thanks for the Easter egg, couldn't wait till then to open it.

    As I made my way downstairs, I passed what remained of the giant chocolate egg which had travelled with me from England. I had heard that David liked chocolate - and by the little that was left of the egg I could see that he did.

    At five-to-three on Wednesday a cab dropped me on the corner of David's street. I walked the rest of the way. Taking the responsibility of being one of only half-a-dozen people in New York who knew his address a bit far, I made sire I wasn't being followed.

    I found David still putting up pictures. One whole wall was complete - photographs, sketches, sheets of stamps under plastic.

    Just then tickets arrived for a Rod Stewart concert that night and David asked Corinne to remind him to ring John Lennon to see if he would like to go along too. Then it was back to the serious business of picture hanging, stopping only to light a cigarette, autograph some photographs for me to take back to England or to show me some more "finds" - like the old Christmas snow scene inside a glass dome and the dozens of plastic circles moulded to look like bronze plaques. "I can do so many things with those," David said, enthusiasm bubbling in his voice. "And then I've found this shop that sells plastics, every shape and colour you could possibly think of. I just couldn't buy anything when I was there, there was just too much. I had to come home and think about it all first." And even though "home" at that time was mostly packed away in wooden chests, David already had a picture in his mind of how things would eventually look.

    But before he could make his plans come true for the rest of the house, David had to put the finishing touches to his studio.

    ...As I left he gave me a kiss on my cheek, a quick hug and then that familiar sound... zoom... zoom. Which is where I'd come in...

    You've got singles and albums in every conceivable chart and everybody from "Tit-Bits" to the "Times" has suddenly decided that it wants to know all about you'n yours, because of the songs you write, the way you look, your face, your race and all kinds of stuff like that.

    And all over the chic bits of the planet, there are people doing their best to look like you and act like you and just generally be you. And naturally, you get pretty concerned.

    So, when a journalist tells you about the lookalikes who he sees at your concerts, this is what you tell him.

    "Firstly, I find it exciting. Then I find it sad, because I know the reason why I became Ziggy and what went into Ziggy. And I always want to rush up to them and explain, 'Before you do this, you must know this and this and this and this.

    But Bowie created a new persona, whereas all these young dudes are content to mimic.

    "The same way that I do myself, and did, especially when I was younger. I was the world's worst mimic - I mean, Anthony Newley. I was Anthony Newley for a year. He stopped his world and got off, which is terrible, because he was once one of the most talented men that England ever produced.

    "Remember the 'Gurney Slade' series? That was tremendous. A friend of mine has a collection of them, and there's a lot of Monty Python in there - left-handed screws and right-handed screws."

    One of the more disturbing things about Bowie's work is that the same Nietschean concepts that formed a basis of Nazism crop up in songs like "The Supermen." How does he feel about being rock's prettiest neo-Nazi?

    Well, he laughs out loud at the thought.

    "That's a humming bloody image, isn't it? I don't know that I'd be really at home with that. I know what you mean though. I set 'The Supermen' as a period piece, but I think it was a forward rather than backward thing. What did you think of 'Stranger In A Strange Land'?"

    "Stranger In A Strange Land", the journalist instantly recalled, was Robert Heinlein's legendary science-fiction novel and one of good ol' Charlie Manson's favourite pieces of bedtime reading. "I think it's the worst-written great book I've ever read," he offered hopefully.

    Bowie considered this for a moment.

    "Yes. Okay," he replied at length. "What do you see as its faults, then?"

    Oh well. Deep breath. "I don't think he writes good dialogue. I don't find his characters at all real. I mean, you're pretty improbable but you're believable.

    Bowie shook with laughter, and then buried his face in his hands. "I'm feeling worse and worse the longer this interview goes on. I found very much the same thing. I find that a lot of it I enjoy very much.

    "I liked the idea behind it all, but I thought the conversation was very bad. Do you think it would translate well into film?"

    Definitely. Was Bowie considering buying it?

    "I've got it. I've written some music for it, anyway."

    Could there ever be, I wondered, a Ziggy movie?

    "A lot of people I've talked to that have been to the shows have got a very, very definite idea of what Ziggy is and what he represents. They know how he works for them. I would not want to shatter anybody's private movie.

    "I would not care to do that, because, not having heard their versions, I agree with them as well as I agree with my own version. I see what they mean, and I would hate to destroy and of that because it's all real. It's all valid."

ONE OF THE many things that sets David Bowie apart from most of tepid ramblers currently passing themselves off as songwriters is his ear for dialogue.

    "Suffragette City" owes its paranoid edgy feel to the constant, repeated vocal backing riff "Hey Man", demand the voices, and that call-and-response technique perfectly evokes the mood of someone who's endlessly trying to get something together, but "those freaks on the phone/won't leave me along".

    "Yes, yes. That's exactly what it was like. That's what is was supposed to be. In fact, I was going to stage it with a phone box on stage."

    I mention Arthur Brown's use of a 'phone during Kingdom Come sets.

    "Oh, Arthur's fabulous. He lives quite near me in Beckenham, but we've only been together once in the last six months, which is ridiculous, because we're just about a hundred yards from each other in the street.

    "Actually Keith Tippett and Julie are just up the road as well. We've never, ever had the chance to actually get together. It's always been that one of us is doing something - I've tried. I adore Centipede - I think they're the most exciting experiment. They really excited me, they're really good, especially because of the kind of music we're getting into now."

    One vile rumour concerning Bowie's recent teenage hit single was that the title refers to the noted novelist Jean Genet, author of "Our Lady Of The Flowers" and "The Thief's Journal."

    "It was very, very sub-conscious, but I think it's probably there, yes. Lindsay Kemp did the most fantastic production of 'Our Lady Of The Flowers' a couple of years ago, and it's always been in the back of my mind. As a production it was superb, absolutely fabulous. He did it at the Travis Theatre in Edinburgh."

    On "Jean Genie", Bowie "wanted to get the same sound the Stones had on their very first album on the harmonica. I didn't get that near to it, but it had a feel that I wanted - that '60s thing.

    "I've got someone to play second guitar in the band now. I was with a duo many moons ago. A guy called Hutch from Scarborough used to work with me, and I've brought him back. He's going to do some backup vocals."

OFF ON another tangent, I asked David if it was necessary to believe in one's own fantasies, or whether one could maintain a fantasy while remaining detached from it.

    "Yes, I think you have to believe in them, and I think you have to really know whether you want to live in a fantasy, or in a presumably real world."

    How can David manage to not only live his own fantasies, but to enable others to live them also?

    "Because I ride with it. I don't plan it; it just becomes something that I derive much satisfaction out of letting ride, and seeing what happens. A lot of other people have them.

    "I think my fantasy, especially in England, is pretty well what a lot of our audience has as well. It's just that role business - about "What is my role?"

    "Do you think reality has much of a future?"

    "No."

    It's a cheap and nasty trick to throw people's lyrics back at them, but I decided to question the lines from "The Bewlay Brothers" that ran: "We were gone/Kings of oblivion/we were so turned on/in the Mindwarp Pavilion". It sounded like a kick at those who lie around all day long in a drug-induced stupor.

    "I've been through that one as well, yeah. I was quite heavily into it at one time but I found that I wasn't producing material. And that - to me - is very, very important.

    "I like to think that I'm bringing something out of myself, and I have to be able to bring it to other people. It's probably quite important to get very stoned a lot of times."

    Particularly what was David aiming for in his writing?

    "I'm probably after, firstly, reaction. If I don't get reaction, then a piece has failed, as far as I'm concerned. If a thing is booed into the ground, then that is a reaction, and I just want it to have a reaction."

    Trouble is, too many people react by regarding David as a new kind of poofter joke. Some of Russell Harty's questions when Bowie recently recorded a segment in the London Weekend Chat Show were in fact concerned with poking fun at David's clothing and manner.

    "Yes, that's because he's...

    Bowie caught himself in mid-sentence, and slowly a broad grin expanded outwards across his face. He sank his head in his hands, and muttered "Shit", and then began to laugh. "Everybody has fantasies, and I'm sure Russell Harty probably has as many fantasies as I do."

    "I think that whole "Let's come out on the streets' bit is very new, to England anyway, and I think everybody is struggling with it very badly. I don't know, we'll see. I think it's all very funny at the moment."

    Of course, most of the glitter brigade are very hetero, and the real gay ones are covering it up.

    "Yes, that's very sad, and I understand their predicament. It's a great puzzle to me, because I don't know whether I am against or for Gay Lib.

    "I understand that they want to have people to be with, so that they're not on their own. I mean, I understand that feeling so well, 'Oh no love, you're not alone', absolutely.

    "I mean, my feeling is that I need people a lot. I know that feeling so well. But on the other hand, to put that many people all together at once is perfect, perfect meat for the papers to pick upon and ridicule.

    "When you're all together like that, you can be stamped immediately. To be a guerilla, to be on your own, is far more rewarding in the end, if you have the determination to carry it though."

WHEREAS IN the '60s, the way to be outrageous was to be sloppy, inarticulate lout (c.f. Jagger, M.). today's rebel will be gay or pseudo-gay.

    "Probably for gay people that's marvellous, because with a bit of luck it'll become part of society. Now, every second person has long hair, and still retains the spotty appearance. With a bit of luck, there'll be as many eccentrics as non-eccentrics.

    "As soon as McLuhan made it so readily available to the public that science fiction was now part of everyday life, it began to be written about as much as any other subject."

    As a closer, a asked David for a quick 'n nifty 35-second State-Of-The-Union message.

    "Oh, Charles," said the man, "you are dreadful". But he leaned into the microphone, and have vent to the following: "Prepare for your war, because it's going to be your war. this is to the people, because it's going to be civil, and not worldwide."

    "The script is meaningless," says Bowie in a Sunday Times interview conducted at the Berlin Wall, "but the clothes are nice"...

    For although Lady Stardust himself has probably had more to do with androgyny's current fashionableness in rock than any other individual, he has never made his sexuality anything more than a completely natural and integral part of his public self, refusing to lower it to the level of gimmick but never excluding it from his image and craft. To do either would involve an artistically fatal degree of compromise.

    Which is not to say that he hasn't had a great time with it. Flamboyance and outrageousness are inseparable from that campy image of is, both in the Bacall and Garbo stages and in his new butch, street-crawler appearance that has him looking like something out of the darker pages of City of Night. It's all tied up with the one aspect of David Bowie that sets him apart from both the exploiters of transvestism and writers/performers of comparable talent - his theatricality.

    The news here is that he's managed to get that sensibility down on vinyl, not with an attempt at pseudo-visualism (which, as Mr. Cooper has shown, just doesn't cut it), but through employment of broadly mannered styles and deliveries, a boggling variety of vocal nuances that provide the program with the necessary depth, a verbal acumen that is now more economic and no longer clouded by storms of psychotic, frenzied music, and, finally, a thorough command of the elements of rock & roll. It emerges as a series of concise vignettes designed strictly for the ear. Side two is the soul of the album, a kind of psychological equivalent of Lola vs. Powerman that delves deep into a matter close to David's heart: What's it all about to be a rock & roll star? It begins with a slow, fluid "Lady Stardust", a song in which currents of frustration and triumph merge in an overriding desolation. For though "He was alright, the band was altogether" (sic), still "People stared at the makeup on his face/Laughed at his long black hair, his animal grace". The pervading bittersweet melancholy that wells out of the contradictions and that Bowie beautifully captures with one of the album's more direct vocals conjures the picture of a painted harlequin under the spotlight of a deserted theater in the darkest hour of the night.

    "Star" springs along handsomely as he confidently tells us that "I could make it all worthwhile as a rock & roll star". Here Bowie outlines the dazzling side of the coin: "So inviting - so enticing to play the part." His singing is a delight, full of mocking intonations and backed way down in the mix with excessive, marvellously designed "Ooooohh la la la"'s and such that are both a joy to listen to and part of the parodic undercurrent that runs through the entire album.

    "Hang on to Yourself" is both a kind warning and an irresistible erotic rocker (especially the hand-clapping chorus), and apparently Bowie has decided that since he just can't avoid cramming too many syllables into is lines, he'll simply master the rapid-fire, tongue-twisting phrasing that his failing requires. "Ziggy Stardust" has a faint ring of The Man Who Sold the World to it - stately, measured, fuzzily electric. A tale of intra-group jealousies, it features some of Bowie's more adventuresome imagery, some of which is really the nazz: "So we bitched about his fans and should we crush his sweet hands?"

    David Bowie's supreme moment as a rock & roller is "Suffragette City", a relentless, spirited Velvet Underground - styled rushing of chomping guitars. When that second layer of guitar roars in on the second verse you're bound to be a goner, and that priceless little break at the end - a sudden cut to silence from a mighty crescendo, Bowie's voice oozing out as a brittle, charged "Oooohh Wham Bam Thank You Ma'am!" followed hard by two raspy guitar bursts that suck you back in to the surging meat of the chorus - will surely make your turn do somersaults. And as for our Star, well, now "There's only room for one and here she comes, here she comes."

    But the price of playing the part must be paid, and we're precipitously tumbled into the quietly terrifying despair of "Rock & Roll Suicide". The broken singer drones: "Time takes a cigarette, puts it in your mouth/Then you pull on your finger, then another finger, then your cigarette." But there is a way out of the bleakness, and it's realized with Bowie's Lennon-like scream: "You're not alone, gimme your hands/You're wonderful, gimme your hands". It rolls on to a tumultuous, impassioned climax, and though the mood isn't exactly sunny, a desperate, possessed optimism asserts itself as genuine, and a new point from which to climb is firmly established.

    Side one is certainly less challenging, but no less enjoyable from a musical standpoint. Bowie's favorite themes - Mortality ("Five Years", "Soul Love"), the necessity of reconciling oneself to Pain (those two and "It Ain't Easy"), the New Order vs. the Old in sci-fi garments ("Starman") - are presented with a consistency, a confidence, and a strength in both style and technique that were never fully realized in the lashing The Man Who Sold the World or the uneven and too often stringy Hunky Dory Bowie initiates "Moonage Daydream" on side one with a riveting bellow of "I'm an alligator" that's delightful in itself but which also has a lot to do with what Rise and Fall... is all about. Because in it there's the perfect touch of self-mockery, a lusty but forlorn bravado that is the first hint of the central duality and of the rather spine-tingling questions that rise from it: Just how big and tough is your rock & roll star? How much of his is bluff and how much inside is very frightened and helpless? And is this what comes of our happily dubbing someone as "bigger than life"?

    David Bowie has pulled off his complex task with consummate style, with some great rock & roll (the Spiders are Mick Ronson on guitar and piano, Mick Woodmansey on drums and Trevor Bolder on bass; they're good), with all the wit and passion required to give it sufficient dimension and with a deep sense of humanity that regularly emerges from behind the Star facade. The important thing is that despite the formidable nature of the undertaking, he hasn't sacrificed a bit of entertainment value for the sake of message.

    I'd give it at least a 99.

    Newton is, in fact, the leading role in the film. He's a character described as someone "who is intensely creative, like no-one else on earth." A fitting part then, for David Bowie, who takes on the role of this mysterious and complex personality. The story begins when Newton appears in the office of a New York attorney (we're not told why) and persuades him to abandon his entire practice in order to represent a single client - Newton himself.

    Despite Newton's frail appearance, the lawyer predicts that his apparent scientific knowledge will revolutionise the nation's system of communication and lead to the largest corporation in the USA being formed.

    His prediction proves correct and as Newton's business grows so does his personal fortune.

    Meanwhile, he falls in love with Mary Lou (Candy Clarke) a simple, sensuous woman. Yet although she is a deeply understanding and caring person, she too instinctively avoids asking any questions about his origin.

    Success follows success and Newton is ready to begin another, more ambitious project. One in which he will gamble his entire world-wide enterprises and launch his own space programme.

    But even to Mary Lou, to whom Newton talks of a wife and family far away, he remains elusive, admitting no more than that he loves them both. But while the wealth that Newton amasses brings him love and admiration, it also brings him increasing opposition. Soon a theory evolves that this strange tycoon is an alien, perhaps even an emissary from another world. And as Newton's Space programme increases so does the growing persistence of those people who oppose his operation into space.

    Finally, before the blast-off Mary Lou fights desperately to keep him for herself, for she alone realises that he is deserting her to go back to his wife.

    She needn't have worried. Minutes before blast off, Newton is kidnapped and his lawyer murdered. His opponents have wreaked their vengeance. Newton is their prisoner and to prove their theory they carry out experiments on him which indicate a strange physical flaw that is not human. Newton realises that he can learn to live with this, for he alone can reach above and beyond those who diminish him. And so we too are left with the dilemma - was he "The Man Who Fell To Earth...?"

    Unlike a lot of his fellows in the pop-biz, David didn't change his surname, purely for effect. His current surname came to him, some years back, when he was trying to get known in the pop world, with a line-up called, David Jones (that being his real name) and the Lower Third. "We were doing all right, I suppose, when another group - The Monkees - became a big hit, and of course, one the members was David Jones, so I thought it was time I had a change of name!"

    One of David's great love's is art. "When I first left school I joined an advertising agency, as a commercial artist. I quite enjoyed the actual job, but I really found the whole business too cut-throat, so I quit to get some music together."

    David's music is very original, he has a style of his own. We wondered if he'd always played this sort of music, or if he had arrived at his own style through various influences. "Well, I guess I've always played the sort of things I do know, though they used to be simpler. But, there was a time when I led a group called David Bowie and The Buzz, when we played progressive blue, very loudly!"

    Did David ever get tired of the music machine, of the never ending run of tours, we asked him? "It's very exhausting and one often gets depressed. In fact, at one time in my career I did leave music altogether! I formed a mime troupe called Feathers. Then joined a troupe called the Lindsay Kemp Mime Company and was with them for eighteen months. At one of my London concerts, I used the troupe to do the theatrical interpretations of my songs!"

    Did he get depressed very easily? "Oh God yes, though I try not to let it get me too down. You get so run down when your on the road, too little sleep, irregular meals, that it's really surprising that eventually you get very low."

    If touring got him down so much, we asked him, now that he was a big name, why didn't he cut his tours down a bit? "Don't get me wrong, I don't dislike touring, quite the reverse, it's just very wearing, that's all. I really enjoy going on stage and performing. It was really the performances that got me known. My album's got a lot of critical acclaim, but, like, Hunky Dory, didn't sell as well as lot of people thought. So, my fame is really pretty recent!"

    How did David go about getting together The Spiders From Mars, his backing group? "Well, I got the original members together when I asked guitarist Mick Ronson to join me, he'd been playing in bands for years, and he also played on Hunky Dory. Mick was at one time in a band called Ronno, and two other former members joined me as well, that's drummer Mick Woodmansey, who really knows his instrument, he's been playing drums since he was five, and bass player Trevor Bolder.

    Now that he has the music biz all sewn up, had he any other projects he like to work on? "Well I hope to be in music forever! But I would like to do a few other things as well. I did start an arts lab at one time, I'd like to do that again and acting I'd like to do a lot more of that, but first and foremost for me is my music!" That's fine by us David!