Young Americans

David Bowie's passing makes me reflect because he is associated with some very significant events in my life. I suspect this is not the case for my siblings and I don't know how true this may be for later generations, but let me explain.

We were raised on a diet of classical music, complete with music lessons. Mine was the violin. We inherited my father's disdain for all things modern-popular and he considered the Beatles to be no better than monkeys. My older siblings listened to Bill Haley, Buddy Holley and Beach Boys genres, but the British Invasion didn't really register with our Hungarian family in Sydney.

Even in high school in Seattle, my musical diet was playing classical music records on the family turntable while I lay on the couch imagining I was conducting or playing the solo.

By the time I started university, my living situation changed. It was the same house, but my house-mates had become rowdy friends. I had a car, I fed myself, we figured out how to get beer underage, and I had less reason to get haircuts. It was a very different environment, but I still clung to my father's deprecation of monkey-music.

That first year in college, l was driving my two-tone Chevy Nova home, south on 15th NE, left onto NE 55th, and an immediate right into the alley behind our house on 5224 15th NE. For some reason I don't remember, I had the car radio on a rock station. Sufragette City (1972) was playing. I was mesmerized. I couldn't believe how great it was. I had never heard anything like it. I pulled into my parking spot behind the house and kept the engine running. I had to hear the entire song and find out what it was. The DJ said David Bowie, Sufragette City.

From that experience, I got into Rock music. It was only a matter of time before I would succumb to cultural influences, but still, it all began that first time listening to Bowie.

His Space Oddity (1969) became a bit of anthem for my four to five year career as a pizza truck driver. My name is Tom. Bowie sings about Major Tom. It was a good fit made perfect because the drivers communicated with the dispatcher using CB radios. "Ground control to Major Tom."

Rebel, Rebel (1974) was played on record often enough, and under less than sober circumstances, that we anticipated every cracking sound scratched into the vinyl grooves. The musical climax for a 5224 kegger often was Jean Jeannie (1973).

When I broke up with Carla, I was devastated. Although I instigated the breakup, I became desperately depressed. Pulling myself out of that was another major watershed in my life, but during the process Young Americans (1975) and especially Sorrow (1973) gave me opportunity to express my grief. Young Americans also expressed my acceptance of being American, something I'd resisted through high school. Odd, a young American identity acceptance coming from a Britisher.

Time passed and I made friends with a gay former priest. Shelly's Leg was the place for gay guys to go dancing and it was the disco era. (If you don't know what Shelly's Leg was, look it up on the internet. There is a Wikipedia article on it.) By God those men could move. I associate Bowie's Fame (1975) with that wonderful, if superficial exposure to the gay world.

Time passes and I take my main squeeze to my most extravagantly favorite date: dinner at the Oyster Bar on Chuckanut Drive. As Shari and I drive through the Skagit flats towards home on Whidbey, intoxicated with lamb, sorbet, chocolate, and port, I remember playing Rebel Rebel, the sultry version by Ricky Lee Jones.

Time continues to pass and my music taste favors stuff you find in the Ethnic or World Music bins of a CD store, if there is any such shop still around. My iPod still has what's left of my six or seven Bowie vinyl collection, but there are few boisterous occasions when I dial up a youthful, rebellious rock song. As for current popular music, I checked out when New Wave turned to Grunge. I suppose I'm of an older generation and I like to complain that they don't make music like they used to.

Three days ago, for some reason that not even Shari knows, she decided to read the Wikipedia article on David Bowie. She was fascinated by the description of his education at Bromley Technical High School. David Bowie never meant much to her, but she urged me to read it. Two days later, yesterday, we woke up to the news that he had died.

BBC America, the news half-hour that shames every other American news or quasi-news program, put on a wonderful fifteen minute tribute to David Bowie last night. Afterwards, I put on my head phones and watched several You Tube videos of Bowie, then played some of those old vinyl tracks on my iPod. The man was amazing, and his exit from life pure artistic class.

It's a pity we wait for obituaries to celebrate someone's achievements. The accolades from people who know popular culture better than I consistently praise Bowie's genius, creativity, originality, and performance. They say his work influenced all who followed. If David Bowie is new to you, do yourself a favor. Become a Young American, if only for a senior moment.