Re: (TV) Bowie/Verlaine

["Philip P. Obbard" <pobbard@yahoo.com>]

For the story on Bowie and Verlaine and SCARY MONSTERS, you can read Tony
Visconti's version of events at
http://www.obbard.com/tvlist-archive/0005/msg00085.html

More TV content at the end of this email, but first to Cameron's question:

Judging from his home demos, I'd say Bowie wrote the vast majority of his own
stuff, but arrangement help from Ronson made a huge difference in the beginning
- just compare the version of "Memory of a Free Festival" that appears on his
second LP with the two-part single version that features Mick Ronson, recorded
shortly thereafter. It's a huge leap, and it's a blueprint for Bowie's next
five albums - all with Ronson. Likewise, Ronson's first two solo albums retain
similar arrangements, while Bowie's post-Ronson albums are all over the board
arrangement-wise.

Bowie's also pretty good about giving out writing credits when necessary,
although he didn't start doing it regularly until 1974 (e.g., "When You Rock
'n' Roll With Me", "Fascination", lots of stuff on the Berlin albums, and all
of his albums since 1995). The one obvious exception is 1970's THE MAN WHO SOLD
THE WORLD, his 3rd LP, which Visconti has always said was recorded and arranged
almost entirely without Bowie's involvement. According to Visconti, even
drummer Mick Woodmansey had a hand in writing the material, and a few people
have noted that "She Shook Me Cold" sounds an awful lot like a song that the
Rats (Ronson's former band) had worked on years earlier, yet it's solely
credited to Bowie. It was Visconti's anger over Bowie's poor work ethic during
this period that led to their initial falling out, and as a result Bowie worked
with Ken Scott for the next four albums and three years. 

Bowie was a big early fan of Television, BTW - he saw them in 1974 and called
them "the first new band I've seen who really has it together" or something
like that, which Television used to reprint on early flyers.

--Philip

--- Cameron Pulley <cpulley@navicominc.com> wrote:
> Did Bowie actually write most of his early songs?  I know they're all
> credited to him, exclusively.  However, a number of them are quite
> complicated (extreme key changes, obscure chord patterns, tempo and meter
> changes throughout the song, etc.)  I had always heard that Bowie was not a
> particularly good guitarist/piano player/sax player, however many of his
> early songs seem to show someone who obviously knows a lot about song craft.
> It's not just three chord pop.  Did he get a lot of "help"?
> 
> Didn't Tom Verlaine play on some of the sessions for Scary Monsters?  Did he
> and Bowie have creative differences?


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