Cover of “The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars”
With “The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars” David Bowie culminated his ten-year development in a concept work that, with its futuristic subject, would have been perfectly suitable for performance as a musical in London’s West End.
The airy song palette, produced by Ken Scott and masterfully arranged by Spiders guitarist Mick Ronson, not only struck a chord with the post-Beatles generation, key anthems such as “Moonage Daydream”, “Hang On To Yourself”, “Suffragette City” and “Rock’ n’Roll Suicide” also developed visionary qualities. Not for nothing did they have a permanent place in Bowie’s stage repertoire for a long time.
Also new was the postmodern narrative style, which presented science fiction with social themes in a subcultural context. Bowie also came out as bisexual, danced wickedly with Ronson on “Top Of The Pops” during the presentation of the single “Starman” and posed with US counterculture greats Iggy Pop and Lou Reed.
Then the then 25-year-old slipped into the role of the androgynous extraterrestrial Ziggy Stardust – not only for the evening performance on stage – who walks the earth as a cultically revered “star” and therefore has to die.
As a sign of the fan mania that soon blossomed not only in England, Bowie’s henna-red squirrel look became the in-haircut of the hour worldwide within a few months. In short: Pop XXL.
An article from the RS archive