David Bowie was really good last night. The most curious thing, though, was the "mature and affable" persona that he's been projecting since the Hours... album -- after all the metaphorical maskwork of previous decades (even what critics cite as the his "pop" phase of the '80s, as if he wasn't pop before), he wants us to think that he's "just a guy", if one that has an alterna-iconic edge. But in its own way, this is yet another manipulation, this time of the disarming sort: at first glance, the crowd of middle-aged Anglo suburbanites seemed prepared for a solid greatest hits package at the very most. It's amazing, then, that Bowie got away with playing so much material that was unknown to most of the crowd -- more than a third of the set was stuff from the last ten years. And a good thing, too: the most theatrically thrilling moment was "Hallo Spaceboy" from his 1995 Outside album; after his polite onstage banter, the image of Bowie menacingly silhouetted against a brilliantly white LED screen was a return to the Bowie of dreams.
Bowie's trying to reconcile various aspects of his career, and succeeds to a large degree. I always thought that his '80s take on "China Girl" was a dubious trivialisation of the shambolic Iggy Pop original, but his "nice, slightly alterna guy" persona was still comfortable playing shiny pop of that sort alongside the Pixies' "Cactus" and "A New Career In A New Town", my favourite instrumental from Low! While the show wasn't anywhere near as pretentious as I think a Bowie gig should be, this kind of eclecticism was still surprisingly challenging. Nothing from Station to Station though, which was a pity, because I know this band does a killer "Word On A Wing". But Bowie really needs Carlos Alomar to return on guitar -- Earl Slick's great for the wonderfully stuttering glam hits, but his blustery rawk nature obviously pulled the set in that direction, and even a slightly embarassing lead guitar solo. Mike Garson to Earl Slick: my demented piano solo smacks down your rawk guitar solo ANY TIME, boy!
The funniest moment, though, was when Bowie introduced all the players, but pretended to forget Gail Ann Dorsey, his bassist. Everyone was yelling out at him in horror, as she fidgeted in the embarrassing spotlight, but he'd apparently moved on: "back in the '80s I did a song with Queen; we really don't have time to play it tonight, but if we did, the person who'd sing Freddy Mercury's part would be... GAIL ANN DORSEY!". They did play it, of course, and I cried. And that's the crux of it, really: Bowie's career reconciliation involves placing "Under Pressure" centrestage as a heartbreaking pop masterpiece, and I'm totally down with that.
