Saturday, February 6, 2016

David Bowie: Out of Ohio

It's ironic that the late David Bowie is being celebrated as a consummate cutting-edge cosmopolitan or even the Ultimate Brit. But his style is directly attributable to a guy from Ohio: the little-known Scott Walker.

So what changed Bowie's singing style in 1965 from this:



To the more familiar Bowie we know?  It was this 1965 hit:


 
...pretty much.  Scott Walker. From southern Ohio.

The same guy who was on Eddie Fisher's TV show:



"He's been my idol since I was a kid," Bowie once said of Walker. David executive produced 30 Century Man, the 2006 documentary about Scott.

Here are several links discussing the huge impact of Scott Walker on Bowie's career (as often admitted by Bowie himself):

http://www.vulture.com/2016/01/bizarro-david-bowie-returns-on-blackstar.html
http://oneweekoneband.tumblr.com/post/7272065250/one-of-the-most-important-bowie-influences-that
https://bowiesongs.wordpress.com/2014/01/02/the-dreamers/

Here's even one in French: http://www.lemonde.fr/musiques/article/2016/01/08/david-bowie-toujours-sous-la-bonne-etoile-de-scott-walker_4843793_1654986.html

Walker's influence on Bowie was at the very beginning but also, as Walker himself changed (Changesonescott?), at the very end, with Blackstar:
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/hear-david-bowies-haunting-blackstar-theme-from-last-panthers-20151006

David is dead, but we still have Scott Walker with us to remember him by!  In 2015 Scott Walker composed the score for the film The Childhood of a Leader.  Scott Walker was very much a leader, influencing David Bowie who influenced scores of musicians on his own.


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