"I took some manuscript paper and I was writing stuff down, and I stopped and said: ‘Do you know what you’ve got here? This is the finest collection of songs, and I tell you what, I don’t have any money but if I did I would put it all on saying that this particular record – which he already told me was going to be called Hunky Dory – will still be around and important long after you and I are gone.’ I went to his house, and he had his guitar and he played all of the songs, and every single one was a winner. ![]() “He knew how the music needed to be and he would pick musicians that he felt could achieve what it was he was after. “David knew what he wanted to do,” Wakeman tells Classic Rock. That’s why he brought in session ace Rick Wakeman to play piano and embellish and add more of a nuanced touch to the recording. Listening to Bowie’s home demo of Changes, the song is all there, although his playing is a bit plodding. Writing on the piano opened up his possibilities, because of its association with so many kinds of music – classical, cabaret, every style.” He had an ability to pluck a song from those first moments when he played with an instrument. “David was a fantastic musician, because his approach was not studied, it was by ear. © 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc.“He loved that piano,” Angie Bowie told me. I don’t think he ever knew how much of a fan I was, although I did get him to sign a copy of ‘Low’ once!” “He had many interests, and a childlike curiosity for the world in general,” the director says. Bowie provided words and some music for one of them, and according to Whately, relished the chance to work on something that wasn’t strictly music-based. The two first began working together in the late-’90s, when Whately directed a series of shorts about modern British sculpture. The documentary closes Whately’s own 20-year collaborative relationship with Bowie. And then he said, ‘What more could any man ask for?’ At the time, I thought, ‘What an odd thing to say?’ It was only after that I realized he was signing off.” He said that he was very happy with the album, and with his lot in life. He was sending out lots of e-mails - including one to me. “He was working very hard, putting his house in order. “Everyone told me that he mentioned it, and just moved off the subject,” says Whately. Compiling interviews with the collaborators the singer worked with on his final two albums and 2015 off-Broadway musical “Lazarus,” Whately goes deep in revealing the intention of his last works, and how his cancer diagnosis in 2014 affected that work.Īlthough Bowie underwent chemotherapy, treatment was stopped in November 2015 while he filmed the video for the “Blackstar” track “Lazarus.” Bowie found out he was dying while on-set. ![]() ![]() It’s one of the tidbits of Bowie’s reclusive last years that Whately uncovers in the film. “Apparently, she’s a yoga teacher in Bristol now.” “After all those years, who would have thought he was still thinking about her?” says Whately. While working on the 1970 film “Song of Norway,” Farthingale left Bowie for another actor on set. “She was his first big love,” director Francis Whately tells The Post. The video featured him wearing a T-shirt that said “Song of Norway” - a cryptic reference to actress Hermione Farthingale, who lived with Bowie in the late-1960s. In 2013, Bowie surprised the world by releasing the nostalgic ballad “Where Are We Now” (his first new material in 13 years) completely out of the blue. But as revealed in the new documentary “David Bowie: The Last Five Years” - premiering on HBO on Monday, Bowie’s birthday - the rocker couldn’t help but think of the one that got away in the twilight of his life. David Bowie’s 24-year marriage to supermodel Iman was one of the most rock-solid unions in showbiz, ended only by his passing from liver cancer in January 2016, at the age of 69.
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