This is also some of my Facebook thoughts from today...
Part of me keeps hoping that the Bowie news is just part of some elaborate performance piece. His new album is about death afterall. He's even got a song on it called "Lazarus."
Maybe, like Lazarus, he'll come back from the dead and we will see this as the latest in a long line of Bowie incarnations. Maybe this is just a new character for him to play.
Unfortunately it appears his final performance is as himself, leaving us behind to ponder his influence on our lives.
His influence on my life was substantial. In 1974, for my 14th, birthday, my older brother gave me four albums by artists that I was unfamiliar with. One of them was David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust & The Spiders from Mars. I firmly believe that album changed my life. I know that sounds ridiculous but after that album I started listening to better music - Bowie, Eno, Fripp, Talking Heads, Tull, Roxy Music, Genesis, Dylan, Tangerine Dream, etc. Music became hugely important to me. I worked at the student radio station in college and through that experience changed my major to Radio, TV & Film. After one thing leads to another over the years I end up editing video for a living. I'm in a creative field because of that album I got at age 14.
Thank you Ziggy Stardust.