David Bowie – Think Bensonium

Day 282: Little Drummer Boy (Peace on Earth) David Bowie & Bing Crosby

Roderick Benson — Sun, 27 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000

This is such an utterly bizarre video in my opinion and well worth watching if you’ve never seen it. Who would have guessed that two very accomplished and famous musicians from opposite ends of the musical spectrum and from different generations would one day come together to produce this Christmas song. Like Bowie’s reference to Lennon being “an old fella”. Watching this now brings a little sadness to my heart knowing that both of them are no longer with us.

Update 31/10/2022: Unfortunately the original video posted here was taken off Youtube due to a copyright claim from Bing Crosby’s estate. I have therefore had to replace it with a video that is of much lower quality but at least it has been on Youtube for 11 years so most likely will not be removed in the near future.

Christmas Day 2022: Well it got taken down a 2^nd time which is kind of odd given I would not think the major music companies would be so precious about stopping this song being played on social media but there you go. Anyway, I have updated the link once again and we will have to wait to see how long this time the link stays live.

Day 274: Song for Dylan, David Bowie

Roderick Benson — Sat, 19 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000

I ended last week’s Covid Island Discs with another song from Bob Dylan. This reminded me of a David Bowie song which is a tribute to Dylan’s musical genius. Really think the lines below that Bowie penned about Dylan are quite appropriate.

About a strange young man called Dylan
With a voice like sand and glue
Some words had truthful vengeance
That could pin us to the floor
Brought a few more people on
And put the fear in a whole lot more

Day 70: 1984 By David Bowie

Rbenson — Tue, 18 Aug 2020 20:42:51 +0000

Wow another milestone. This completes my David Bowie trilogy with the last 1984 themed-based song from his Diamond Dogs album. I remember really wanting to have a New Years’ Eve party because wouldn’t it have been great to play this song at midnight on the dawn of 1984 (just as good as playing Prince’s 1999 at turn of the Millennium: man what a disastrous night that was, do you remember David E Coleman).

Needless to say, I did not get my wish because the Benson family were on holiday (can’t remember where now maybe Lake Macquarie Julie Cummings ??) so it was just a quiet night in for me as a then young 17 year old teenager who put the song on his car cassette radio near midnight so he could pretend and imagine what it would be like to play this song at that unique date in human history.

This song really is great in its musical intensity.

Someday they won’t let you, now you must agree
The times they are a-telling, and the changing isn’t free
You’ve read it in the tea leaves, and the tracks are on tv
Beware the savage jaw of 1984

They’ll split your pretty cranium, and fill it full of air
And tell that you’re eighty, but brother, you won’t care
You’ll be shooting up on anything, tomorrow’s never there
Beware the savage jaw of 1984

Day 69: We are the dead

Rbenson — Tue, 18 Aug 2020 20:42:06 +0000

OK given Helen is currently reading 1984 and since there is no discernible change in the Johnson government’s behaviour, I thought I would share two more songs from David Bowie’s Diamond Dogs album before returning to my 21^st century theme. The second half of the album had three songs all dedicated to the dystopian novel 1984. I remember studying this novel for the HSC (yes back in 1984 in fact: I’m a very old git now) and we studied it alongside Aldous Huxley’s “A Brave New World”. I think Huxley’s book is a more accurate prediction of what would happen in the Western world up until what I will call the “post-truth” Trump era. However, the doublethink of 1984 certainly appears to be becoming more present in modern political discourse. One absolutely unforgettable scene in the book is when Winston Smith turns to his lover and says “We are the dead”. She replies “We are the dead”. Then the government speaker on the wall sounds to life saying: “You are the dead“. Freaky stuff which is captured well by Bowie in today’s Covid Island Disc.

But now
We’re today’s scrambled creatures, locked in tomorrow’s double feature
Heaven’s on the pillow, its silence competes with hell
It’s a twenty-four hour service, guaranteed to make you tell
And the streets are full of press men
Bent on getting hung and buried
And the legendary curtains are drawn ’round Baby Bankrupt
Who sucks you while you’re sleeping
It’s the theater of financiers
Count them, fifty ’round a table
White and dressed to kill
Oh caress yourself, my juicy
For my hands have all but withered
Oh dress yourself my urchin one, for I hear them on the stairs
Because of all we’ve seen, because of all we’ve said
We are the dead
We are the dead
We are the dead

Day 68: Big Brother by David Bowie

Rbenson — Tue, 18 Aug 2020 20:40:57 +0000

This was not my planned post tonight as I am currently working through 21^st century songs. However, I feel this song is highly relevant to the current political shenanigans in the UK and it is a great excuse to hear some Bowie at his best.

“Someone to SHAME us, some brave Apollo
Someone to FOOL us, someone like you
We want you Big Brother, Big Brother“

Day 17: A Space Oddity by David Bowie.

Rbenson — Sun, 16 Aug 2020 22:00:33 +0000

So my rock collaboration theme has come to an end and I am now going to start to look at what some of these amazing people produced outside of the music they made as part of their collaborations. I will start with David Bowie (see Covid Island Discs day 14). This youtube live version is really great and worth watching.

Just remember in these difficult times to “take your protein pills and put your helmet on“

Day 14: Under Pressure by Queen and David Bowie.

Rbenson — Sun, 16 Aug 2020 21:53:05 +0000

Staying with the music collaboration theme, magazine said this was the second best rock collaboration of all time. An apt song for the reality in which we currently find ourselves.