David Bowie's Diamond Dogs (33 1/3, 143)

163 Pages·2020·3.388 MB·English

by  Glenn Hendler

DIAMOND DOGS
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Diamond Dogs
Glenn Hendler
BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC
Bloomsbury Publishing Inc
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BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC and the Diana logo are
trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
First published in the United States of America 2020
Copyright © Glenn Hendler, 2020
For legal purposes the Acknowledgments on p. vii constitute an
extension of this copyright page.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Hendler, Glenn, 1962- author.
Title: Diamond dogs / Glenn Hendler.
Description: New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2020. | Series: 33 1/3; 143 | Includes
bibliographical references. | Summary: “Provides a window into a moment when both
phantasmatic and real relationships between straightness and queerness, between
blackness and whiteness, and between utopia and dystopia, were in flux; Bowie in the
mid-1970s both exemplified and had a hand in creating the complex and contradictory
opening of possibilities now seen as the hallmark of that decade”–Provided by publisher.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019040272 | ISBN 9781501336584 (paperback) | ISBN 9781501336591
(epub) | ISBN 9781501336607 (pdf)
Subjects: LCSH: Bowie, David. Diamond dogs. | Bowie, David–Criticism and interpretation. |
Glam rock music–History and criticism. | Rock music–1971-1980–History and criticism.
Classification: LCC ML420.B754 H43 2020 | DDC 782.42166092–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019040272
ISBN: PB: 978-1-5013-3658-4
ePDF: 978-1-5013-3660-7
eBook: 978-1-5013-3659-1
Series: 3331
Typeset by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India
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Contents
Track Listing vi
Acknowledgments vii
1 This Is Not America 1
2 Who Can You Be Now? 11
3 1984 in 1974 19
4 Mr. Burroughs Goes to Hunger City 31
5 Boys and Things 41
6 Rough Trade 53
7 Futures 63
8 This Ain’t Rock ’n’ Roll 77
9 Repetition I 87
10 Repetition II 95
11 Wild Mutations 101
12 Everybody Wants to Be a Fascist 117
13 After the Human 127
14 It’s No Game 137
Track Listing
Side one
1. “Future Legend” (1:00)
2. “Diamond Dogs” (5:50)
3. “Sweet Thing” (3:29)
4. “Candidate” (2:39)
5. “Sweet Thing (reprise)” (2:32)
6. “Rebel Rebel” (4:21)
Side two
1. “Rock ‘n Roll with Me” (3:54)
2. “We Are the Dead” (4:48)
3. “1984” (3:24)
4. “Big Brother” (3:21)
5. “Chant of the Ever Circling Skeletal Family” (1:48)
Acknowledgments
There are many people to acknowledge, not only because
it’s taken years to write this book but also because I’ve
been thinking about David Bowie for decades. Reaching
back to the beginning, I want to thank Aram Berberian for
introducing me to David Bowie’s music. In the course of
writing this book I communicated with Aram and two other
old friends, Athene Reiss Mount and Hyla Flaks Crane, with
whom I attended my first Bowie concert in 1976. It was a
pleasure reconnecting with each of them, and I hope they see
some of their memories here. Next, Alan Linn gets credit—
but no blame—for persuading me that Diamond Dogs was
the Bowie album I should write about. Well, maybe a little
blame. I think back fondly to meeting Alan in 1981, and to
standing on the docks at Camp Hazen YMCA singing songs
by Bowie, Lou Reed, and others. I also met Stephen Trask
at Camp Hazen, where I was his counselor. Bowie’s music
spilled loudly from the speakers in my cabin during those
summers, and since Stephen went on to cocreate Hedwig
and the Angry Inch, I suspect he was listening. More recently,
Stephen spent several hours with me on Skype, working
A CKNOWLEDGMENTS
through Diamond Dogs song by song; it was extraordinarily
generous of him, and helped me hear the album in new ways.
I owe thanks to other Bowie fans who have helped sustain
me in my life, fandom, and intellectual engagement with
Bowie over many years. Beth Wagshul Besen helped me get
through high school by being a Bowie fanatic with me. More
recently, John Graham invited me back to that high school
to talk about this book; that was a great experience. Nancy
Deren and Gretchen Helfrich attended memorable Bowie
concerts with me, decades apart. In between, in the early
1980s, I had a late-night conversation with Todd Haynes
about Bowie, sexuality, and identification. He may not
remember it, but there are ideas from that chat percolating
in this book.
It’s also been a pleasure immersing myself in the world
of online David Bowie fan groups: Bowie Kooks and the
Church of David Bowie and others too numerous to list. I
have gotten information and ideas from the conversations
there. And though I hope I have given credit in the notes
to the extensive community of critics, biographers, and
scholars who have written about Bowie and from whom I
draw in this book, I have to single out Chris O’Leary, whose
blog analyzing every Bowie song has been adapted into two
intimidating and invaluable books: Rebel Rebel and Ashes to
Ashes.
Daphne Brooks’s 2017 conference on Bowie and Prince
was deeply inspiring, as were many of the talks I heard there.
So was a conversation I had at that conference with Michael
Gillespie about “We Are the Dead.” Michael is one of several
people I would have liked to talk with more about Bowie;
viii
A CKNOWLEDGMENTS
so are Daniel Alexander Jones and Tracy K. Smith. Geoffrey
Marsh, co-curator of the Victoria and Albert Museum’s David
Bowie Is exhibition, offered multiple insights in transatlantic
phone conversations. Meeting Sam Perkins resulted in more
than one good Bowie conversation and connection. Right at
the end, I got help with a musicological puzzle from Erich
Hertz, Matthew Gelbart, and especially Matt Brubeck. Since
I listened to Bowie with Matt four decades ago, it was nice to
do so again, even virtually. I appreciate support from multiple
colleagues at Fordham, including Chris Dietrich, Scott
Poulson-Bryant, and Keri Walsh. I’m grateful to Eric Lott
for sharing his work-in-progress on the waka-waka guitar
sound. Thanks to all my colleagues in Fordham’s English
Department, as well as to Fordham’s Office of Research.
Lina Jiang provided invaluable research and bibliographical
assistance. And I owe especially deep thanks to Sarah Mesle
and Sarah Blackwood, coeditors of Avidly for the Los Angeles
Review of Books. They encouraged me to write a piece on
Bowie for them right after he died, and that article is an
origin of this book.
I took so long to write this book that there are generations
of 33 1/3 editors to acknowledge. The idea for writing this
came up when I was sitting on a plane next to someone
who was reading much more interesting stuff than I was.
She turned out to be series editor Ally-Jane Grossan; thanks
for encouraging the annoying guy on the plane to come up
with a book proposal. Thanks to Kevin Dettmar for being
my initial contact with the series’ next editorial collective,
and to the other three members of that group—Daphne
Brooks, Amanda Petrusich, and Gayle Wald—for approving
ix