“Space Oddity” is a song written and performed by David Bowie and released as a 7-inch single on 11 July 1969. It was also the opening track of the album David Bowie. The song is about the launch of Major Tom, a fictional astronaut, and was released during a period of great interest in space flight. The United States’ Apollo 11 mission would launch five days later, and would become the first manned moon landing another five days later. The lyrics have also been seen to lampoon the British space programme, which had only launched rockets at that time and has never attempted a moon landing. Besides its title, which alludes to the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, the introduction to the song is a barely audible instrumental build-up that is analogous to the deep bass tone in Also Sprach Zarathustra that is prominently used in the film. (More from Wikipedia)
Although still Cavern Club favorites who were known as “the wild, wild Klubs”, the true Liverpool bands (and later the audiences) began to resent the popularity of the Klubs who actually hailed from the other side of the Mersey River in Birkenhead. Not least among the reasons for this is that the Klubs began to let their hair grow halfway down their backs and started appearing on stage in dresses that they borrowed from their girlfriends and sisters. The above photo is how singer Paddy Breen looked back then. David Bowie had a hard enough time pulling off the androgynous pose, but at least he was based in London. The Klubs were being even more overtly provocative the year before Bowie’s first big hit, “Space Oddity” was released – and in a much rougher town.
(July 2013)
Future keyboard superstar Rick Wakeman was in the Strawbs in 1970 and 1971; he had been an active session musician, whose work includes playing mellotron on David Bowie’s first hit single, “Space Oddity” in June 1969.
(July 2014)
