Just on two years back I wrote a post about a particularly interesting album by David Bowie entitled Station To Station. That blog post attracts more comments than most on this blog.

The album was released in 1976. The album is excellent in its own right and marks Bowie’s transition from his US influenced ‘plastic soul’ period of Young Americans through to the experimentation of the Berlin influenced trilogy of Low, “Heroes” and Lodger. Bowie collaborated with Brian Eno on those albums.

My original post sets out the variations in the artwork that were planned for and finally graced the Station To Station album sleeve. The original artwork incorporated a full colour photograph of Bowie taken on the set of the film, The Man Who Fell To Earth. This artwork, apparently, was not favoured by Bowie and a cropped black and white incarnation of the photograph was utilised instead. That album sleeve is shown below. Some of you may own a copy.

Many fans were oblivious to the existence of the full colour artwork until a copy was published in David Bowie: An Illustrated Record by Roy Carr and Charles Shaar Murray. The full colour artwork was an impressive revelation at the time and many wondered why the decision was made to go with the cropped black and white photograph.

Full colour printer proofs were produced by RCA in the USA in 1975. Michael Olsen, who was working for Bowie’s record company in 1975 obtained copies of the printer proofs amongst a collection of materials that the company felt was no longer needed. Michael himself commented about this on my earlier post. In addition to the RCA full colour proofs printed in the USA a number of 24″ X 12″ full colour flat mock-ups of the sleeve were produced by RCA in the UK and these were used by sales representatives to market the forthcoming album. One of these RCA UK mock-ups is illustrated below. Promotional posters printed at the time featured the full colour artwork as well.

During the late 1980s one of the full colour RCA proofs was sold or passed to a collector in the UK and it was utilised to produce a counterfeit of the full colour artwork. One could pick up a copy of the counterfeit sleeve for £10.00. As I commented on my original blog post the counterfeits were excellent and nicely reproduce the RCA USA colour proof. They were folded and glued and they were ubiquitous amongst Bowie fans from that time. Some collectors bought half a dozen or more. It was a genuine bargain. One of these counterfeits is illustrated below. I bought two.

Most fans thought that they would never ever get to see a copy of the authentic artwork for the full colour Station To Station sleeve and when the counterfeit turned up it it was a real god-send. We all knew it was a counterfeit but we did not care. It was simply neat to have a copy and thus get an idea of what the full colour RCA sleeve would have looked like if it had actually been officially released.

The counterfeit is a little flawed however. When one looks closely at the artwork it is blurred. The colours do not blend well and appear to be ‘bleeding’. This is illustrated below. The counterfeit is on the left. The official RCA product is on the right.

Well today, Jeff Gold, a famous record collector and dealer commented on that blog post as well. Jeff confirmed Michael’s account of the original colour proofs in the USA and shed light on yet another version of the Station To Station artwork that featured white lettering across the top of the album sleeve. A copy of that proof was placed on eBay today. I illustrate that proof below.

This new revelation adds another chapter to the history of this album sleeve. It will surprise many fans.

Finally, in order to confuse all of you further, when the Station To Station album was reissued with bonus tracks by both Ryko and also EMI during the 1990s they utilised the full colour artwork. A Japanese CD reissue in 2007 featured the black and white artwork.

Addendum. This is a photograph of the two late 1908s reproductions and the RCA UK flat mock-up, in the foreground, that I possess. The test pressing of the album is on the right.

Back in November 1985 David Bowie’s record company, EMI, had planned to release a compilation album featuring dance remixes from a couple of Bowie’s recent albums. The name of the album was imaginatively titled Dance [EMI ST-17175]. Each track on the proposed release was to receive additional production and mixing by Rusty Garner and Paul Sabu. The track listing was as follows:

Loving The Alien
Let’s Dance
Shake It
Blue Jean
China Girl
Dancing With The Big Boys
Modern Love

However, the album was withdrawn from EMI’s release schedule and it did not come to pass. No vinyl or CDs were pressed. A number of printer proofs for the sleeve were created. One of these was recently auctioned on eBay. Before all the sleeves for the album were destroyed a few were salvaged and others were used as packaging material for other albums as delivered to retail outlets. These were subsequently passed on to fans.

The sleeve artwork is not that brilliant and it seems that EMI was attempting to recapture the hype that surrounded Bowie in 1983 at the time of his hit album Let’s Dance and the Serious Moonlight Tour. Download a high resolution image of the sleeve.

Links:

BowieNet
Illustrated David Bowie discography
Bassman’s Bowie Page

One of my favourite sites on the Internet is Wolfgang’s Vault. “What is that?” you ask? It is one of the most incredible music sites on the web. It streams live concert audio archives going back 40 or more years. There are concerts by David Bowie, Neil Young, Led Zeppelin, Blondie, Devo, Allman Brothers Band, Joe Cocker and on and on. There are over 1740 concerts. Check out this listing…

Many of these shows were broadcast live on American radio networks. Some of you may remember the King Biscuit Flower Hour or the Superstar Concert Series? Quite often these radio broadcasts were recorded by fans on to tape and then bootlegged. One of my favourite bootlegs was Resurrection on 84th Street which featured a live performance by David Bowie that was recorded at the Nassau Coliseum in Uniondale on the 23rd March, 1976. I bought my copy from Toad Hall’s Rare Records in Victoria via the post. The double album set cost me $11.00AUD.

Anyway, portions of this show are now available at Wolfgang’s Vault. The band for the tour were tight. The shows were powerful. Bowie was really enjoying himself.

Every now and then I surf over to the vault and listen to a gig or two. It is incredible. The two Led Zeppelin shows from 1969 are brilliant.

Tonight I thought I would set up Airfoil on the Mac and play the streamed audio through my stereo via the wireless network. I have been playing my iTunes playlists over the wireless network for a while now. I should have set up Airfoil to broadcast the other audio on my Mac as well a long time ago.

This software is neat. You can select the different nodes on your network and adjust the volume and equalisation of the audio. Works on Windows too.

Caught Devo live in concert last night in Sydney. It was brilliant. To quote their own bio the “band took its name from their concept of “de-evolution” – the idea that instead of evolving, mankind has actually regressed, as evidenced by the dysfunction and herd mentality of American society.” Most of the tracks they played during their frenetic gig came from their first three albums. There were quite a few fans wearing the Devo Energy Domes as well as the yellow or white boiler suits.

Photograph of Devo by AfterGlow76. Some Rights Reserved.

I was a little surprised when they came out on stage. A couple of the band members looked rather portly in their trademark yellow boiler suits. I have seen David Bowie as well as the Rolling Stones perform live recently and they are holding their own somewhat. Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo had put on a little weight, yet his energy levels were enormous. They all performed at a frantic pace. It was such a great show.

Photograph of Mark Mothersbaugh by Nathan Wind as Cochese. Some rights reserved.

I first saw Devo perfom live back in 1982. I had read about the band in a copy of New Musical Express in 1978 and imported their album Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo! It was simultaneously an immensely enjoyable and challenging album. You hade to be a little eccentric or willing to step outside of your musical comfort zone to get into Devo.

Photograph of Devo by AfterGlow76. Some Rights Reserved.

I bought some of their early singles, some live bootleg albums plus their first few official albums after that. I have since sold the bootleg albums on eBay.

You can catch their seminal track, Jocko Homo, live here on YouTube if you wish to sample a live experience from 2007. There is a live audio recording of Jocko Homo dating bac to 1978 on the Devo MySpace page as well. Here are the lyrics for you to digest. What can they teach you in the 21st Century you web 2.0 devotees?

Jocko Homo by Devo

They tell us that
We lost our tails
Evolving up
From little snails
I say it’s all
Just wind in sails
Are we not men?
We are DEVO!
We’re pinheads now
We are not whole
We’re pinheads all
Jocko homo
Are we not men?
D-E-V-O
Monkey men all
In business suit
Teachers and critics
All dance the poot
Are we not men?
We are DEVO!
Are we not men?
D-E-V-O
god made man
but he used the monkey to do it
apes in the plan
we’re all here to prove it
i can walk like an ape
talk like an ape
do what a monkey do
god made man
but a monkey supplied the glue
We must repeat
O.k. let’s go!

Well, is there a lesson for teachers and administrators in there, somewhere?

Addendum 7th August, 2008. Dion, over on The WhimWham has written a great review of the gig with a setlist, photographs, video and an acount of a meeting with the band! Simply brilliant!

This is an aboriginal interpretation of Zorba The Greek. This performance always lifts my spirits. I am always happy to see anyone enjoying life and not taking themsleves too seriously. As the description on the YouTube page explains…

Frank Djirrimbilpilwuy from Milingimbi has been in the Indigenous Media Industry for many years and has been a long-standing member and supporter of the Top End Aboriginal Bush Broadcasting Association, TEABBA Radio. He has worked Independently in Music and Film for many years also. As the man behind the camera and release of the video, Frank is also representing the dance group who call themselves “The Chooky Dancers”.

Frank has said that he filmed the footage at this years Ramingining Festival on the 30th September 2007 and knew it would be “something special” as soon as he saw the boys rehearsing. “The crowd went wild as you can see in the video, and the classic song Zorba the Greek has now become a hit overnight in the communities and now it seems, everywhere else too.”