David Bowie is certainly up there with the most important musical figures that planet Earth has ever spawned. The man who first strode into the wider public consciousness in the guise of alien messiah Ziggy Stardust went on to explore, subvert and invent genres across a career that spanned over 50 years. His sad death in 2016 was marked by one final monumental creative achievement, that revered but devastating album Blackstar.
While we could blather on about Bowie all day (and believe us, that’s something we’re always eager to do), who better to rely on to provide an insight into the real man behind the mask(s) than his roster of trusty sidemen, his guitarists.
After all, they spent more time than most in the presence of the real David Jones.
A while back, MusicRadar compiled an array of conversations that had been conducted over the years by the site with a plethora of Bowie’s chief axe-wielders. From longest-serving guitarist Carlos Alomar, and Station to Station squall-merchant Earl Slick to Heathen, Reality and The Next Day aural wizard Gerry Leonard, via early ’00’s musical director Mark Plati and, fascinatingly, the man who arguably was pivotal to his post-‘80s creative rebirth, Reeves Gabrels. Now a member of The Cure.
First meeting Bowie at an art show, Reeves’ initial relationship with David was based on a shared interest in literature and culture, evolving into a musical partnership much later.
“What I found with David, really, was that the guitar playing was almost the least of it,” Gabrels told us. “We had a relationship first, so a lot of the time I felt like my role was to be the guy that reminded the emperor of what he was really trying to do. When other people were ‘yes man’-ing him, I decided my role was to tell him the truth.”
After the artistically meagre Tonight (1984) and the tragically uncool Never Let Me Down (1987), Reeves’ frankness helped Bowie steer his creative energies back into exciting waters.
“I said to him, ‘Do you have creative control? Does your label have to put out what you give them?’ And he said, ‘Yeah, they do.’ So I said, ‘Well, then, really it’s all down to your ego. If you’re willing to make the music you want to make, you should just do it.’”
And thus, for better… and for worse… Tin Machine was born.
Bowie’s rather odd notion of sticking himself within a raucous, Pixies-inspired band had many, many detractors, but time has been kinder to the project.
Making the two Tin Machine albums helped to deflate the bombast of his ‘80s pop persona, and was crucial for realigning Bowie’s sense of self. Best regarded as a cathartic exercise (as opposed to a genuine listening recommendation) Tin Machine served to get Bowie’s artistic ducks in a row ahead of a far more fruitful ‘90s.
“He said that for him that was a lightbulb moment, truly, because no-one had said that to him,” Gabrels remembered. “So my role with him became musical director, co-writer, co-producer, and it just so happened that I was also the guitar player. That was great, because I felt like I was really helping someone who I looked up to and I wasn’t just along for the ride.”
Gabrels told us about Bowie’s questing nature, and how he was never entirely sure of just what he was actually looking for until he heard it. This allowed Reeves unfettered freedom to push his guitar playing to bizarre extremes.
But directing musical ideas verbally was something that Bowie tended to do in quite a colourful manner…
“The first thing we did together was a reworking of [Lodger-era song] Look Back In Anger,” Gabrels remembered. “He said, ‘There’s two-and-a-half minutes at the beginning and the end, and the song in the middle for you to play guitar around.’ Basically all he had was a drum machine and keyboard pads. He said, ‘Maybe you could build German gothic cathedral architecture out of guitar.’ And I just kind of went, ‘Okay…’
“Then other times it was like, ‘This should be like Jackson Pollock’ or ‘This should be like The Persistence Of Memory by Salvador Dali, but with melting guitars instead of melting clocks.’ Or that it should feel like something written by Terry Southern. The reference points were rarely specifically musical. They were almost always visual or about feeling.”
Read our full interview with Reeves and more of Bowie’s chief guitarists in this feature.
