I don't recall why I stopped reading this back in 2014. Probably boring schedule demands and nothing more. After the tragedy of 2016, I couldn't bear the thought of reading anyone else's thoughts about my favorite human being. However, a few nights ago, a friend asked if I often felt sad that I would never get to meet Bowie. The answer to that is complicated, and too personal for a Goodreads review.Nevertheless, the question reminded me I still had this on my shelf. I started fresh with it yeste...

It is an essay rather than a book, and a subjective one, at that. The reader learns few things new about Bowie, but learns a whole lot about Critchley's perception and understanding of Bowie. The books is filled with literary and cultural references of varying obscurity, that are meaningful to the author, but are tedious for the reader. If you get them all - good, but if you do not - it's a choice between ignoring a chunk of text or, well, spending time to Google. And the latter route is just un...

Not a pop star biography, this is a loving philosophical investigation into the underpinnings of David Bowie’s many personas and why he has exerted a practically lifelong fascination over the author. Predictably my favorite elements of this book were the parts where the author talked about his own life and what individual Bowie songs meant to him. Like you would expect, Critchley covers gender, sexuality, creating identities, and dystopias. But what was different from everything else I’ve read a...

Not my cup of tea. Way too personal for supposedly being about someone else. I know more about the author after reading it than I do about Bowie. I knew it wasn't a biography "On Bowie" or anything like that, but I expected more context. Also just felt like a bunch of jibber jabber sometimes, but, you know, trying to sound smart and quoting "important people" to top it off. Felt a bit arrogant, even towards some of his idols work that apparently wasn't good enough for some reason. Can I interest...

A collection of personal musings/essays about the magic that was Bowie. Critchley brilliantly captures the feeling of sexuality, sadness, and hope that David Bowie exuded with every breath. Though most of us never met the man, Bowie transcends stardom and instead moves each person whose life he touched with his music in a way that is almost spiritual. There will never be another being like him...and how beautiful and tragic that is.

I always liked David Bowie, but he was never someone to get excited about. He wasn’t authentic. All his poses were pulled from more pure sources, or so I thought. Unlike some of those influences, though, Bowie has aged better. There’s a carnivorous feel to his art, like hip-hop, that chews up the scenery of the times and spits out a wholly original yet recognizable pop gem. That’s a talent. Now add all the literary references and ideas about identity and more to his work and you can see why inte...

This slim little volume lets loose philosopher Critchley on the oeuvre of the rock star who gave him his first sexual response as a 12 year old watching Top of the Pops. Not many musicians could provide enough grist for this type of mill, but Bowie, almost 50 years into an almost indescribable career, certainly does. In fact, the book feels short, the punches (friendly or otherwise) pulled. These are sketches, cunningly arranged to give a suitably non-linear overview of Bowie's career, full of t...

I received this from my son and daughter this year 2016 for Mother's Day. I was and still am a massive Bowie fan from the first time I heard and saw him on TV. More so as Mum thought he was just plain weird! We do that as a teenager enjoy shocking our parents. I began reading this that night but his death was still too raw. I finished the rest of it tonight and loved how Simon portrayed David's life and explained his music. I had my own views of the meanings of his songs so this added to my own....

Despite this being a book about Bowie, and, ostensibly, about the meaning of persona, transformation, and the negotiation of "nothing," this is a very personal, beautiful book. Obviously, as a book titled, "Bowie," it will resonate with those already familiar with Bowie's body of work and litany of characters. But its an accessible book that might prove meaningful to anyone interested in the discussion of persona, of "authenticity," and an artist's complete commitment to their cause over a lifet...

personal and illuminatingsimon critchley is a fan and writes like one. he also happens to be a smart guy. unlike critics, fans usually are able to navigate the corpus of an artist as a geography where peaks and valleys have a value of their own and at the same time make sense only if you understand long processes, like a geologist. in this case, critchley's "geology" happens to be philosophy. while reading the book, i was able to recognize the love and to bodn with the author in his assessments

R.I.P. David, you meant a great deal to me (and millions of others too). The new album is great. 11.1.16enjoyed this immensely (I am a Bowie fan - a big one in the 70s when I saw him live, not so much in the 80s and 90s)..more laterIf I grew up with the Beatles – I was 7-15 during their reign – then Bowie took over from 17 – 25. I went to see Bowie in 1972 – see this review – and was taken by his fast and furious musical ch-ch changes, which made me grow with him and open up my mind to new music...

Hello Critchley!

“I feel that reality has become an abstract for so many people over the last 20 years. Things that they regarded as truths seem to have just melted away, and it’s almost as if we’re thinking post-philosophically now. There’s nothing to rely on anymore. No knowledge, only interpretation of those facts that we seem to be inundated with on a daily basis. Knowledge seems to have been left behind and there’s a sense that we are adrift at sea. There’s nothing more to hold onto, and of course political...

This is an excellent collection of short essays on the impact David Bowie and his work had upon the author, and by extension others like him. It pulls from all corners of the discography, arriving at beautifully tied themes and conclusions that will make you smile with delight. Critchley approaches this in a charming, slice of life manner, as he meanders across time, with Bowie ever waiting in the wings to bring in new meaning and relevance.Any David Bowie fan looking for more than the usual cas...

LET ME BEGIN WITH A RATHER EMBARRASSING confession: no person has given me greater pleasure throughout my life than David Bowie.Short, personal collection of quasi-chronologically sorted essays on Bowie's music and life-work starting with the Ziggy phase and ending with the release of "Where Are We Now?" (sadly no "Blackstar", which is amazing). After the personal introduction (Bowie as a symbol of the other for kids who grow up in terrible British suburbs, "Millions of self-conscious mini-Hamle...

A lightning fast read - 90 minutes at most - yet profound and thought provoking. A lot of music criticism is self-indulgent or tries too hard but this treats Bowie and his work with the respect and reflection it deserves. I don't always agree with Critchley's take or taste but his arguments are well founded and warrant our attention, even when we don't agree. The author is a fan and much of his feelings about Bowie's place in his life mirror my own. Critchley is also a scholar and puts the work

Very short book written by a fan and giving his thoughts about some of the songs. I wouldn’t recommend it for someone wanting a more general book about Bowie’s life or career, but as a fan tribute for other fans to read, it’s quite an enjoyable little book.

I had a medical procedure this morning. The doc was running late, and thus, I was gifted the time to read this amazing gem of a book in its entirety. This book was wrapped under our Christmas tree with a label saying "To: Jess, From: David Bowie" - the kids were mystified and a bit alarmed, as one often is when contemplating Bowie.This book - written by "the most powerful and provocative philosopher now writing" (so says Cornel West) - dissects and reassembles Bowie's complete body of work, unco...

A breeze of a read, very deeply processed appreciation here. Critchley is opinionated to the max and that's good and bad. He does provocative drive-by shootings on memoir and levies wrong-headed hatred, to me, of Bowie's joyous, deep 1983 hit "Modern Love." But what you admire and even envy is his love and knowledge of Bowie. How he seized as a boy upon the artist and his music, seeing from the start Bowie's genius. A key appeal of the book for me is that it almost becomes a stealth memoir. We s...

For me, this is the perfect bedtime book, full of thought-provoking and personal essays in bite-sized chapters. I cannot tell you how often I'd drift to sleep with a particular Bowie tune in my head, which -- as you can imagine -- resulted in some interesting dreams. As I consider myself 'nerd-lite' in the Bowie world some of the topics did elude me, but that only made me more determined to do further reading on his life and works.