Five years without David Bowie’s living magic

Madrid. This Sunday will mark 5 years since the death of a musical icon who left as a testament an album, “Blackstar”, recognized by critics and the public as one of the best in history. Something few celebrities can boast about, but which is only available to characters as charismatic as David Bowie.

The legendary British musician, also known as “The White Duke”, a pioneer of “glam rock” and a reference to legions of artists, died on January 10, 2016 at the age of 69, two days after his birthday, in New York. from liver cancer he had suffered for 18 months.

The news of his death shocked thousands of people, since three days before he had released his latest album: “Blackstar”.

“Blackstar” was the twenty-fifth studio album, which, in retrospect, contains what, according to its researchers, seems to be references to his own death. An omen or the last evil of the artist who knows his fate?

Bowie took the answer to the grave, but the lyrics to the album’s first single, “Lazarus,” leave no doubt: “Look here, I’m in heaven, I have unseen scars, I have drama, it can’t be stolen, everyone knows me now.”

In addition, the video for this song, about four minutes long, shows a pale, blindfolded Bowie levitating in a hospital bed.

With only seven songs and a duration of about 45 minutes, the posthumous album is the only work that does not contain an image of the musician on the cover. In its place appears a black star, which, if placed in sunlight, turns into a field of bright stars and, if placed under UV rays, lights up as if it were a galaxy with blue stars.

Shortly after its release, the album was received with good reviews from both the music press and the public, reaching number one in the music charts in many countries.

The album, which sold 146,000 copies in its first week in the UK and over 181,000 in the US, peaked at number 1 on iTunes downloads in 25 countries and became Bowie’s first album. to reach the top position on the US Billboard chart.

But fame had already smiled on David Bowie more than four decades before., in 1972, when he released his fifth studio album “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars”, full of mysterious and electrifying lyrics, and accompanied by his image, as spectacular as it is ambiguous.

His biggest hits, turned into music classics and cult references, include titles like “Let’s Dance”, “Heroes”, “Under Pressure”, “Rebel, Rebel”, “Life on Mars”, “Suffragette City” or “Space Oddity”, and this brought him the Ivor Novello Award for his originality.

Bowie had an innate artistic vocation that led him to tempt painting, design and writing and to alternate music with film.

Beyond the triumph of the youth film “Labyrinth” (Jim Henson, 1986), where he shared the cast with a newcomer Jennifer Connelly, the British artist also participated in “The Last Temptation of Christ” (1988) by Martin Scorsese, where Pontius Pilate played.

“The Man Who Came from the Stars” (1976) by Nicolas Roeg, “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence” (1983) from the Japanese Nagisa Osima, set in World War II and with music by the famous composer Ryuichi Sakamoto or very popular in the horror genre “El ansia” (1983), by Tony Scottare also listed in the CV.

He also acted in the role Nikola Tesla, With Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman on the box Christopher Nolan, “The Final Trick” (2006) based on the epistolary novel by Christopher Priest which is about the rivalry of two magicians from the beginning of the twentieth century. All a paradox for the considered magician of pop music of the eighties and nineties of the same century.

Five years after his death, David Bowie’s magic continues to live on among his fans. A charm earned by his work. Since 2002 he has been on the list of the 100 most important Britons in history and in 2004 Rolling Stone magazine and also placed him among the most important hundreds of artists of all time and in its list of the best singers.