It was during the "Earthling" tour, a period where Bowie had embraced the Drum 'n' Bass scene and other electronic elements in a continuation of the career renaissance that had begun with the release of "Outside" a couple of years prior. After a long period of lacklustre albums in the eighties and early nineties, Bowie had finally seemed to have rediscovered his groove, and you could tell from interviews and performances from around the time that he was excited about making music again. That excitement led him to record some great albums including 1997's "Earthling", and when he announced a tour in support of that record I was totally on board for the opportunity to hear it performed live.
But the appeal of the "Earthling" tour wasn't just the chance to see Bowie live again, it was also about the size of the venue he'd be playing in. This wasn't going to be a big stadium show, or even an arena sized concert, this was a club gig, an audience of only about a couple thousand people and that made it an event. By that point I had already seen him play shows from up close, but those had been at larger spaces where Bowie was still working with that old theatre ideal of making grand gestures because you're playing to the back row. The appeal of the "Earthling" dates was the chance to see a more focused performance, something up close and personal.
I was able to score a single for each of the two nights, and on the Saturday show I tagged along with my friend Nat who remains one of my most favorite people and a solid Bowie fan to this day. Nat and some other friends and I met up at my place on Queen Street before the show so we could take a cab over to the Warehouse together, and when we told our driver that we were going to see David Bowie he got very excited, telling us that he had gone to school with Iman and that she was very kind and a good student. Nat and I took that to be a good sign for the show to come and we spent the rest of the ride asking him questions about Iman which he was all too happy to answer. It should be noted that even now, twenty five years later, Nat and I still remember that taxi driver who was probably the best driver that either of us have ever ridden with.
We got to the Warehouse shortly before the show started and found a space roughly central to the stage towards the back in a slightly raised area that gave us a nice perspective for the whole band. And just as we got settled in, Bowie walked out on stage with little or no warning, an acoustic guitar over his shoulder and a quick launch into Quicksand from the "Hunky Dory" album. Not a choice that I ever would have guessed to open the show with, but a welcome treat just the same. But that wasn't the only surprise of the night, 'cause he continued the set with The Supermen, Queen Bitch, Panic in Detroit, and a cover of Waiting for the Man by the Velvet Underground before he got around to anything from "Earthling". Bowie did a great job of linking sounds and themes within the set, with the new material working well with a selection of reworked older tracks, and true to his promise to retire the hits after the Sound+Vision tour in 1990, Bowie filled the setlist with mostly choice rarities and deep cuts with a few exceptions for Fame and The Jean Genie.
It was a great night of music, and the band that Bowie had assembled for this tour was particularly strong, with Gail Anne Dorsey on bass, Mike Garson on keyboards, Zachary Alford on drums, and Reeves Gabrels on guitar, all of them veteran players who had a rich history of playing with Bowie. Dorsey shone particularly brightly that night with some tight playing, singing duets with Bowie on Under Pressure and a cover of Laurie Anderson's O Superman, both of which spoke to her impressive vocal talents. Gabrels was on fire too, an amazing guitarist with a distinct and unique sound that defined a lot of Bowie's work up to that point in the nineties. Alford was the perfect live drummer for the pulse of the new material, and of course Mike Garson is always awesome, a steady companion throughout most of Bowie's career. Bowie's voice was in fine form this tour, and as suggested earlier it really felt like he was excited to be there, excited to have reconnected with his work. That excitement, that reconnection made it a particularly great time to see Bowie in concert.
After such a great show on the Saturday night, I had pretty high hopes for the Sunday show, and I'm happy to say that it lived up to my expectations and then some. I went by myself and I ended up walking to the Warehouse so no taxi driver telling stories about Iman and no Nat to listen to me obsess over how he hadn't played X song since the Diamond Dogs tour, but it was still pretty great. Bowie changed the set list up a bit including a jaunty run through My Death and a rare performance of Strangers When We Meet, which is one of my favorite tracks from "Outside", so that was pretty cool. He closed the Sunday night show with Moonage Daydream, and of course he was an alligator and we all kept our electric eyes on him, and we all freaked out as was to be expected.
There's no question that seeing Bowie in a small venue was pretty special. My experience has always been that there's something about smaller shows that inspires a greater connection between artist and audience, a sense of intimacy that often makes for a better performance. I expect that part of that has to do with actually being able to see the audience, a better opportunity to create some kind of synergy between the artist and the crowd, and I would expect that the synergy from smaller audiences went a long way towards inspiring Bowie's return to form in the nineties and beyond. A club tour was definitely the way to go for him to reconnect and to be re-energized by his music, and the albums that would follow definitely benefit from Bowie's revitalized attitude...
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