Pop star, rock star, artist, actor, painter . . . now we can add comedy impersonator to David Bowie's list of talents after a tape of him doing spot on impressions of Bruce Springsteen, Iggy Pop, Lou Reed and Tom Waits surfaced online.
The tape was recorded by a studio engineer in August 1985 and reveals Bowie, then working on the theme song for Julien Temple's overlooked film Absolute Beginners, taking time out to sing in the style of fellow singers including Neil Young and many others.
The clip was uploaded by record producer Mark Saunders, who was working with Bowie at Westside Studios in London at the time.
Writing on YouTube, Saunders said: "I was lucky enough to work with Bowie in 1985 at Westside Studios in London. My bosses, Clive Langer and Alan Winstanley (Madness, Dexys Midnight Runners, Elvis Costello, Bush) were producing the soundtrack for the movie Absolute Beginners, for which Bowie was acting and writing songs (it was a better soundtrack than it was a movie!) and I was graduating from assistant engineer to engineer at that time.
"The day Bowie was first due to show up at Westside, we were all a bit nervous - Bowie was the biggest star client for Clive and Alan at that point in time. We kept looking out the windows, waiting for a stretch limo to show up and an entire entourage to walk in, but then a black cab showed up and out popped the unaccompanied Bowie.
"He walked in, announced in what seemed a more cockney voice than I remembered, “Hi, I’m David Bowie,” and shook our hands. He seemed smaller than I imagined he would be in person. A bit later I noticed that the cockney had dissipated somewhat and he also seemed to have grown more upright and taller, too.
Iggy and David
"I thought, “Wow, he really is a chameleon,” and wondered if the earlier exaggerated cockney was his way of reducing his superstar status temporarily to put people at ease on first meeting him.
"The impersonations on this YouTube posting were recorded in August '85, when Bowie came in to do the lead vocal. At the end of the session, he broke into the impersonations and I realized that these might get erased at some point, so I quickly put a cassette in and hit “record.”"
"I wish we could hear the other side of the dialogue between Bowie and Clive and Alan, but unfortunately that wasn’t being recorded."
