Why David Bowie Matters
We now live in a world without David Bowie. What a sad and mind-boggling idea. After all these years, it seemed we quietly believed he was immortal. However, on January 10, 2016, we learned we were wrong—and the world is now forever changed.
While most in memoriam tributes will begin with the laundry list of his accomplishments, true Bowie fans won’t need to read them. We have the records memorized by heart. Those who argue Low was his greatest will battle it out with the Hunky Dory camp. Those of us who stayed loyal on into later releases will preach to the greatness of Heathen, a truly underrated album with a stupendous title track. We’ll talk about when we saw him, if we met him, or if we never got the chance. There will be photos of Halloween costumes, club outfits and bedroom walls we’ve strewn with his likeness over the years. David Bowie was a part of us this whole time, and we knew it would hurt, but not like this.
We cry for the loss of David Bowie, but in honesty, it is a slightly selfish grief—because it feels like a loss of part of ourselves. Why is that? What was it about David Bowie that affected us all so deeply? What triggered this unending tsunami of collective mourning when his passing was quietly announced Sunday night?
For starters, David Bowie was the patron saint of misfits. For the wallflowers, the corner dwellers and the rabble-rousers, he held the freak flag high with dignity. If you felt misunderstood, Bowie spoke your language. It was suddenly okay to simply be yourself. Why? Because this larger-than-life Brixton boy who gave no fucks proved that being true to you is all you need. While the deep-seated, existential fear that we will never be good enough lurks in everyone, Bowie’s otherworldly self-confidence gave us the hope that maybe, just maybe, we were already good enough. He made us all feel like part of his club. The Goblin King knew how to make those who never fit in feel perfectly at home.
He taught us to how to be complex and how to grow up. Bowie was the ultimate king of change and juxtaposition. He managed to be both completely outlandish and beyond gender, while at the same time classy and effortlessly elegant. Pin him down as the flamboyant Ziggy Stardust, and he will raise you one well-poised Thin White Duke. In a world desperate for stasis, he was never afraid to change. He taught us all to embrace the strain and evolve, evolve, evolve. As life ambles on and fears of mediocrity creep in, Bowie was proof that you need never be stuck—no matter what your age. The right to change, to defy odds and to be vital, is limited only by the boundaries you place on yourself.
He taught us how to be cool. Seriously, though, there has never been nor will ever be a rock star as cool as David Bowie. His every look was well orchestrated. His every move was utterly natural, even when in protest. He didn’t have to strive hard to make a point, because he never had a thing to prove. As he evolved from ‘70s club kid icon to sober, elder statesman of rock, Bowie taught us all that we can all do it with cool, and he didn’t need media validation to do it.
In a 2003 Complex interview with him and Mos Def, Bowie defended his outsider status, saying, “It’s always the same kind of artist, I think, who has more enjoyment being slightly on the outside of things, who doesn’t want to be sucked into the tyranny of the mainstream. Because once you get sucked into that, you’re dead as an artist.” Bowie was never a slave to the machine, because he would rather be loyal to his art. Not many can say that—and that is why he was so cool.
However, his greatest hat trick, it seems, was in teaching us how to die. You could also say, he reminded us how short a time we have to still live. One of the most challenging internal struggles any human will know is the march toward their own death. Author Ron Mehl once summed up his terminal diagnosis thusly: “We’re all dying; God just decided to let me know when.”
Bowie knew his time was coming, and Blackstar was his journey in navigating that road without fear. He could have let us all know in advance, you know. It would have been easy for him to collect the favorable album reviews and revel in our overwhelming sympathies while still on earth. However, the Patron Saint of Misfits, the Arbiter of Evolution and the ultimate King of Cool would never do such a thing. Instead, he spared us and left us Blackstar as a care package.
And consider this—the last single and video he released was for the song “Lazarus.” It is perhaps no coincidence that the song bears the same name as the famous Bible parable about the divine power of God over the ultimate foe: death. Bowie was telling us from the beginning that he was ready to conquer death as he sings, “Look up here… I’m in heaven.” He was letting us know that we will be okay, and he will never be too far away.
Thank you, DB, for teaching us how to live and how to die.
