Whilst on holiday I took the opportunity to listen again to my restored version of the final Ziggy Stardust performance. This took place at the end of a very long and successful tour which climaxed at the Hammersmith Odeon on July 3 1973. Bowie may have been worn out but he still delivered a solid show which ended with a special guest (Jeff Beck) and a major surprise.
It’s a hugely significant gig, probably not one of the best Ziggy concerts, and certainly not one of the best recorded shows. The concert sound was recorded very hastily as the decision to film the show was only taken the day before. Lack of time to set up mics and test the sound balances leave the raw recordings sounding very brittle and thin. This may be one of the reasons that the show wasn’t issued in late 1973 as planned. The tapes sat on a shelf for 10 years until DB finally allowed the film to be issued on video in 1983 along with a remixed and (not very well) overdubbed soundtrack album. In 2005 the film was remastered again for DVD and Tony Visconti spent a long time working his magic on the soundtrack. The 2005 remaster is a big step up from the 1983 release, but there was only so much that Visconti could do. Most of the 1983 overdubs were removed, though he kept some of the added backing vocals on "Moonage Daydream" and "Time" as Ronno’s original vocals were sung off mic.
But even this reissue was incomplete. The DVD features far more of the intro so to the remastered 2005 cd I’ve added the DVD stage announcements and crowd noise. Mike Garson’s piano medley of Bowie tunes which was played as an overture to the gig (and which appeared on the web a year or so back in excellent quality) is now back in it's place at the start of the show. Then I cleaned up the two songs which Jeff Beck refused to allow a release – "The Jean Genie" which slips into "Love Me Do" and which has been available since the mid 1970s on bootleg, and then the version of "Round and Round" which Beck also played on and which somehow appeared in trading circles about 20 years ago. The quality of "The Jean Genie" was fine, it needed a bit of boosting but it’s otherwise a good recording. "Round And Round" is more muffled and rather distant, and there’s not too much that can be done with it, but just as I was about to restore it, a raw sound desk recording of the two Beck tracks slipped out onto the internet. Whilst I decided to stick with the bootleg "Jean Genie" (as it sounded more listenable than the sometimes harsh soundboard), the improved version of "Round And Round" was a marvellous and timely find.
After the two Jeff Beck assisted songs Bowie stepped up to the mic and thanked the crew and the band and then he said, "This particular show will remain with us the longest, because, not only is it the last show of the tour, but... it's the last show we'll ever do." The following "Rock ‘n’ Roll Suicide" is perhaps a little workmanlike musically, though DB gives it everything he’s got. One reason for the rather muted band performance is probably that none of the band (bar Mick Ronson) knew anything about the retirement and they were as shocked as the audience!
In my restoration I used the retirement announcement from the bootleg as the official recording oddly sounds very thin and lacks the atmosphere of the boot in which the utter shock of the audience is extremely clear.
Anyway, after all that, it’s still a good gig, though perhaps thought of more highly than it should be purely because of the historical significance, rather than the musical quality. Some of the songs are brilliantly played and sung, but some are, frankly, a bit of a mess. There is a real sense that both DB and the Spiders are exhausted. The pre-gig announcements refer to 70 gigs in 65 days which is a very heavy schedule, so it’s little wonder that things are getting a touch frazzled. For example, "Cracked Actor" is pretty awful and "Watch That Man" suffers from too fast a tempo and lack of finesse. On the other hand "White Light / White Heat" is tremendous, "Space Oddity" is genuinely majestic and "My Death" is simply stunning. "Moonage Daydream" is rather marvellous too, as is the very neat medley of "Wild Eyed Boy" / "All The Young Dudes" / "Oh! You Pretty Things". "The Jean Genie" is perhaps a little too enthusiastic and seems oddly sloppy in places (and someone, possibly Jeff Beck, is out of tune) but it is tremendous fun. The retirement announcement still sends shivers down my spine and the stunned and disbelieving crowd is more than audible at that point.
Of course you should never believe anything that David Bowie says - 11 months later he was embarking upon the Diamond Dogs tour, arguably the most ambitious concert tour ever staged in North America. Wish he'd come out of retirement one more time...
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