David Bowie Empire Pool Wembley London 8th May 1976
A car load of us went to this gig, which was the last of a series of 6 shows at Wembley Empire Pool in 1976. These were Bowie’s only UK gigs and were his first in the country since 1973. We’d sent our postal orders off through the mail and had been allocated our seats; mine was Entrance 55 Row K seat 45. We were all very excited about seeing Bowie again, not quite knowing what to expect. There had been a lot written about these gigs in the music press and anticipation was high. I drove us down to London, and we stayed at my mate’s aunt’s house in Walthamstow after the gig, driving back the next morning. The drive down wasn’t without incident in that we broke down just past Wetherby, and waited for a friendly AA man who got us going again and on our way.
My memories of the gig are quite strong. The Empire Pool (now Wembley Arena; having been rebuilt) was a cold, cavernous shed. Arena gigs were still by no means the norm in those days and places like the Empire Pool hadn’t been designed with concerts in mind at all.
There was no support act, instead the avant garde black and white film Un Chien Andalo was shown before Bowie took to the stage. I still recall one segment, showing a razor blade cutting into an eyeball. The whole set up and lighting were built around a black and white concept. The stage was bathed in white light, and Bowie and the band wore black trousers, white shirts. The programme (left) entitled ISOLAR (I still don’t know what that means?…) was a newspaper with pictures and no text, very arty. This was a gig which, at the time, I didn’t quite get. It was just too different to the rock n roll splendour and sass of Ziggy for me. However, I would love to go back again now and revisit it. The set was a mixture of Bowie classics and tracks from the recent (then) Station to Station lp. These were performed in the white soulboy manner that Bowie was getting into at that stage. On the day I remember feeling some disappointment at what we experienced at that gig. Looking back it was pretty clever, great theatre, and a massive development from Ziggy. Wish I could go back and see it again (has anybody got a time machine?). Setlist: Station to Station; Suffragette City; Fame; Word On A Wing; Stay; Waiting For The Man; Queen Bitch; Life on Mars?; Five Years; Panic in Detroit; Changes; TVC15; Diamond Dogs; Rebel Rebel; The Jean Genie
Archive for the ‘David Bowie’ Category
10 Jan
David Bowie Empire Pool Wembley London 8th May 1976
9 Jan
David Bowie Ziggy Stardust Tour 1972 and 1973
David Bowie Newcastle City Hall 2 June 1972
Sunderland Top Rank Suite 5 September 1972
Newcastle City Hall 8 June 1973
In celebration of David Bowie’s 65th birthday, I’ve decided to spend the rest of the week recalling my concert experiences of him, which started in 1972 in the Ziggy Starduct era, and will take me to this last Reality tour which I caught in Dublin 2004.
My first experience of David Bowie in concert was at Newcastle City Hall on 2nd June 1972. 
I’d heard the new single Starman on the radio, and decided to go along and see what all the fuss was about. There was a lot of chat in the music press at the time about Bowie knocking T Rex and Marc Bolan off the top. So I wandered along to the City Hall and paid the princely sum of 40p entrance at the door for a seat toward the back of the stalls. The hall was by no means full, as I recall; the support act was a folk band called The JSD Band. I’d heard the Hunky Dory lp, and of course knew the Space Oddity single, but a lot of Bowie’s material was still unfamiliar to me. Although this tour is often refereed to as the Ziggy Stardust tour, the Ziggy lp was not yet released. In fact it came out a few days after the Newcastle gig on 6 June 1972. Bowie was great, wearing the full make up and Ziggy gear, as on Top of the Pops a month later when Starman hit the charts.
See attached the lovely flyer which my friend Jon recently purchased for me from eBay. The rear of the flyer is hand signed by David Bowie himself (who knows if this signature is genuine 🙂 but it is great anyway)
During early 1972 the setlist was something like: Hang On to Yourself; Ziggy Stardust; The Supermen; Queen Bitch; Song for Bob Dylan; Changes; Starman; Five Years; Amsterdam; Andy Warhol; Moonage Daydream; White Light/White Heat; Suffragette City; Rock ‘n’ Roll Suicide
Bowie was back in the north east a few months later, at Sunderland Top Rank on 5 September 1972. Although Starman had been a hit, he was still by no means a massive star, to the extent that the gig was, as I remember, pretty poorly attended. The thing I remember about this gig was that, surprisingly at the time, David performed the show without any make up or costume at all. I am pretty sure that he wore a leather jacket and a pair of jeans. I can also vividly recall a few encores including definitely White Light White Heat and (I think) Waiting for the Man.
Pretty sure my mate Gilly and I missed the last bus and walked home after the gig, getting back very early in the morning, which wasn’t good as we we at school the next day.
Aladdin Sane was released on 13 April 1973, and by this time the demand for tickets was huge, to the extent that Bowie played a couple of shows on the same night at Newcastle City Hall. The setlist had developed to include songs from Aladdin Sane and was something like: Hang On to Yourself; Ziggy Stardust; Watch That Man; Wild Eyed Boy From Freecloud; All the Young Dudes; Oh! You Pretty Things; Moonage Daydream; Changes; Space Oddity; The Jean Genie; Time; The Width of a Circle; Let’s Spend the Night Together; Suffragette City; White Light/White Heat; Round and Round. The production had also developed since he previous year. Bowie was wearing dresses and having several costume changes, and was accompanied by a mime artist. This tour culminated in a show at Hammersmith at which Ziggy announced his retirement. At the time I thought I’d seen David Bowie for the last time.
I never did get a programme for any of these concerts on the Ziggy tour. I just assumed (apparently wrongly) that there was no programme for these dates. However my friend John who now lives in the USA found one on eBay which he kindly purchased for me (see image). Now back in those days tour merchandise was pretty rare. Most concert tours did not have any programmes, posters or T-shirts. And often I would go to the merchandise stall, or see the staff (who I knew well) who sold the programmes as well as selling ice creams and ask if they had any programmes for sale. They would often reply “yes apparently there were programmes but they sold out of them after the London concerts” or something like that. It seems that programmes were often printed in a short run and soon sold out, often after only a few concerts. And by the time the Newcastle concert came there would be none left. I guess that is what must have happened in this case. Anyway thank you so much John for getting me this collector’s item. It is great to possess the real item and to be able to add it to my blog now!
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