Post Mortem on Ziggy Stardust

Some amount of time over two years ago I recorded a cover of Jimi Hendrix’s “Little Wing” with Jonny, my guitarist.

He made spacey noises on the pedal steel and it reminded me of Dark Side of the Moon. From there was born the wacky idea to play that famous Pink Floyd record live. We spent a few months practicing it, brought in a couple of ringers at the last minute to help us flesh it out, and lo, a show was born. I just thought it might be a fun thing to do and that maybe people might also find it fun to listen to. The weird part was the emotional reaction the crowd seemed to have. More than one person came up to me afterwards with tears in their eyes. I didn’t expect that at all.

So we decided to do it again the next year and picked Radiohead’s OK Computer. The weird thing about the process is how the record really starts to open up to you when you’re practicing it. These are records that all of us were really familiar with as fans, but they morph and change when you’re trying to bash out live versions of them. True, by the time we’re done, I really don’t want to hear them again for a while, but somewhere in the middle they really do become completely new records to me, full of little surprises. We brought along another ringer and played the show.

Afterwards, people had the same emotional reaction, which surprised me even more. So I figured, well, I guess this is a THING now. Since we’d done the show in October I thought, I’ll make this our Halloween tradition… where we pretend to be another band and play a full record live. The upcoming October was looking to be busier than usual for us so I tried to pick a record that I thought would be a little more straightforward than the last two.

But I was wrong. I think The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars may have been a bit easier for some in the band, but I know for me it was the hardest one so far. I know Debra (a ringer from the Dark Side show, now a permanent band member) had to work really hard for it, too. Bowie’s voice and style are not mine, so it was a much bigger stretch for me in terms of technique and attitude. Usually about halfway through practicing the record, I will find myself in it and it all makes sense. But it honestly wasn’t until the last night we practiced that I finally felt like I got it right.

We streamed the show live over the web this year (thanks, Paul Abrelat!), and here’s an archive of that (a little pixelly, a little out of sync, we’re not all the way in the future yet, but we’re getting there).

I tried very hard to be the special man, and they were definitely Ziggy’s band. I am a very lucky musician to be surrounded by such talented people (including this year’s ringers: Laura Seebol and Brian Bland), and to be able to play these odd little shows for people who open up to the experience. Thanks to them, and thanks to you.