Space Oddity

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"Space Oddity"
"Space Oddity" cover
Single by David Bowie
from the album Space Oddity
Released 1969 (original)
1975 (reissue)
Format Vinyl record
Recorded Trident Studios, 20 June 1969
Genre Folk/Rock, Space Rock
Length 5:15 (album/4:33 (single)
Label Philips (UK)
Mercury (US)
Producer Gus Dudgeon
David Bowie singles chronology
"Love You Till Tuesday"
(1967)		 "Space Oddity"
(1969)		 "The Prettiest Star"
(1970)

"Space Oddity" is a song written and performed by David Bowie and released as a single in 1969. It is about the launch of Major Tom, a fictional astronaut who becomes lost in outer space. Supposedly released to coincide with the Apollo 11 moon landing, it appears on the album of the same title. The BBC featured the song in its television coverage of the lunar landing.

Contents

[edit] Narrative and content

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The song is often interpreted to be about self-destruction and estrangement from humanity.[citation needed] Major Tom's cryptic last message, "Though I'm past one hundred thousand miles / I'm feeling very still / And I think my spaceship knows which way to go / Tell my wife I love her very much (She knows!)", suggests that he is still alive and well but chooses to kill his circuit to ground control. Bowie seems to confirm this interpretation with his 1980 follow up to "Space Oddity", "Ashes to Ashes", where Ground control eventually receives a message from Major Tom: "I'm happy, hope you're happy too".

In "Ashes to Ashes", Major Tom's communication failure could be reinterpreted as losing human contact due to drugs, and as such, "Space Oddity" can be interpreted as a "bad trip". At the start of the song Major Tom takes pills ("take your protein pills and put your helmet on"), those pills have their effect ("and I'm floating in a most peculiar way / and the stars look very different today") but eventually Major Tom fails to come out of his trip. This has been likened to heroin use, and this interpretation is supported by the "Ashes to Ashes" lyrics, "We know Major Tom's a junkie/Strung out in heavens high," as "junkie" is a slang term for a heroin addict.

This narrative continues in rock music throughout the late 20th century, both in Bowie's own work and that of others. As well as the aforementioned "Ashes to Ashes", Elton John's "Rocket Man" seems to allude to Major Tom, though not by name. It tells of an unnamed astronaut who is lonely in space, who is "not the man they think I am at home". Bowie alludes to this analogy in a live performance of "Space Oddity" released on the David Bowie BBC Sessions 1969-1972, in which he sings, "I'm just a rocketman!" In 1983, the German pop singer Peter Schilling released his own take on the story, entitled "Major Tom (Coming Home)", although he denied for several years after the song's release that his Tom was the same as Bowie's, and even went so far as to claim he had never even heard "Space Oddity".

Bowie himself returned to the subject on 1995's Outside album with the song "Hallo Spaceboy", and a hit single remixed by The Pet Shop Boys even included disjointed lyrics from the original "Space Oddity".

[edit] Recording and release

Following Bowie's split from record label Deram, his manager Kenneth Pitt managed to negotiate a one-album deal (with options for a further one or two albums) with Mercury Records, and their UK subsidiary Phillips in 1969. Next he tried to find a producer. George Martin turned the project down[citation needed], while Tony Visconti liked the album demo-tracks, but considered the planned lead-off single, "Space Oddity", a gimmick track[citation needed], and delegated its production to Gus Dudgeon. An early version of the song had appeared in Bowie's promotional film Love You Till Tuesday.

Following recording of a fresh version, the single was rush-released on July 11, 1969 to coincide with the Apollo 11 moon landings. In the UK, it was used in conjunction with the BBC's coverage of the landing, and also promoted via adverts for the Stylophone, which featured on the record. This exposure finally gave Bowie a hit, reaching #5 in the chart. It failed to chart in the U.S., however.

Mogol wrote Italian lyrics, and Bowie recorded a new vocal, releasing the single "Ragazzo Solo, Ragazza Sola" ("Lonely Boy, Lonely Girl") in Italy, reportedly to take attention away from covers by the Italian bands Equipe 84 and The Computers.

The song was awarded the 1969 Ivor Novello Award, together with Peter Sarstedt's "Where Do You Go To (My Lovely)".

The song became so well-known that Bowie's second album, originally released as David Bowie in the UK (like his first album), was renamed after the track for its 1972 reissue by RCA, and has since become known by this name.

In December 1972, Mick Rock shot a film clip of Bowie performing the song during the sessions for Aladdin Sane, which was used to promote the January 1973 US reissue on RCA, which reached #15 in the Billboard Chart. This was then used to support RCA's 1975 UK reissue, which gave Bowie his first #1 single in November.

A stripped down version, originally performed on Kenny Everett's New Year's Eve Show was issued in February 1980 as the B-side of "Alabama Song".

Preceded by
"I Only Have Eyes For You" by Art Garfunkel		 UK number one single
November 2, 1975		 Succeeded by
"D.I.V.O.R.C.E." by Billy Connolly

[edit] Track listing

1969 original
  1. "Space Oddity" (Bowie) – 4:33
  2. "Wild Eyed Boy from Freecloud" (Bowie) – 4:52
1975 reissue
  1. "Space Oddity" (Bowie) – 4:33
  2. "Changes" (Bowie) – 3:33
  3. "Velvet Goldmine" (Bowie) – 3:09

[edit] Personnel

Credits apply to 1969 original release:

Musical
Technical
  • Gus Dudgeon - record producer

[edit] Other versions

Alternate Studio Versions
  • (1980) on Alabama Song - An unplugged re-recording of the song.
Live versions
Cover versions

[edit] In pop culture

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The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.
  • In one episode of Pee-wee's Playhouse, Pee-wee plays connect-the-dots, the dots forming a rocketship, which he flies into outer space. Pee-wee makes a reference to "Space Oddity" during this scene by saying he's Major Tom.
  • In the 2002 movie Mr. Deeds, there is a moment in which Adam Sandler and a group of men on a helicopter break out into singing "Space Oddity".
  • After the success of Space Ship One in 2004, it was agreed that the song should be played onboard the ship when giving space tours to wealthy sightseers.
  • In the British sitcom The Young Ones, the song is mentioned in an outer-space scene where Neil is getting high on drugs (literally) and floats into space. He passed a space shuttle where two astronauts have the conversation - "This is just like that record by David Bowie", to which the other replies "What, er.. "A Jean Genie"". The following line is "Hey look, the planet Earth is blue and there's nothing we can do", mimicking a memorable line from the song.
  • In the 2004 video game Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater a character named Major Zero changes his codename to Major Tom; he is even asked "Can you hear me, Major Tom?" (one of the song's lyrics). However, since Metal Gear Solid 3 is set in 1964, before the song existed, the reference couldn't be mentioned without being anachronistic. Instead, Zero explains that the codename is a reference to the "Tom" escape tunnel in the 1963 film The Great Escape. Also Hideo Kojima (the game director and producer) stated that initially he wanted to use "Ashes to Ashes" and "Space Oddity" as ending themes for the game, that idea was eventually discarded when the games focus moved off the space race.
  • In an episode of the MTV show Sifl and Olly, the character Olly dresses up as a Bowie-esqe "Olly Moondust" and sings a song called "Star Lover", a presumed parody of "Space Oddity." The lyrics include a stanza which goes: "I've been stuck in space/for such a long, long time/Sorry, Mum/I'm five years late for tea time."
  • On Jackson Publick's Adult Swim program The Venture Bros. the song's story, along with that of "Ashes to Ashes" was played out in the opening of "Ghosts of the Sarragaso" using its lyrics as dialogue, and the character of Major Tom and Action Man were recreated as actual characters. The scene takes place in 1969, the same year the song was released.
  • In the series Angel, season 2 episode 9 "The Trial" (aired Nov 28, 2000), the character Lorne responds, "Ground Control to Major Tom!" to express his feeling that the blues singer's life is following a doomed trajectory from which it may never return.
  • Spanish Rock singer Enrique Bunbury makes multiple allusions to "Space Oddity" in his song "Lady Blue". Though the song is in Spanish it begins with the countdown "ten, nine, eight, seven..." which can also be heard in "Space Oddity". The song is about an astronaut who is lost in space but says that "everything is ok". The video for the song also uses an outer space theme.
  • In the British comedy Red Dwarf, The Cat tries to convince a ground controller to grant him and the crew clearance to (illegally) leave Red Dwarf in a 'Blue Midget' ship. Unable to supply a name, Lister jumps in with "Major Tom!"
  • In the Canadian movie C.R.A.Z.Y. there is a long scene where the main character Zac "performs" "Space Oddity" in his room, unaware that several people are watching him through the window.
  • In the series Without a Trace - Season 3 / Episode 22, Title "John Michaels" - "Space Oddity" is used at the beginning and the end of the episode.
  • In the 2006 film The Fountain, actor Hugh Jackman portrays a character who appears in three incarnations across a 1000-year span: as a 16th-century Spanish conquistador named Tomás, as a modern-day research oncologist named Tommy, and as the guru-like Tom who travels alone in a spacecraft to a distant nebula in the 26th century. In an April 2005 interview with the SuicideGirls website, Darren Aronofsky, the film's director, cited "Space Oddity" as an inspiration for this third storyline and as the probable source of the protagonist's name. [1] Both film and song draw influence from Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey.
  • In 2004 Wes Anderson's film The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou one of the characters is Pelé dos Santos (played by Seu Jorge), a Brazilian mariner who sits alone with his guitar and plays several Bowie Songs in Portuguese, one of these is "Space Oddity", which he sings the first verse of as pirates are sneaking aboard the Belefonte behind him.
  • In the Barclay James Harvest song "The Great 1974 Mining Disaster", the singer recounts having "Heard a song the other day/About a major out in space/And though the song was kind of grey/It took me far away". The song also references Bowie's "The Man Who Sold the World".
  • In the The Edwin J. Hill Social Club episode "Room For Let", the serial killer has a penchant for dispatching his victims to the tune of David Bowie's "Space Oddity". The song is used during the end credits of this episode, as well.
  • New Zealand "novelty band" (comedy duo) Flight of the Conchords parodied "Space Oddity" in Season 1 Episode 6 of their 2007 HBO series. The TV episode entitled "Bowie" featured a music video 'Bowie's in Space' which paid homage to the musical and set stylings of the original. While the episode aired on July 22, 2007, the Flight of the Conchords has been performing the song on tour and on their UK radio program for years.
  • The 2008 game, Worms: A Space Oddity, is named after the song.

[edit] External links

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Oddity"
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