End of an era?

Hear Geoff MacCormack talk about Bowie announcing the end of his tour on stage.

 Ziggy retirement gig, July 1973. (c) Geoff MacCormack

 

Transcript of interview:

Geoff: The last gigs of the 1973 UK tour were at the Hammersmith Odeon,  which is now renamed something else, like the Apollo. It was the first night, so it was the night before he retired and I think he was reading a review. He didn’t know I was taking the picture and I just love the colours, the golden with a symbol on his forehead. The golden and the brown hues in that picture, it’s all quite caramel isn’t it.

Interviewer: It’s the sort of thing that on Instagram you’d have the filter that made it look like that. 

Geoff: But it would make a great wrapper for a caramel chocolate, wouldn’t it?

Interviewer:  What, a Werther’s Original? [Laughter]. So what was that like being on the stage and him making the announcement, how did that come over?

Geoff: Well, because I was his pal I’d get to know things before they happened, so I knew that was going to happen and I believe Mick Ronson knew, because Mick Ronson had been offered this golden career but the other guys didn’t know so when David announced it they just kind of looked each other like, maybe this is one of David stunts, they couldn’t understand. That was announced just before the last number, which I believe was ‘Rock and Roll Suicide’, appropriately.

Interviewer: Was this quite typical of something he would do then?

Geoff: He was fairly dramatic, he did like a bit of drama but I think it was some financial issue in terms of the management trying to get more cash from record companies and I think the further touring at that point wasn’t viable. It was something to do with finances, I’ve never to this day really understood. I thought that was it and I would have been quite happy with that wonderful few months of touring in America, Japan and Britain but of course I went on to hang around for another couple of years.

Interviewer: He had other ideas for you….