Preface Publishing When Ziggy Played Guitar: David Bowie, The Man Who Changed The World

An excellent book, the second I have by the author Dylan Jones.

A fantastic look into the mind of David Bowie during his years as Ziggy Stardust/Aladdin Sane and Halloween Jack. The things that made him "rise" in that direction to give birth to Ziggy Stardust and a look at his eventual "fall" when he finally realized that he would have to kill Ziggy before Ziggy killed David. And yes, Ziggy Stardust may very well have kept me alive, because when that album came out I was at a very stressful place in my life. I always felt like an alien of some sort because I didn't fit in anywhere. There were many times that I considered taking my own life, but when I put on that album and her the final song "rock 'n' roll suicide" I realized that I had a friend and kindred spirit in David Bowie. "Gimme your hands cause you're wonderful"!

Nice book

Why patient? As endearing and wonderful as this book is, it is stretched and repetitive to the max. It's as much about the atmosphere and conditions of England at the time as it is about Bowie. There is little new information, and although full of pictures, nothing I haven't seen a million times. How could there be. Bowie has been written about, and written about, to the point where, if you read a dozen or more of the previous biography's, it all starts to blur, and you realize you could write your own. I enjoyed his personal "autobiographical" parts of growing up on the coast and the state of the pop music world. The actual Top Of The Pops storyline, and who else played that night, etc. is repeated and woven in at every opportunity and gets a little boring. Any Bowie fan of that era knows how we felt about him, who he influenced, how "important" he was. This would have been a tremendous edited story for one of those Q magazine Bowie tributes. But as an insight, I kept waiting and waiting for that gem of information I had never heard before, and it just didn't come.

Part biography, part autobiography, part love story, part cultural study but so much more!This book was a genuine pleasure to read. 300 pages on the phenomena that was Ziggy Stardust, David Bowie's glam and androgynous early 70's creation. One could believe that everything that needed to be documented about Ziggy has already been achieved. One would be incorrect!Buy this book, it's beautifully written and contains information that even the most seasoned Bowie fan may be unfamiliar with. My heart skipped a beat to discover that the Dame has sound board recordings of ALL his 74, 76 and 78 tour dates. C'mon David we miss you! If you cannot give us a new album then please share these with us.The writing is intelligent and engaging and the photographs within are superb. This is indeed a triumph for Dylan Jones.