David Bowie V's Bauhaus

David Bowie has always been a musical chameleon, not willing to play any one style of music or to portray any one character. With his public experiments with gender and identity in the seventies and his diverse music influences such as folk, glam, blues, punk, pop, funk, soul, hard rock … Bowie has always tried to create his own style while remaining aware of and absorbing the current musical vogue.

Constantly moving from one genre to another, and releasing three dozen albums over a 40 year period, has seen many flashes of brilliance, but it has also produced some less inspiring moments and for me, once he started getting a suntan and making film clips in Australia he diverged along a path less interesting. For more Bowie information, check out Stefan Westman’s great Bowie site.

Bauhaus were much more fixated on one style and characterization, but they were at the forefront of the goth movement which evolved in England in the late 1970’s. Like Bowie, their personas and stage performance were very theatrical, and their influence and popularity continues to this day.

In line with their gothic leanings, Bauhaus had a cameo appearance in the movie "The Hunger", a modern version of the vampire myth set in New York, where they performed (appropriately) "Bela Lugosi's Dead" in a club visited by the leading stars, Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie, who were on the lookout for a suitable bite.

Bauhaus split in 1983 but reformed in 1998 and very successfully toured North America and Europe and they have just reformed again to play at Coachella 2005.

David Bowie - Ziggy Stardust

Bauhaus - Ziggy Stardust