Announcing:
Rebel Rebel (Revised). Or maybe Rebel Rebel Again? Rebel Rebel (Second Edition). Rebel Rebel in some form. Coming, via Repeater Books, in summer 2025. I’m about to send in the manuscript.
This is a fully revised and corrected (yes, no longer does “Britain” win the 1966 World Cup, sorry) version of the book that I wrote in the early 2010s, and which was published almost exactly a decade ago. It covers about the first third of the Bowie catalog, from his earliest professional recording in 1963 to Station to Station, going through it song-by-song, in chronological order.
For those who got Rebel Rebel—I can’t thank you enough. But, hey, you might find the revision of interest, too.
Why do a new version?
Clik here to view.
Well, ten years have passed. It’s fair to say that a lot happened. We have far more details about Bowie’s work than we had in the early 2010s. The museum exhibit. The movies. The books: heavens, so many new books. Songs have appeared that no one (even the most devoted Bowie chroniclers) had ever heard of before. Thanks to auctions of Bowie’s until-then-unknown demos, and the ongoing issuance of archival sets, there are a decent number of “new” songs to chronicle, or greatly enhance, in the new Rebel Rebel, including (snare roll):
I Never Dreamed
It’s True My Love
I Live in Dreams
How Can I Forget You
I Want Your Love
Bunny Thing
Your Funny Smile
Mother Grey
The Reverend Raymond Brown (Attends the Garden Fête on Thatchwick Green)
Angel Angel Grubby Face
Goodbye 3d (Threepenny) Joe
Run Piper Run
Love All Around
Animal Farm
Jerusalem
Hole in the Ground
So Long 60s
King of the City
It’s Gonna Rain Again
The Young Americans Medley
and a massively-expanded entry on the Man Who Fell to Earth soundtrack.
In the years since Bowie’s death, many who knew him or had worked with him published memoirs. Three by his drummers! Earl Slick, John Hutchinson, Geoff MacCormack, Mary Finnigan, Suzi Ronson, Ava Cherry—the volumes keep piling up. There have been scads of documentaries and biopics and whatever Moonage Daydream could be classified as. Essential Bowie surveys by Jérôme Soligny, Leah Kardos and Glenn Hendler, among others. There’s a comprehensive book, Dan Gutstein’s Poor Gal, which digs into “Liza Jane,” the song that became Bowie’s first single.
Thus I’ve rewritten, or expanded, or flavored with new information and fresh quotes, nearly every entry in Rebel Rebel. I think it’s a much better book; if not, it’s at least a more thorough one, and as up-to-date as it can be.
Will Rebel Rebel (2) have a new look?
Yes. We’re taking advantage of the reissue to better align my two Bowie books, visually. Rebel Rebel (Rev.) and Ashes to Ashes will likely have a similar look, and their covers could even be connected in some way—I’m not sure yet. My hope is that they will, at last, look like a set, which had always been my intention; they will no longer be the Mutt and Jeff of Bowie books (see above).
I’ll have much more to say about the book in the new year. All best to everyone.
