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Remembering the legacy of David Bowie
Brittney MacDonald, Life & Style Editor

David Bowie song I heard was, I wouldn't
be able to answer them. In truth, I grew

up with the sound of his vocals as a constant
lull in the background of my childhood.
This was mostly due to my mother, whose
eccentric musical tastes not only enveloped
the spandex clad Ziggy Stardust and the
Spiders from Mars—Ziggy Stardust being the
alter-ego Bowie took on in the 1970s—but also
other musical greats like Tupac and Nirvana.
This odd musical upbringing probably
sheds a lot of light on my own strange bardic
tastes, which as of 2001 definitely included
a healthy dose of Bowie, independent of
my mother’s CD collection. It also accounts
for something a little more troubling—my
utter failure to recognize David Bowie as a
human being capable of dying one day.

Perhaps it was naive, or maybe just
selfish of me to assume that people that I had
made into symbols and icons would always
be a presence in the world. I don’t consider
this celebrity worship, but more so put it in
the same psychological category as having
a mental image of your childhood home
that is destroyed by you going to revisit it,
only to find it has been torn down. To me,
David Bowie and the music he created is a
connection I shared with my family, as well
as a connection to my childhood and teenage
years, and friends that I had made during
those times—some of whom aren't around
anymore. However, my biggest offence
through all of this is that in turning Bowie
into a personal symbol, I also failed to see the

S hould anyone ever ask me what the first

amazing things he did and fought for as a man.

Millennials like me have a lot to thank
Bowie for—probably a lot more than you

think. Not only did he inspire many of today’s
most successful musicians, but he was also the
first musical artist to have his own website.
It went up in late 1995, and was mostly text
based. In 1996, that website pioneered the
first ever digital download MP3. Bowie’s song
“Telling Lies” from his Earthbound album
was available long before Napster was even
a thought, and definitely predated iTunes
by more than a couple centuries. In short,
Bowie opened the gateway for the luxury that
people around the globe enjoy—listening
to their favourite music on their phone.
In today’s modern age it’s hard to imagine
a time when you were incapable of finding
even the minutest support from the public
regarding issues of sexuality and gender
identity. But there was no Internet to stand
behind him when Bowie was labelled a freak
for wearing make-up and donning women’s
leotards. Nor was there any when he declared
himself openly bisexual and began getting
a rather negative reputation for his many
sexual conquests, which included the likes
of Mick Jagger. He revealed his true self
when people were caught in a vicious cycle
of hypocrisy and fear. In the words of my
mother, “At that time, nobody admitted to
liking Bowie...’— thankfully, times change.
Through all of this, Bowie never
apologized for who he was. Instead, he used
his notoriety to benefit several children’s
charities, and to help spread awareness about
HIV/AIDS, as well as the political struggle
that came with it during its early outbreaks
in the UK and North America. In 1982, he
collaborated with Freddie Mercury on the
now famous duet “Under Pressure”—a song
that he sang at the Freddie Mercury Tribute

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