DA Pennebaker’s record of David Bowie’s final concert on the Ziggy Stardust tour at London’s Hammersmith Odeon in 1973 (Bowie is part of the reason we will never be reconciled to saying “Eventim Apollo”) is rereleased after a restoration. It was the legendary “all killer no filler” gig at which, in the presence of the Spiders from Mars – Mick Ronson (guitar), Trevor Bolder (bass), Mick Woodmansey (drums) – he retired his Ziggy Stardust persona, announcing to a stunned crowd that it was the last time he would ever play (as Ziggy).
The show itself, in which Bowie and band members appear starkly key-lit in darkness, with the crowd glimpsed briefly and almost stroboscopically, looks intriguingly intimate, like something at a much smaller club venue. The concert is straightforward and almost minimalist in its staging and Bowie’s cheeky theatrical genius and rackety exotica has something panto about it. Often, the piano and sax lines in Changes give the event a Vegas-residency feel, although no Vegas residency, even in 1973, would be so austerely presented. (Aladdin Sane is incidentally, along with “the Beatles”, a phrase which has transcended its own wordplay origins.)
