July 11: David Bowie released the single “Space Oddity” in 1969

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message message_box_color=”mulled_wine” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-quote-left”]Ground Control to Major Tom
Ground Control to Major Tom
Take your protein pills and put your helmet on
Ground Control to Major Tom (ten, nine, eight, seven, six)
Commencing countdown, engines on (five, four, three)
Check ignition and may God’s love be with you (two, one, liftoff)[/vc_message][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message message_box_color=”mulled_wine” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-quote-left”]…Finally, he teamed up with Elton John producer Gus Dudgeon to create “Space Oddity,” a song he’d been fiddling with all year. The folk ballad about astronaut Major Tom getting stranded in space was rushed out by his label to coincide with the launch of the Apollo 11 moon landing, and the BBC played the song during the coverage of the event. “In England, it was always presumed that it was written about the space landing, because it kind of came to prominence around the same time. But it actually wasn’t,” he told Performing Songwriter. “It was written because of going to see the film 2001, which I found amazing.
rollingstone.com[/vc_message][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Single by David Bowie
from the album David Bowie
B-side “Wild Eyed Boy from Freecloud”
Released 11 July 1969
Format 7-inch single
Recorded
Genre
  • Psychedelic
  • folk rock
Length 5:15 (album version)
4:33 (UK single edit)
3:26 (U.S. single edit)
Label Philips
Songwriter(s) David Bowie
Producer(s) Gus Dudgeon

Space Oddity” is a song written and recorded by David Bowie. It was first released as a 7-inch single on 11 July 1969. It was also the opening track of his second studio album, David Bowie. It became one of Bowie’s signature songs and one of four of his songs to be included in The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
-wikipedia

Original Video (1969):



Accolades

Publication Country Accolade Year Rank
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame United States The Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll 2004 *
NME United Kingdom “Greatest No1 Singles In History” 2012 26
Channel 4 and The Guardian United Kingdom “The Top 100 British Number 1 Singles” 1997 27

 

Lyrics

Ground Control to Major Tom
Ground Control to Major Tom
Take your protein pills and put your helmet on
Ground Control to Major Tom (ten, nine, eight, seven, six)
Commencing countdown, engines on (five, four, three)
Check ignition and may God’s love be with you (two, one, liftoff)
This is Ground Control to Major Tom
You’ve really made the grade
And the papers want to know whose shirts you wear
Now it’s time to leave the capsule if you dare
“This is Major Tom to Ground Control
I’m stepping through the door
And I’m floating in a most peculiar way
And the stars look very different today
For here
Am I sitting in a tin can
Far above the world
Planet Earth is blue
And there’s nothing I can do
Though I’m past one hundred thousand miles
I’m feeling very still
And I think my spaceship knows which way to go
Tell my wife I love her very much she knows
Ground Control to Major Tom
Your circuit’s dead, there’s something wrong
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you “Here am I floating ’round my tin can
Far above the moon
Planet Earth is blue
And there’s nothing I can do”

Live versions

Live 1969:

Marquee Club in London, October 19-20, 1973:

Live at the Tokyo Dome, 16 May 1990:

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-Egil

Egil Mosbron

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