David Bowie looked to John Lennon as a mentor and a close friend. When they first met, though, he worried about embarrassing himself in front of the other musician. He was a longtime fan of Lennon’s music and worried about looking “stupid” by bringing up The Beatles. Immediately after meeting Lennon, though, Bowie mentioned the band.
David Bowie said John Lennon was a mentor to him
Bowie worried about making an impression on Lennon, but they quickly bonded. Bowie said that Lennon became his greatest mentor.
“It’s impossible for me to talk about popular music without mentioning probably my greatest mentor, John Lennon,” he said in his commencement speech at the Berklee College of Music. “I guess he defined for me, at any rate, how one could twist and turn the fabric of pop and imbue it with elements from other art forms, often producing something extremely beautiful, very powerful and imbued with strangeness.”
Bowie saw Lennon as a kindred spirit.
“Also, uninvited, John would wax on endlessly about any topic under the sun and was over-endowed with opinions,” he said. “I immediately felt empathy with that. Whenever the two of us got together it started to resemble Beavis and Butthead on Crossfire.”
He immediately said something that he thought would make him look stupid
Bowie and Lennon first met at a party in 1974 when Elizabeth Taylor introduced them.
“We were in LA, and one night she had a party to which both John and I had been invited,” Bowie explained. “I think we were polite with each other, in that kind of older-younger way. Although there were only a few years between us, in rock and roll that’s a generation, you know? Oh boy, is it ever.”
Bowie said he worried about looking foolish in front of Lennon and told himself not to mention The Beatles. Almost immediately, though, he brought up the band.
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“So John was sort of [in Liverpool accent] ‘Oh, here comes another new one.’ And I was sort of, ‘It’s John Lennon! I don’t know what to say. Don’t mention the Beatles, you’ll look really stupid.’ And he said, ‘Hello, Dave.’ And I said, ‘I’ve got everything you’ve made — except the Beatles.’”
David Bowie and John Lennon became close at the Grammys
Bowie explained that he and Lennon solidified their friendship not long after Taylor introduced them at the party. At the Grammys, Bowie spoke to Lennon about his frustration that American audiences didn’t seem to understand him. When he went onstage to present an award to Aretha Franklin, he felt that she perfectly demonstrated this attitude.
“So the big moment came and I ripped open the envelope and announced, ‘The winner is Aretha Franklin,’” Bowie recalled. “Aretha steps forward, and with not so much as a glance in my direction, snatches the trophy out of my hands and says, ‘Thank you everybody. I’m so happy I could even kiss David Bowie.’ Which she didn’t! And she promptly spun around swanned off stage right. So I slunk off stage left.”
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Afterwards, Lennon approached him and cemented their friendship.
“And John bounds over and gives me a theatrical kiss and a hug and says ‘See, Dave. America loves ya.’ We pretty much got on like a house on fire after that.”
