From Kendrick Lamar to Lou Reed: a new book reveals David Bowie’s favourite music

Famously, David Bowie was a prolific music lover, with a huge and eclectic appetite, consuming everything from Britpop to classical, delta blues to electronica. ‘It would have been a real surprise not to be surprised by David Bowie’s tastes,’ says musician and journalist Jérôme Soligny, who together with Bowie’s lifelong friend Geoff MacCormack has delved into the subject for new book, David Bowie: Music Lover, published by ACC Art Books. ‘Music Lover highlights, particular, lesser-known artists who were crucial to David, such as Biff Rose, and some may come as a surprise to some readers.’

The book, which unites over 100 artists who had a regular slot on Bowie’s turntable, begins with Little Richard, whose tracks Bowie played on his childhood Dansette record player, and ends with Kendrick Lamar, whom Bowie listened to during the recording of Blackstar, his final album, released just two days before he died.

‘I have been friends with [record producer] Tony Visconti since the 1990s, and it was Tony himself who revealed that they had listened to this Kendrick Lamar album a great deal whilst they were working on Blackstar,’ adds Soligny. ‘For this book, and the other ones we wrote, we have made a point of not ‘putting words into David’s mouth’, so it would be presumptuous to explain why he liked this album. However, the fact that Lamar is such an adventurous artist could only have appealed to David Bowie.’

Inside David Bowie's record collection

Wallpaper*: Having known and listened to music with Bowie for so many years, what does his record collection reveal about him that perhaps his own records and public persona don’t?

Jérôme Soligny: Not much, to be honest, or a great deal – which, in the case of an artist like him, who worked in a way that was a bit like communicating vessels, amounts to the same thing. David Bowie’s music is a sort of fantastical journey, and his musical tastes inspired his work. Lou Reed’s ‘I’m Waiting for the Man’, for example, is a sort of benchmark song that inspired him to write many others. David believed that to know him was to know his music. Everything he wanted to reveal is in his songs.

Geoff MacCormack: I would say that they are one and the same.

W*: Bowie was famously restless in his musical curiosity. How did he discover new music? What did he look for in an artist?

GM: It wasn’t so much as being restless, there was always much he wanted to do with many forms of art, including music – added to which fame and the opportunity to experiment came fairly late. He was already 26 in 1973 when it all took off for him. In many ways, he was trying to catch up. I think he liked anything that had soul, not as in the genre but as in authenticity. Also, if it was quirky or strange too, well, all the better.

W*: How important was listening to music to Bowie’s creative process? Could you tell when something he was listening to was beginning to influence what he was recording?

GM: I think the reason Bowie tolerated me being around him (even taking pictures) was because I never asked him stuff, I was just there as a trusted friend. At any rate, what was happening in David’s life was completely new to us both. I can tell you he, and I, loved Black American music all our lives and would say, obviously, of course it influenced him.

I can tell you we were listening to Kraftwerk around the time of the recording of Station to Station, but I can’t tell you, absolutely, whether it influenced him or not because I didn’t ask him. I would say that what we listened to over the years or recommended to each other, together with what his musicians and other friends introduced to him and whatever he discovered by any source, it would be a given that, like any great artist, all kinds of music would seep through purposely or unconsciously.

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