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Baker's Dozen

Jamming Good: Spiders Drummer Woody Woodmansey's Favourite Bowie Moments
Valerie Siebert , February 22nd, 2017 09:50

During the earthly sojourn of Ziggy Stardust, Woody Woodmansey laid down the rhythm for David Bowie's mercurial backing band The Spiders From Mars. Here he talks Valerie Siebert through his 13 favourite Bowie tracks, sharing personal memories of how they were made along the way.

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'Ziggy Stardust'
That one was really a brief summing up of the concept of Ziggy and the Spiders, but kind of done in a futuristic type of way. I was really into King Crimson at the time and I loved the drummer. He used to play things, strange drum rolls at strange places in the song. I used to think it was a bit weird, but then I learned how to do it, and I thought that would really work for this song. So, I definitely took a bit of inspiration from King Crimson for my playing on that one. And it worked! It kind of left it hanging at certain places and didn't make it sound like a 'normal' rock song. That one always went down amazing live. People would be waiting and waiting for that song. Like when we were in Japan and he would sing that line 'like some cat from Japan' and the place would just go berserk! Absolutely mental.