Description
A rarely seen take of Five Years, from the 1976 David Bowie Isolar I Tour rehearsals.
It is fifty years ago today that Bowie and his ’76 tour band, “Raw Moon”, played the first show of the Isolar I Tour, AKA the Station To Station Tour, on the 2nd of February 1976, at the Pacific Coliseum in Vancouver.
Earlier that day, there was a full dress rehearsal at the Pacific Coliseum, which was filmed by a local film crew. 15 tracks, about 90 minutes of footage from that shoot – almost the entire live set, up to Rebel Rebel - are commonly in circulation and easily found on YouTube.
In that rehearsal reel, Bowie and the band make several attempts at Five Years. The first one lasts about a minute or so, with Bowie making several vocal flubs until the song is paused at, “…soldier with a broken arm”. Bowie and the band pick up again where they left off, but again stop after only about 30 seconds. After quite a long pause, with Bowie asking for a cigarette, there is another take and they complete the song.
This take of Five Years is absent from every version of the Pacific Coliseum rehearsal reel that I have seem online. In this take Bowie gets most of the lyrics right, except, “I heard telephones, opera house, SOMETHING OR OTHER on TV. Saw toys, boys, electric irons on ME”. I suspect that this take was actually the penultimate one, since the last take in the rehearsal footage reel has almost no vocal flubs plus it has the addition of backing vocals at the beginning, that are absent in this and all the other preceding takes.
Source update:
As @L.T.VideoAndAudio has pointed out in the comments, Stacy Heydon wears a different shirt in this clip to the one in the existing rehearsal reel. George Murray is also wearing a different shirt. And, the top hat he wears throughout the rehearsal reel, is absent in this clip.
The quality is quite good compared to existing sources of the rehearsal footage online, but as Bowie becomes animated sharp horizontal movement lines mar the picture. These probably originate from an interlaced source that wasn’t transferred correctly. Wherever the cause, I was not able to remove them.
Thanks for watching, I hope you dig it!
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Credits
Source:
David Bowie | Five Years | Rehearsal | Pacific Coliseum, Vancouver | 2 February 1976
Big thanks to Tyler.
Musicians:
David Bowie | Vocals
Carlos Alomar | Guitar
Dennis Davis | Drums
George Murray | Bass
Stacey Heydon | Guitar
Tony Kaye | Keyboards
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