The Bonnaroo List

As the 4 of you that actually read this space will know, I have been venturing to the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival since 2006.

In honor of the upcoming event this summer - and Second Tier Tickets are going on sale soon - I am going to be doing a recurring series of musical posts regarding those who will appear at the Manchester, Tennessee event this year.

As the clues are being released starting this week, I'd like to post what I feel are the best answers.

First up - and I hope this is correct, based on the first clue - David Bowie:

The clip below is Halo Spaceboy, from the Bowie/NIN tour back in '95.



The next clue dropped in less than one hour.

Midweek Music

I still kick myself when I recall that I never got to see Bowie and Nine Inch Nails tour together after the concept album "Outside" was released - 15 years ago on my birthday. To me, it stands as a triumphant musical milestone for the Thin White Duke alongside such masterpieces as "Low", "Heroes", and "Lodger" - as it not only showed that Bowie could master the genres of industrial, electronica, and experimental - but because it reunited him aural magician Brian Eno.

In video form, the tracks from Outside gave cutting edge directors of the day a vehicle to push their creative vision. Most notably was Samuel Bayer who had created videos for Nirvana ( Smells Like Teen Spirit ), Blind Melon ( No Rain ), Corrosion Of Conformity ( Albatross ), and was likely picked for the track highlighted below because of his work on The Smashing Pumpkins video for "Bullet With Butterfly Wings".

'The Hearts Filthy Lesson'



But it was the pairing of Reznor and Bowie that gave the musical world something that had been lacking. The Nine Inch Nails remix of 'Hearts' has been - for me at least - a wonderful example of how Trent Reznor can tap into the energy of someone like Bowie and blend it with EDM sensibilities, the industrial flair of people like Front 242 or even Skinny Puppy, and create an audio film score for the visions in our head that we can't quite articulate with language alone.



The rich and storied history of David Bowie is one that none in the modern music catalog could ever begin to match. From being the man who created the track that typified the first human launch into space to the one that helped reshape modern music as we know it, David Bowie is one that should be honored, respected, and studied by anyone that plans of picking up any type of instrument.

Spacial Sounds

Recently WIRED compiled a Top 10 list of songs that used space as their central theme. And while classic tracks like Bowie's "Space Oddity" and Elton John's "Rocket Man" were tops on the list, there were several that I thought had been left out. This isn't to discount the list in whole, but I have gathered together my own love-of-space music list.

Black Sabbath: Planet Caravan



Monster Magnet: Space Lord



David Bowie: Life On Mars



The Rolling Stones: 2000 Lightyears From Home



Pink Floyd: Astronomy Domine