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Sara Cox sits in for Chris Evans. She pays tribute to David Bowie after his passing, and music journalist Matt Everitt discusses Bowie's influential career.

Sara pays tribute to David Bowie after his passing and music journalist Matt Everitt discusses his influential career. In a special Half Wower we hear some of his biggest hits and your memories of the iconic artist. Dr Jim Harris reflects on how inspirational David Bowie's individualism was in today's Pause For Thought.

2 hours, 59 minutes

Last on

Mon 11 Jan 2016 06:30
麻豆约拍 Radio 2

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Clips

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Music Played

  • Wham!

    Young Guns (Go For It)

    • Wham - The Best Of Wham!.
    • Epic.

  • Foxes

    Amazing

    • (CD Single).
    • Sign Of The Times.

  • Peggy Lee

    Fever

    • Mad About The Boy: Ladies Sing The Bl.
    • Crimson.

  • American Authors

    Best Day Of My Life

    • (CD Single).
    • Def Jam.
    • 001.

  • Crowded House

    Weather With You

    • Crowded House - Recurring Dream.
    • Capitol.

  • The Pointer Sisters

    I'm So Excited

    • Greatest Hits.
    • BBR.
    • 020.

  • Olly Murs

    Stevie Knows

    • Never Been Better.
    • Sony Music.

  • David Bowie

    Space Oddity

    • Space Oddity.
    • RCA.

  • Leona Lewis

    Time After Time (Live on 麻豆约拍 Radio 2 Breakfast )

  • The Moody Blues

    Go Now

    • Fifty Number Ones Of The 60's (Variou.
    • Global Television.

  • Seal

    Every Time I'm With You

    • 7.
    • Warner Bros.
    • 001.

  • David Bowie

    Starman

  • KC and the Sunshine Band

    Give It Up

    • The Best Summer Ever (Various Artist.
    • Virgin.

  • Snow Patrol

    Chocolate

    • (CD Single).
    • Polydor.

  • David Bowie

    Heroes

    • David Bowie - Best Of Bowie.
    • EMI.

  • David Bowie

    Let's Dance

    • David Bowie - Best Of Bowie.
    • EMI.

  • David Bowie

    Fashion

    • David Bowie - Best Of Bowie.
    • EMI.

  • David Bowie

    Rebel Rebel

    • David Bowie - Best Of Bowie.
    • EMI.

  • David Bowie

    Sound And Vision

    • David Bowie - Best Of Bowie.
    • EMI.

  • George Thorogood & the Destroyers

    Bad To The Bone

    • 100% Blues & Soul (Various Artists).
    • Telstar.
    • 4.

  • Cream

    Strange Brew聽

    • The Greatest Hits Of 1967 (Various).
    • EMI.

  • Stevie McCrorie

    My Heart Never Lies

    • Big World.
    • Decca Records.
    • 1.

  • The Police

    Message In A Bottle

    • The Very Best Of Sting & The Police.
    • A&M.

  • Grace

    You Don't Own Me (feat. 骋鈥怑补锄测)

    • Memo E.P..
    • Columbia.

  • Tom Robinson Band

    2-4-6-8 Motorway

    • The Greatest Hits Of 1977 (Various).
    • Premier.

  • Bruce Springsteen

    Hungry Heart

    • Bruce Springsteen - Greatest Hits.
    • Columbia.

  • Coldplay

    Hymn For The Weekend (feat. 叠别测辞苍肠茅)

    • A Head Full Of Dreams.
    • Parlophone.

  • David Bowie

    Absolute Beginners

    • The Ultimate 80's Ballads (Various Artists).
    • Polygram TV.
    • 4.

  • Beverley Knight

    Piece of my Heart

    • (CD Single).
    • Parlophone.

Pause For Thought

Pause For Thought

Art Historian, Dr Jim Harris

When I was younger, I always wanted to be something.聽 I don鈥檛 mean that I wanted to be famous, or important.聽 I didn鈥檛 want to be the boss of something or to accrue titanic wealth (though I sometimes wonder whether I underestimated the appeal of titanic wealth鈥�).

What I mean is that I wanted to belong to something: to be a punk, or a mod, or a new romantic, or, well, anything. I wanted to be part of a movement.聽 I wanted to be special.

But I never was.聽 I was too young to be a punk, too scared of mods to be a mod and never remotely creative or bold enough to be a New Romantic.聽 To be honest, I was just too conformist, too ordinary, too normal. I was happy being, well, a pretty conventional north London teenager who was also a scout.

Someone like David Bowie, whose death we鈥檙e mourning today, seemed to me the epitome of the sort of individualism I thought I was looking for.聽 Here was a man with the imaginative power and flatout chutzpah to conceive of himself as an alien being called Ziggy Stardust.聽 For heaven鈥檚 sake, here was a man whose eyes were two different colours.聽

But, looking back, I actually think that Bowie was the exact opposite of what I wanted to be.聽 I wanted to part of a movement.聽 He was determined to be himself.聽 I wanted to be the same.聽 He wanted to be different.聽 I wanted to be identifiable.聽 He wanted to be unique.

The bible teaches us that we are all unique.聽 Each of us is 鈥榝earfully and wonderfully made鈥�, each of us is loved, each of us is given particular gifts, each of us is absolutely and only ourselves.聽 We are God鈥檚 creative masterpiece, every single one of us different, everyone who ever lived perfect and perfectly themselves.

If, in the end, I鈥檓 perfectly honest, as a teenager I slightly disapproved of David Bowie.聽 He was too outlandish, too far removed from anything I thought I could be comfortable with.聽 But I was wrong.聽 He knew the joy, the power, the value of being unique.聽 He celebrated it, he refused to be part of something.聽 He was himself.聽 I reckon that if Bowie was a hero (and he was, for much more than one day) it was in that.聽 He showed us, he showed me, how extraordinary it might be just to be yourself.

Broadcast

  • Mon 11 Jan 2016 06:30
    麻豆约拍 Radio 2

Farewell Chris Evans: The best bits from his last shows at Radio 2

After eight years of hosting the Breakfast Show, Chris Evans leaves Radio 2.

500 Words

麻豆约拍 Radio 2's story-writing competition for kids.