US Festival '83, Glen Helen Regional Park, San Bernardino, CA, 5-30-1983 - Day 3, Part 9: David Bowie

The ninth and final act on Day Three (Rock Day) of the 1983 US Festival is David Bowie.

In 1983, David Bowie was probably at the commercial peak of his long music career. His album "Let's Dance," released in April 1983, sold ten million copies worldwide, his biggest selling album by far, and turned him into a superstar.

It so happened that Apple Computers co-founder Steve Wozniak was a big Bowie fan, and the US Festivals were basically vanity projects bankrolled by Wozniak.  

Berry Fey was the promoter organizing the festival with Wozniak. He later recalled, "The festival was completely booked, and Van Halen had a favored-nation clause in their contract that said no one could get more than them – and they were getting $1 million. Then Steve [Wozniak] came to me and said, 'God, Barry, I really love David Bowie.' I say, 'Steve, there's no room. Let's put this to bed.' And he says, 'Well, I really do love David … Could you try? It is my money and my festival.'"

Fey called Bowie, but Bowie was touring Europe to support the "Let's Dance" album. He wasn't due to perform in California until August, months away. He could only spare a single day flying to the U.S. and back to make the festival.

Fey said, "David tells me: 'We'll have to interrupt our tour and charter a 747 to bring our equipment and get it right back again.' So I went to Steve: 'David's gonna cost you a million and a half, but it's gonna cost you an extra half a million for Van Halen.' He just shrugged his shoulders: 'So?' The addition of Bowie ultimately cost $2 million."

Bowie and his band arrived on the morning of the day they were due to play, flying by helicopter from the airport. When they got backstage, they found a party started by Van Halen the night before was still going strong. Carmine Rojas, bassist for Bowie, later recalled to Spin Magazine that the drug use was heavy. "Everybody was packing – and I don't mean guns. Everybody was holding, as they said back in the day."

Carlos Alomar, guitarist in Bowie's band, also remembered the time. "We were shitting bricks, alright. David used to freak out over California and New York [concerts, because of their high profile], and he would always tell us, 'Don't go partyin'!' – just like all the other bands that got totally ripped up and fucked up before the [US Festival] gig. We had done that before, and David sometimes was a little cautious and would say, 'Listen guys, don't party too hard because I need you to be [on your game].' Well, that doesn't work! He did not ask us that for the US Festival. We remained what we will call primed – we were totally fuckin' hyper and primed the minute we hit the stage. We were bouncing off the walls. So no, we did not do that 'get plenty of rest before the show bullshit.'"

Alomar added, "It was a huge, huge deal. We had to understand how special the occasion was. Van Halen, David Bowie – this is top of the line. This was a job that had to be fabulous. It had to be our best."

Rojas further commented that the concert went over well with the crowd. "It was majestic. The sound coming off the big speakers, and the audience singing along with you, it's powerful. It's very tribal. It touches on your emotions strongly when you have people [singing] back and forth with you like that, and you're one huge team. That's a very powerful, positive energy. And David was such a leader and frontman, controlling all of that – and he was loving it."

Alomar was similarly pleased. "I look back at that performance and can still see David turning around and smiling at me. We had this thing where he'd give me the cues and then I'd cue the band. So we always had this connection going. And sometimes when he looked back at me that night, I was like 'Dude, you're lookin' like a Cheshire cat right now' [Laughs.]. There was a different smile, a look of, 'We nailed it. We did it. They went for that one. Oh, they loved that one.' It was that kind of joy. It wasn't that regular 'this is a cue' look. No, it was 'listen to that.'"

Of all the acts for the 1983 US Festival, I had the most trouble with the music of this one. For the vast majority of the others, I was able to find soundboard bootlegs, or at least videos of similar high quality that I converted to audio. But not with the Bowie set. He wasn't even included in the Westwood Radio One network show of highlights from the festival. All I could find was an audience bootleg that has the problems typical of audience bootlegs.

So at first I considered not including this, for fear that the sound quality wasn't up to snuff with the rest. But then I decided that Bowie was one of the headliners, one of the biggest acts, so I had to include his music. I resolved to do my best trying to improve the sound. For instance, I used the MVSEP audio editing program to get rid of most of the audience noise, other than at the ends of songs and during key moments of massive cheering during songs. That helped a lot. I also used the UVR5 program to improve the mix, mostly by boosting the lead vocals relative to the instruments. 

I think this set sound a lot better now, way better than the bootleg I started with. It's still not as good as most of the rest from this festival, but I think it's definitely listenable. 

The end of Bowie's set marked the end of the main portion of the US Festival, after New Wave, Heavy Metal, and Rock days one after another. Most people went home. But it wasn't actually the end of the festival, as there was a Country day a few days later. I only have a small portion of that to post, but I'll be posting that too.

This album is an hour and 36 minutes long.

118 Star (David Bowie)
119 Heroes (David Bowie)
120 What in the World (David Bowie)
121 Golden Years (David Bowie)
122 Fashion (David Bowie)
123 Let's Dance (David Bowie)
124 Breaking Glass (David Bowie)
125 Life on Mars (David Bowie)
126 Sorrow (David Bowie)
127 Cat People [Putting Out Fire] (David Bowie)
128 China Girl (David Bowie)
129 Scary Monsters [And Super Creeps] (David Bowie)
130 Rebel Rebel (David Bowie)
131 White Light-White Heat (David Bowie)
132 Station to Station (David Bowie)
133 Cracked Actor (David Bowie)
134 Ashes to Ashes (David Bowie)
135 Space Oddity (David Bowie)
136 talk (David Bowie)
137 Young Americans (David Bowie)
138 Fame (David Bowie)
139 The Jean Genie (David Bowie)
140 Modern Love (David Bowie)

https://www.imagenetz.de/gP67q

alternate link:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/b4FEajuJ

The cover photo comes from this exact concert.