Rant #1,589: Ashes to Ashes, Funk To Funky

So I didn't win the PowerBall lottery. That is fine, I guess.

Let me move from PowerBall to power player, and let me talk about David Bowie again.

David Bowie's death has released an avalanche of praise, look backs, and new appreciations of the artist, unlike anything we have seen since perhaps John Lennon went to the great beyond.

He wasn't a perfect person, but as an artist, he was able to see past the latest trend and create a new one.

You would be taken in, and then, just as you got it, he would move onto the next thing.

I have been a Bowie fan for ages. I have a lot of his recordings, some of his early recordings, and I do plan on buying Darkstar, his latest album, even though I have to admit, I am not yet jumping on the bandwagon of praise that this record is getting.

From what I have heard off of it, it is kind of a downer, very depressing, but might need repeat listenings for me to fully appreciate it. Or maybe not.

Anything to knock the completely dour and boring Adele out of the top spot on the album charts is welcome, and this will be Bowie's first No. 1 album in the U.S. when it ascends to the top spot on the charts.

But when I look at my own record collection, as I did the other day in this column, I see that I really have so much of his output, yet I don't have everything, so there is still so much more to get.

To me, he was just so, so different, so different for Americans to handle.

Europeans got him a bit earlier, and even there, it took him quite a few years to find his sea legs.

Once he did, there was no stopping this guy.

Here in America, it was tougher going.

It wasn't until really 1973 or so when Americans started to embrace him, and he started to embrace America ... so much so that he lived in New York until the day he died.

Like I said earlier, he was not a perfect person--he had some drug arrests, he was even charged with rape in the early 1980s, and he had a somewhat odd private life at least early on--but he was an original, or at least one original to rock and roll.

He was incredibly influenced by Judy Garland, in his stage presence, in his gay aura (neither was gay, by all accounts), and his ability to create a stage atmosphere that got you hooked by words, music and movement. Edith Piaf, Johnny Ray, and yes, Elvis Presley were probably major influences on him, but think of all that he influenced, everyone from Freddie Mercury to KISS to Madonna to Lady GaGa.

So yes, we lost a major figure in the world of popular entertainment when David Bowie passed on, and it appears that we will be hearing about his life--and death--for weeks and years and decades to come.

When an original comes and then leaves like he did, it is inevitable that the clamor will be intense, and it appears that in his being so different, he really was an ordinary guy.

I have interviewed many celebrities, and no matter how high or how low they are in the spotlight, I always thought that some celebrities' ego outbursts were extremely juvenile. I mean, these guys put on their pants the same way I do each day, they are no better than I am, even if they think they are.

Bowie was able to make the strange mainstream, and if he did nothing else, this is his legacy to the world.

We are all human beings ... some of us use that as a virtue, others use it as a detriment.

He lived the life, and we were his beneficiaries.

Simple as that.