David Bowie: "Martian Invasion" Article (1976)

David Bowie’s "Martian Invasion", a one-page article in Record Mirror, February 28, 1976.

THE SPIDERS first came to fame as David Bowie's backing band. Originally there were three of them: Mick Ronson (guitar), Trevor Bolder (bass), and Woody Woodmansey (drums).

Later on, additions were made to the line-up, but the band ceased to exist on July 3, 1973, when Bowie made his famous "retirement" announcement on stage at the Hammersmith Odeon.

After that, Ronson went on to do his solo thing, Bolder worked with him for a while, and Woodmansey played in a jazz band and got involved in Scientology. Bolder, however, always had the idea of one day putting a new Spiders together: "I didn't want to go on just being the bass player in a band and, frankly, if I were to stay in that position I'd rather do it with David than Ronno."

by Ray Fox-Cumming

In February last year, he achieved his aim. Back came Woodmansey on drums and then Newcastle provided a singer and guitarist. The guitarist, Dave Black, had been with a group called Kestrel, and the singer, Pete McDonald, had fronted a band called Bullfrog.

Immediately they'd formed, the new Spiders From Mars set about writing material, separately or in pairs, then they demoed it, rehearsed it, and recorded it, and by May had an album ready. Then came trouble: "Management hassles," says Trevor, "there was no money to pay for the album so it just had to stay in the can."

By autumn the group had secured themselves a recording deal with Pye and the way was clear for the album to be released. First, however, came a single.

"We didn't really want to put out a single first," said Trevor. "But the

record company wanted one as a trailer for the album, so we brought out a track called 'White Man Black Man.'"

Before one has time to ask how it fared, Trevor and Pete chorus: "It got lost in the Christmas rush."

"I don't really think it was right for a single anyway," adds Pete. "It was too laid back, a bit McCartneyesque."

Just before Christmas the group played their first series of dates - six of them in all, but few people knew about them because there was no

press coverage. "Our manager decided it would be best for us to play ourselves in quietly," explains Trevor, "but then he saw how well we were doing and rushed round trying to get journalists to come to the last date. It was too short notice though and no-

body'd come!" Now the album is out. It's called just 'Spiders

From Mars', "because we want to get the name of the group across" and there's a second single from it out as well, called '(I Don't Wanna Do No) Limbo'.

In radio quarters, the album's been well received. "Fluff's playing it," says Trevor, "so's John Peel and the single's getting a few plays too." To further interest in both album and single, The Spiders are spending the next few days touring the country's radio stations, but they are not pinning all their hopes on radio and TV to break them.

"In March," says Trevor, "we'll be doing a British tour of somewhere between 12 to 16 dates."

In an exclusive Record Mirror & Disc news story (February 14), it was announced that negotiations were proceeding for the Spiders to follow their Spring tour by opening Bowie's Wembley shows for him in May, but they are very cagey about saying anything on the subject.

How the Spiders crept back

"It was supposed to be a secret," says Trevor, "and Bowie had asked us not to say anything about

it. When we read the story, we were worried that he'd think we'd put it out, but apparently he's let it out all over America."

"No offer has been made," chips in Pete. "David's thinking about the idea and so are we, so you had better just say that negotiations are still proceeding. It's got no further than that."

In the meantime, the Spiders are firming up other plans. They'll make a second album in the summer and then tour America in the autumn. Trevor makes it clear that he wants people to think of the Spiders as a new band. "People shouldn't expect us to play just the kind of thing we were doing in the Bowie days. We couldn't do that, we'd get murdered for it. We want to cover as wide a scope of music as possible."

Did you do any Bowie numbers on your pre-Christmas dates? "Yes," says Trevor, "two. 'Suffragette City' and 'Man Who Sold The World', but we did the Lulu version of that, not the Bowie one."

For the next album, Trevor hopes that the whole group will write songs together. "I think too that there'll be a little more rock on it than there is on the first one."

Hopefully for the second album they'll avoid the last-minute panic they had on the first one. "We spent so long doing the backing tracks," says Trevor, "that Pete had to put on all the vocals in one day."

"I don't know how I ever did it," grins Pete, "I must have had 50 cups of tea that day, just to keep the voice going."