** Full disclosure: Mick Ronson is one of the main reasons I started playing guitar seriously. He is a major influence on my attitude...
** Full disclosure: Mick Ronson is one of the main reasons I started playing guitar seriously. He is a major influence on my attitude and creative muse, as well as my personal touchstone for what a rock guitarist of a certain era should be. Therefore, to be completely honest with our wonderful Guitar Player readers, I am admitting that I did not attempt to be journalistically objective in the following report. Reader beware...
Without taking anything away from David Bowie's genius, vision, and ambition, the story of his early days may have ended quite differently had Mick Ronson not become his musical foil, creative sentinel, and lead guitarist. So many of the thrilling and ferocious riffs and beautiful sweetening parts (pianos, strings, etc.) on Bowie's The Man Who Sold the World (1970), Hunky Dory (1971), The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars (1972), Aladdin Sane (1973), and Pinups (1973) would never have happened without Ronson, and it's temping to believe that those records — and all of those songs — would have been pale ghosts with Ronson's contributions deleted.
But Ronson's mammoth and essential impact on Bowie's recordings — as well as those by Lou Reed, Mott the Hoople, Ian Hunter, John Mellencamp, Bob Dylan, Morrissey, the Rich Kids, and several random talents that he graciously assisted for little or no compensation — has been celebrated by an almost exclusive club of guitar players and Bowie zealots. WE know how valuable Ronson was to the Bowie legend and guitarcraft in general, but Bowie's larger-than-life persona tended to overshadow much of Ronson's importance from the general public.
It didn't help