I discovered David Bowie at age 14 and it was love at first sight, my father kept a vinyl of Aladdin Sane in the garage, along with Quadrophenia from The Who and Rock N Roll Animal from “Uncle” Lou Reed. This story features Geoff MacCormack, a friend of David since the age of eight when they attended Burnt Ash Primary School in London’s Bromley and The Spiders from Mars, who met in January 1973 for a concert at Radio City Music Hall (Salvador Dalí was also in the audience).

In a few weeks MacCormack found himself on board Hurricane Bowie (passing from New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Hawaii, Canada to Japan) as we know David was notoriously phobic of the flight, arriving in Siberia via Trans- Siberian Express; later in Poland, in eastern and western Germany, Paris and finally Rome. Of this incredible journey there are photographs that tell us the man beyond the artist, captured in everyday life starting from the moment he wakes up in the morning even after an alcoholic night, as MacCormack explains:

“We drank cheap Riesling and beer (Peeva) with a bunch of soldiers we’d met the night before. They were friendly and inquisitive as to what life was like in the West. We asked them what they did in the army: they said they were in the construction unit. You can just make out the bleak Siberian landscape through the window”.

Spontaneous moments of an incredible life, few poses, a lot of improvisation, cool stories to tell and others that we will never know. David was always very calm before every concert, as MacCormack explains, looking at the Hammersmith Odeon shot in 1973: it was the glorious time of Ziggy Stardust.

The MacCormack travel diary was released in May 2007 in a limited edition and is now on display at the Lucy Bell Gallery in Hastings, East Sussex. If you want to know more, I suggest you visit the website of the English gallery, which you find here.