Lazarus: The Second Coming of David Bowie

“A superb biography” William BoydA major new biography of David Bowie on the 10th anniversary of his death, exploring the second half of his career from commercial failures to critical rebirth in the 21st century. When David Bowie died on 10 January 2016, aged 69, his death was greeted with the greatest display of public mourning since Princess Diana three decades before. Twenty-five years before, Bowie appeared to be washed up.

His Eighties career had been a slow descent into self-parody, his attempts to diversify into hard rock with the had been disastrous, and the art-rock music with which he had made his name was badly out of fashion. The Thin White Duke needed a miracle if he was not only going to be able to assume his rightful place at the top of the rock music firmament, but even to continue his career. And a miracle – a resurrection from the dead – is precisely what happened.

Lazarus: The Second Coming of David Bowie is the first biography of Bowie that tells the full and candid story of what happened in between those two apparently unbridgeable points. With new and exclusive interviews with the musicians, filmmakers and cultural figures who worked with and befriended Bowie throughout this period, Lazarus is the definitive account of the previously overlooked and fascinating latter half of a great and distinguished career. A career that climaxed with his final masterpiece, Blackstar, and the unprecedented theatrical flourish of his departure from the stage as he passed into legend.