David Bowie passes, age 69

[Crossless2.0]

These days (and for many years now), gender-bending among pop stars is so routine it's hardly worth mentioning. When Bowie did it, it was new, provocative, and shocking -- even for many in the hip crowd, whose only real experience with such stuff involved jackasses making cracks about the length of their hair. Bowie was years ahead of his time, and the artists who owe much of their schtick to him would form a line stretching around the block and then some. He was a groundbreaker culturally and -- more importantly -- musically. His run of albums in the '70s is an accomplishment that damn few pop/rock acts can claim to have approached, much less equaled.

I had no idea he was ill, so the news came as a bad surprise when I heard it this morning. I'm glad he was able to drop that last album just before he died. I'll be buying it soon.