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Remarkable set of ‘data visualization’ 12-inch records of David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’
03.10.2017
01:27 pm
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Space Oddity” came out in 1969, and it was David Bowie’s second charting single—”The Laughing Gnome” was the first. For many fans, however, the song represents the true start of Bowie’s career as a world-changing superstar.
 

 
Timed to mark “the first trip around the sun since Bowie’s passing,” Valentina D’Efilippo and Miriam Quick, two data designers working out of London, unveiled their Oddityviz project a few weeks ago—the idea being to release ten 12-inch albums in ten weeks, each one with a visual design featuring a circular data visualization representing some aspect of the song. Each visualization is laser-engraved onto a 12-inch acrylic disc. Even though this isn’t how records actually work, for the purposes of the visualization on its surface, a single rotation of the record equals the duration of the song, which is 317 seconds long.

As they explain:
 

The project visualizes data from Bowie’s 1969 track “Space Oddity” on a series of 10 specially engraved records with accompanying posters, plus a moving image piece. Each 12-inch disc deconstructs the track in a different way: melodies, harmonies, lyrics, structure, story and other aspects of the music are transformed into new visual systems.

 
 
The art of data visualization depends on numbers to function—if you’re curious to see what the statistics that each visualization used, you can check the work yourself at a Google Spreadsheet that was created for the project.

Seven of the records have been released. As D’Efilippo and Quick explain, the final record, “10 Emotions,” is “a bit different. It visualizes the emotional responses people had while listening to ‘Space Oddity.’”

Here’s an example of what the prints look like:

 
This video attempts to explain what’s going on:

 

“1 Narrative illustrates our interpretation of the story of ‘Space Oddity.’ It is a story with two characters: Ground Control and the doomed astronaut, Major Tom.”
 

“2 Recording deconstructs Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’ into its eight original master tracks.
 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Martin Schneider
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03.10.2017
01:27 pm
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Little kids singing David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’
12.03.2011
04:00 am
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I was so uplifted by Tara’s post of the little kids at The Sullivan School singing “Judy is a Punk” by The Ramones that I went to their Youtube site and found this sweet take on David Bowie’s “Space Oddity.”
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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12.03.2011
04:00 am
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David Bowie’s first major TV appearance, 1970
07.08.2011
08:07 pm
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The first major television appearance of David Bowie. Watch as a young Bowie performs “Space Oddity,” a song that was initially thought of—even by his longtime producer Tony Visconti—almost as a novelty record, after winning the Ivor Novello Award on May 10, 1970.
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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07.08.2011
08:07 pm
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