I remember back in the early ’80s when I first saw Heaven 17’s “Let Me Go” on MTV asking my older sister ‘is this David Bowie?’ I was 11, and my Bowie knowledge was limited primarily to songs from “Let’s Dance”. So I find it fitting that Heaven 17 vocalist Glenn Gregory has been fronting a touring band that performs Bowie’s music. The project, Holy Holy, was launched by Bowie’s ‘Spiders From Mars’-era drummer Woody Woodmansey and long-time Bowie producer/collaborator Tony Visconti. In early 2022, the group did a “Best of Bowie” UK tour, but without Woodmansey.
When I interviewed Gregory in 2018 about Afterhere (a collaboration with Berenice Scott), I asked about his work with Holy Holy:
How did you get involved with Holy Holy, and what has the experience been like?
Glenn Gregory: “It’s been great. It’s hard work, actually. It’s a hard show live. Sometimes it’s up to 2 hours, and all those Bowie songs are quite full-on to sing. So physically, it’s quite difficult, but I’ve been enjoying it. How I got into it, had to do with being in the right place at the right time. I’d been working on a project with a Dutch composer named Stephen Emmer called ‘International Blue.’ Tony Visconti produced it. I remember being in the studio at Abby Road and Tony saying, ‘You know Glenn, sometimes your voice really reminds me of David’s.’ David was still alive at this time, and I said, ‘Oh that’s amazing, that’s such a compliment coming from you. Thank you, Tony.’ He and Woody [Woodmansey, former David Bowie drummer] had been talking about doing ‘The Man Who Sold the World’ live together, because that album had never been performed in it’s entirety. David had never done it at the time. And Woody said to Tony, ‘Ok, it’s great that we’re going to do it, but can you think of any singers who could do it?’ And I think purely because Tony had just been working with me, they called me. It was my birthday, actually, and I was walking home with my son from school. He said, ‘I just hung up with Woody about this project we’re doing, “The Man Who Sold the World” live. Would you like to be involved?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, I’d love to.’
“At the time, I thought he just wanted me to sing that track. I thought it would be some kind of big experience, and there would be lots of singers doing different tracks. So I said, ‘Is there anything else you’d like me to sing?’ And he said, ‘No, I want you to sing everything, the whole album and probably even more songs as well.’ I was a bit blown away. I was like, ‘Wow, really? Are you sure?’ That triggered a good 3 months of serious rehearsals for me, personally, getting those songs in my head. The only way I can do anything live is to totally know it inside and out, because then I can start to make it a little bit mine and not just sing it as David sang it. I struggled for a bit at first and then Woody called me out of the blue to see how I was getting on. Woody said to me, ‘Look, don’t try to sing it like David, just be you, sing it like you. I don’t want it to be a kind of tribute act and a sound-alike act. I just what to do that album, and that’s why Tony and I wanted you, because we like you and we want it to be like that.’ And that really helped me, and from that point, I really just tried to do it how I wanted to do it. Luckily, my upbringing from about the age of 14 was a lot of Bowie anyway. I loved David Bowie, and Roxy Music. I loved glam, Bolan, T-Rex, so I guess there’s David Bowie influence in me to make it sound just enough like it to work. I was nervous as hell the first time we did it. I figured if I got anything wrong, they’d start throwing bottles at me. But thankfully, it’s been a very delightful experience. Its’ an amazing show to do; it’s so full of energy. Fantastic guitarists and keyboards, it’s just brilliant.”
Read the full interview with Glenn Gregory here. For more info on the current tour, visit www.holyholy.co.uk.
