--- title: How David Bowie Helped Nina Simone Out of a Slump description: After a chance meeting at a New York club, the two artists struck up a friendship canonical: https://time.com/4176079/david-bowie-nina-simone/ author: Alan Light article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-01-11T23:39:02.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:04:40.843Z article:section: Ideas og:title: How David Bowie Helped Nina Simone Out of a Slump og:description: 'Where you’re coming from, there are very few of us out there' og:url: https://time.com/4176079/david-bowie-nina-simone/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt12b8f976636c557f/698878982dce01e46e9e7480/david-bowie.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4312 og:image:height: 2426 og:image:alt: David Bowie og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How David Bowie Helped Nina Simone Out of a Slump twitter:description: 'Where you’re coming from, there are very few of us out there' twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt12b8f976636c557f/698878982dce01e46e9e7480/david-bowie.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How David Bowie Helped Nina Simone Out of a Slump > Sponsored content. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. by [Alan Light](https://time.com/author/alan-light/) ## Alan Light Jan 11, 2016 11:39 PM UTC  British singer, actor and musician David Bowie, 1974. British singer, actor and musician David Bowie, 1974.Terry O'Neill—Getty Images by [Alan Light](https://time.com/author/alan-light/) ## Alan Light Jan 11, 2016 11:39 PM UTC _For both David Bowie and Nina Simone, 1974 was a year of great transition. Simone, the “High Priestess of Soul” and an activist who had become one of the most emblematic and pioneering figures in the Civil Rights movement, was at a low point. Though she was honored with a day-long tribute for “Human Kindness Day” that May, she had largely stopped performing and recording, and was facing charges from the IRS. “The most prevalent view was that she was being tremendously harassed by the government,” said the politician and diplomat Andrew Young. Bowie, meantime, had recently killed off his Ziggy Stardust persona, moved to New York City, and begun a new musical direction oriented more toward soul music. He was also descending into drug addiction and paranoia. But one night, these two icons accidentally collided, leading to a friendship that has never been previously revealed._ Things looked bad for Nina Simone in the mid-’70s. But around this time an unlikely ally appeared, offering her a small morale boost. In July 1974, she took her daughter Lisa to a David Bowie concert at Madison Square Garden. About a week later, she went out, on a whim, to a private club called the Hippopotamus, and shortly after she arrived Bowie himself walked in with a small entourage and sat in a corner of the club. When Simone got up to leave and walked past his table, he invited her to sit down. Though they had exchanged only a few words, Bowie asked for her phone number and then called her that night at exactly 3:00 a.m. “He said, ‘The first thing I want you to know is that you’re not crazy—don’t let anybody tell you you’re crazy, because where you’re coming from, there are very few of us out there.’ ” For a month, he called her every night and they would talk for hours. Finally, he paid a visit. “He looked just like Charlie Chaplin, a clown suit, a big black hat,” said Simone. “He told me that he was not a gifted singer and he knew it. He said, ‘What’s wrong with you is you were gifted—you have to play. Your genius overshadows the money, and you don’t know what to do to get your money, whereas I wasn’t a genius, but I planned, I wanted to be a rock-and-roll singer and I just got the right formula.’ ” What Bowie was affirming for Nina was her true calling as an artist, a sensibility that he could recognize as something different from that of a pop star. At a period of such turbulence, it was a lift that she needed. “He’s got more sense than anybody I’ve ever known,” she said. “It’s not human—David ain’t from here.” Bowie later would record “Wild Is the Wind,” the title song from the 1966 Simone album, as the final track on his stellar _Station to Station_. And soon, as Bowie had done before her, Simone would leave her home country in search of a more sympathetic environment. _Excerpted with permission from_ [What Happened, Miss Simone?: A Biography](http://www.amazon.com/dp/1101904879/?tag=timecom-20). _Copyright 2016 by Radical Media LLC and the Estate of Nina Simone. 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