“[When we first met], we talked for hours…[David was] an incredibly intelligent man, one of the smartest men I’ve ever met on the planet.”

Michael Kamen, cited in Alias David Bowie (1987 edition), p.465

“We were exuberant [during the ‘Diamond Dogs’ tour]…‘What’s happening, man? Where’s the buzz, man?’ It was a party, a big big ball. We were surrounded by people. The tour seemed to be the focus of the entire world’s attention. [Groupies would] come out of the woodwork. You’d walk out of your hotel room and they would be three deep in the hallways, waiting for a glimpse of David.”

Michael Kamen, cited in Alias David Bowie (1987 edition), p.471

“[During the tour, Bowie was fast becoming] one of those rare creatures of rock and roll – you were extremely blessed if you got close to anybody in the competition, much less David himself. ‘Himself’ began with a capital letter and he was being insulated, very effectively so.”

Michael Kamen, cited in Alias David Bowie (1987 edition), p.472

“One minute [David] would be a sweet and wonderful friend, somebody who was easy to talk to and be around with. The next minute he was somebody who would burn through you with their eyes. It was a quite sudden switch.”

Michael Kamen, cited in Alias David Bowie (1987 edition), p.472

“[The Philly Dogs tour] was horrific – a sort of third-rate gospel revivalist meeting. The stage was full of large black people going ‘Halleluja’ and shaking tambourines, and poor David was very thin and very white and completely out of his element.”

Michael Kamen, cited in Alias David Bowie (1987 edition), p.486

“[Edward Shearmur] worked for me for many many years. I met him when he was fresh out of Cambridge as an organ scholar, and he was sent to me by Pink Floyd's manager's then-girlfriend, now-wife. He's her nephew. She said "I want you to meet him, he's a really good musician, and he's very eager to find out about a career in the music.” I said "What does he do?" and she said "He's an organ scholar from Cambridge,” so I said "Fine, I'd love to meet him,” and he came round to me and he made his big points with me almost immediately. I don't quite know how he got onto it, but he said that - you have to remember that at that time I was in my thirties, and he was nineteen years old - and he said that one of the great, epochal moments of his life that made him realise that there was classical music contained in rock and roll, that there was possibly an area of great interest, something that really inspired him, and I said "What was it?" and he said there was a David Bowie record with an incredible oboe solo in it. And I smiled, 'cos it was me! And it was my playing oboe solo in "1984", the song from the David Live album, that started Ed thinking that maybe there was a place for him in this new world of commercial music, that maybe there was some value in it.”

Michael Kamen, Bronxweb (1998)

"There is the sense, when you are working with him, that he is the only thing happening, that he is it."

Michael Kamen (1974), cited in David Bowie: The Starzone Interviews (1985)