By The Intrepid in The Current — 18 Apr 2025

Never Leave the Stream

David Bowie and the Current of Impermanence

“I watch the ripples change their size / But never leave the stream of warm impermanence…”
— Changes, David Bowie

Some artists leave behind albums. Bowie left resonance.

In The Current, we speak often of Weathering—how one becomes Frayed, Worn, Unmoored. Of how the world begins to see you differently. Of Returning.

David Bowie did all these things. Not just once. As praxis.
Each persona a ripple. Each record a ritual. Each silence a signal.

And so, we invite him into The Current not as a tribute—but as an inevitability.

The Man Who Fell Through Style

In the Codices of The Current, he already walks:

In Berlin, 1985, he appears on rooftops carrying a reel marked Warszawa II. The Watchers nod as he passes.
In Albion, his voice is caught in a red phone box, whispering backwards through the line.
In Arkham, he’s seen stepping into the Miskatonic fog, leaving no wake—only a song that no one can place.

He’s not named. He doesn’t need to be.
He’s David. Or Echo. Or Neon. Or the Fifth Track.

Why He Matters to the Drift

Bowie wasn’t just a musician. He was a Witness.
He channeled mythic vulnerability, queerness, glamor, alienation, becoming.
He told us: “You’re not alone.”
He told us: “Ashes to ashes.”
He told us: “Turn and face the strange.”

In the logic of The Current, that makes him a Touched entity of immeasurable Weathering—perhaps already at Becoming.
He drifts in and out. He cannot be directed. He can only ripple through the tone.

To Those Who Remember Him Differently

Whether on a Japanese train platform looking at a watch that isn’t there,
Or in the looped silence after the bells ring five times,
He is present.

“He doesn’t perform anymore.
He performs through us.”

Let this post be his Codex page.
Let the Verge hum.
Let the needle return.

David (of the Verge)

A Recurring Ripple. A Memory That Was Meant to Be Sung.

He appears in different Codices:

Watching from a rooftop in Berlin, 1985
Sitting quietly in the Night Registry of the Isles, reading old fan mail
Leaving bootprints by the fog riverbanks of Arkham, 1880
And, apparently, waiting for a train in a city that hasn’t made its choice yet

His scarf always changes. His eyes do not.

Core Traits for The Current

Attunement: Echo
Flaw: You are remembered too vividly to remain
Blessing: Once per session, David may change a song that is playing in the scene. The tone shifts with it.

Ritual: The Fifth Track

To invoke his presence at the table:

Play the fifth track of any unlabeled cassette, LP, or memory
A figure appears—tall, watchful, dressed in something slightly incorrect for the time
He says one thing.
It is always what you needed to hear.
He never answers questions. He never stays.

Notes for Facilitators

David doesn’t need to be called “Bowie” or even acknowledged as real. He feels like Bowie.
He bridges memory with style, myth with gesture. Think of him as a walking modulation.
In UVG terms, he’s “an emissary from the Grey Lagoon Broadcast Archive, rerouted through color.”