Heart op Bowie: it will all be hunky dory

ROCK legend David Bowie yesterday said he could not wait to get back to work following emergency surgery for a heart problem that forced him to cancel his European tour.

The 57-year-old star was seen by doctors for a trapped nerve in his shoulder after playing a gig in Germany last month.

But it was discovered that he had “an acutely blocked artery” requiring an emergency procedure known as an angioplasty, his spokesman said.

Bowie was due to play at the Oxygen festival in Punchestown as the headline act tomorrow.

Thousands of fans who had bought tickets for the remainder of the star’s European tour dates were disappointed when he cancelled the shows, originally citing the trapped nerve problem.

But voicing his own frustration yesterday, Bowie said: “I’m so p***** off because the last 10 months of this tour have been so f**king fantastic. I can’t wait to be fully recovered and get back to work again.

“I tell you what, though, I won’t be writing a song about this one.”

Bowie’s spokesman said that he left the clinic where he was treated in Hamburg last week. The heart problem was only identified when the star was being treated for a trapped nerve which he suffered during a previous concert in Prague on June 23.

He played a full concert at the Hurricane Festival, in the German town of Scheessel on June 25, before seeing doctors for the trapped nerve.

“During that treatment they found this heart problem.

“Nobody knew it was there until it was discovered during the physical after he hurt his shoulder,” Bowie’s spokesman added.

Bowie cancelled the next day’s scheduled concert at the Southside Festival, which was also in Germany.

He announced to thousands of disappointed fans that he would have to cancel the rest of his European tour.

His spokesman said: “Bowie, who was able to leave the clinic early this week, is now convalescing with his family and hopes to start work next month.”

A 2000 NME poll voted Bowie the most influential musician of all time. His last album, Heathen, the 25th of his career, was hailed by critics as his best since 1980’s album Scary Monsters.

He turned down a CBE in 2000, the same year Mick Jagger was knighted, and said: “I would never have any intention of accepting anything like that. I seriously don’t know what it’s for. It’s not what I spent my life working for.”