DAVID BOWIE: "Look up here, I’m in heaven" - Lazarus was his parting gift to the world

A pioneering chameleon of performance imagery, he straddled the worlds of hedonistic rock, fashion, and drama for five decades, pushing the boundaries of music and his own sanity to produce some of the most innovative songs of his generation.

And in classic Bowie style, he left a parting gift to the world, a new album released just days before his death, prophetically, its lead single, ‘Lazarus’, opening with the lyrics: “Look up here, I’m in heaven.”

The cultural pioneer’s death at 69, in New York on Sunday — some 18 months after his cancer diagnosis — was confirmed by his family.