But Bowden insists Starboy is still on track.
"So many people wanted to come to it, who couldn't, simply because they had a prior engagement with Santa Claus."
He says that when an acrobatic abseiler plunged 20m off a building in Aotea Square this month, a council review of safety procedures and consents put his show in doubt.
"We had a lot of acrobats coming out of the ceiling, and a lot of flying happening ... and [the council] couldn't give us an answer until 48 hours before showtime."
Over eggs benedict at a North Shore cafe, Bowden explains his dream is to tour his show through Asia and Europe.
"I guess maybe I'm the only person who thinks that glam rock can make a comeback. But I'm willing to try.
"In a sense I am doing it tongue-in-cheek, and becoming a rock star ... You're going to be taking the piss really, you've got to have a sense of humour."
But he admits that given his role as de facto spokesman for the legal-high industry in New Zealand, Starboy's fanbase will lie predominantly offshore.
"My market has to be overseas now, because in New Zealand the public don't like it if you've changed from one thing to something else."
When Bowden lobbied for the party pill industry before the BZP ban in 2008 he often wore a suit and a short-back-and-sides haircut to go with it.
He now wears his hair long and makes no effort to look like a nine to fiver - something he says probably hurt his credibility with some sections of society when he fronted for synthetic cannabis.
"But I don't really care. You get to the point where you're pretty hardnosed. It was tough, people saying, 'I'm going to smash you, I'm going to kill you if I see you'.
"I had death threats ... it's kind of nasty. Is that because of the eyeliner, is that the issue? Or is it the hair?"
And the threats haven't worked - Bowden still talks articulately and passionately about drug reform, and predicts the return of legal highs to New Zealand.
Although smoking products like Kronic cannot be proven safe, other legal highs will triumph over what he says is a completely futile war on drugs.
The review of the Misuse of Drugs Act and the establishment of a new regulatory body next year will see New Zealand to the fore of drug reform, he says.
"New Zealand will lead with a pragmatic, regulatory model. Other countries will follow suit. And when we've got three or four countries, then we take it to the UN level."
But didn't the rollout of Kronic - now helping to fund Starboy - into dairies, many next to schools, damage the argument for legalising similar products?
"It was messy in the same way that road works are messy," Bowden counters.
"You get a result at the end of it ... It was pretty clear that regulation was needed. That's what you should be able to see there - that regulation was required."
And if Starboy does sell-out stadiums across the globe, that message will be carried through his music.
"I'll always be a freedom fighter ... I see it as the role of the artist, which is to stimulate creative thought - to progress policy and mankind."
