David Bowie - the Studio Albums

[Slim]

I've quite enjoyed these journeys through the studio catalogues of various seminal bands and artists. It's interesting to hear them in sequence and writing a few lines about them helps me to crystallise my thoughts.

I thought I'd have a go at David Bowie next. I've been a fan since I was 14 or 15 and I have all of his records. I've listened to all of them at least once, sometimes through clenched teeth. This will be a lengthy project; there are 26 of them. So let's begin ..

David Bowie [June 1967]

If you're not familiar with this early phase of David Bowie's career, you'd probably be very surprised to hear this first album. It's not easy to describe what this is, really .. very lightweight, very theatrical frothy pop songs with Bowie channelling the voice of Anthony Newley in all its overtly vaudevillian, cockney hamminess. Really strange. Mostly camper than a row of pink tents.

On the plus side, it's clear the young Bowie has an ear for a melody and there's certainly a fair helping of downright oddness. Despite the lightweight, gaily orchestrated music hall mood that pervades the record there's some startling lyrical content here, albeit tongue-in-cheek. Take We Are Hungry Men for example, with its casual references to mass abortion and infanticide. Wild.

This was, until I downloaded it a few days ago, the only Bowie album I didn't have. Back in 1975 or so I did buy a compilation album entitled The World Of David Bowie that has most of its tunes along with the well-known single Laughing Gnome and a couple of other tunes that aren't on here.

I suppose the best-known tune from this era is Love You 'til Tuesday.

A very odd album and quite honestly, it's a bit of a cringe-fest. I don't know who the natural audience for this stuff might have been. I can well imagine that it would appeal to middle-aged folks more than teenagers.

There's no way you could have seen Ziggy Stardust or Diamond Dogs coming. I always think of Bowie as being a few steps ahead of everyone else, but when you think of his contemporaries in the mid '60s - The Beatles, The Who, Pink Floyd especially - it's hard not to conclude that he was a few steps (or a few miles) behind at this point. This was released five days after Sergeant Pepper.

[The Picnic Wasp]

Looking forward to this tome unfolding, not least because I don't have many of his albums despite always considering myself a fan.

[Thenop]

Never really took the time to properly listen to all of his output.
I have some clear favourites going into this, one of which is not under the Bowie moniker at all: Tin Machine, fantastic album that is probably one of his most straightforward ones.

Bring it on.

[captainkurtz]

Huge fan.  Looking forward to your deep dive.
That run from 1970-80 is unsurpassed.

[Slim]

I have some clear favourites going into this, one of which is not under the Bowie moniker at all: Tin Machine, fantastic album that is probably one of his most straightforward ones.

I liked the Tin Machine albums as well and I'm not sure why they were so poorly received. Certainly I don't think they're peak Bowie but for me they definitely improved on the couple of albums that preceded them which I've never liked at all. Perhaps I'll revise that opinion when I come to them, but I doubt it.

On their own terms, ie as more down-to-earth rock music, the Tin Machine records definitely work for me (mostly). "Pinstripes and Purple Haze" was the term coined by Q Magazine and somewhere I still have my copy of that issue.

Just found an online transcription, apparently Reeves Gabrels came up with that pithy phrase. Scroll down to June 1989 - Q Magazine

https://www.bowiewonderworld.com/press/press80.htm

People were confused by this idea of Bowie as a band member rather than solo artist and I think that was a bit of a sham, given that he wrote most of the songs and I can't really doubt that he was in charge even though he pretended that they were a democratic band. I must admit I hadn't thought about those two albums, I'll add them to the list.

[Slim]

David Bowie [November 1969]

Though usually known as Space Oddity, Bowie's second album was originally, like his first, titled David Bowie - perhaps reflecting a view that his debut, over two years earlier, had been something of a false start. And certainly it's a very different proposition.

It was retitled in the early '70s to cash in on the success of David's big hit single.

I've had this since the late '70s. It's not a great album on the whole. I hadn't listened to the whole thing for years, though I dip into it quite often for its two exceptional tunes - Space Oddity of course, and the brilliant Letter to Hermione which is a beautiful, wistful, atmospheric farewell song to the girlfriend young David had just lost. Best love song ever. I quite like Wild Eyed Boy from Freecloud as well, although the musical theatre style orchestration is a bit OTT and puts me off.

I would suppose everyone's heard the haunting Space Oddity, which was a hit single in 1969. The BBC even used it as a theme for some of their Apollo 11 coverage, before someone at the corporation took the time to listen to the lyrics. I can remember hearing it on the radio when I was still in junior school. I still think the Stylophone sounds great; somehow less dated than the synthesisers used on early prog records. But it's used very judiciously. Did Rolf Harris ever use one on one of his own records?

Elsewhere, it's an interesting and quite eclectic record. Some of it seems to foreshadow the Ziggy Stardust sound, and curiously there's some decidedly Ronson-esque guitar work here and there, despite the fact that Mick Ronson doesn't actually play on it. It's mostly definitely a rock album, though there's plenty of folky strummed acoustic guitar and a bit of grand orchestration. It all blends together nicely.

A couple of these tunes are pretty ordinary hybrid acoustic / electric rockers. Some feel a bit drawn out and overwrought.

Years before I had this record I had a David Bowie chord book that featured some of these songs. I couldn't read music so I had no idea what the melodies or the tempo were, but I made up my own versions from the lyrics and the chords. I admit that David's were better.

Promising but patchy. A bit unfocussed. And still nowhere near the quality of some of his later work.

[Slim]

The Man Who Sold The World [November 1970]

I've loved this album since 1975, but I must admit I haven't listened to it much in the present century. There's just too much music, isn't there? But it was a joy to reacquaint myself with it on Tuesday.

I suspect casual listeners, familiar with the great man's later work from the likes of Heroes or Let's Dance might be quite surprised by this record if they were to give it a listen. It's undoubtedly a hard rock album for the most part, albeit an unconventional one. It's quite dark as well, a little unsettling. Clever stylistic touches throughout. Lots of heavy guitar riffola.

It defies specific classification really but it's fair to say that there are elements of prog here as well as well as heavy rock. Take the opening tune Width Of A Circle for example - definitely my favourite from this album. It lasts more than eight minutes, and goes through a few changes of mood and pace. It has a sort of extended jam session as well, with Mick Ronson and Tony Visconti, who plays bass as well as producing the record, going at it like Jeff Beck and Jack Bruce.

Elsewhere there are punchier, more compact tunes - the brilliant, haunting title track, Black Country Rock which reminds me of T Rex, and the psychopathic Running Gun Blues. The lovely After All has a touch of psychedelia. She Shook Me Cold is heavier and nastier than any Sabbath tune I can think of.

The one criticism I have is that the album finishes on what I think is its weakest tune, The Supermen. Feels a bit anti-climactic. I think After All should have been the closing tune, to end on a wistful note - a bit like Rock & Roll Suicide does for Ziggy Stardust.

Anyway - this is a terrific record, the first album from Bowie's classic period.

[Slim]

Hunky Dory [December 1971]

Again, an album that I played to death as a teenager. A year after Man Who Sold The World, David has moved on from his progressive heavy rock phase. This album has more of a singer / songwriter vibe. It's a bit eclectic. It is, I suppose, a hybrid pop / rock record in the main but the most striking thing about it is the sheer quality of the songwriting.

There are at least three tunes on this record, which, had he never written another decent tune in his life, Bowie would be remembered for to this day. I suggest that any one of Changes, Oh! You Pretty Things or (especially) Life on Mars? would be career-defining for any other artist. It's only because the Thin White Duke wrote a couple of dozen other masterpieces that they're not remembered as such. If Elton John or Freddie Mercury had somehow written Changes, it would be their signature song. No question.

Elsewhere there's a sort of electric folk ode to Bob Dylan, a darkly satisfying Velvet Underground pastiche, a partly experimental tune about Andy Warhol that segues from atonal synthesiser oddness into a brisk acoustic ditty. And a very endearing and witty upbeat lullaby to David's firstborn.

The only tune on the album I don't really get is Eight Line Poem which is a bit of a piano dirge with a simple vocal and boring low key bluesy guitar on top.

Clearly the standout tune is Life on Mars?, probably my single favourite Bowie tune of all, perhaps with the exception of Aladdin Sane's title track. But perhaps I shall revise that opinion as I trawl through the canon. Originally conceived as a sort of answer to the Sinatra classic My Way with which it shares a similar structure in some respects, but harmonically even more ambitious. An unbelievably clever song but more than that, I find it so powerful and inspiring. Life-affirming, even.

It's the cherry on top of a spectacular album.

[Slim]

The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars [June 1972]

Released a mere six months after Hunky Dory, but in some ways a massive step forward, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars represents one of those rare moments in popular culture where unmitigated brilliance meets with mass appeal.

This is where it all comes together for Bowie. The whole album has a single, coherent sound. In keeping with its theme, it sounds like a band. There's none of the eclecticism of his previous work, no whimsical meanderings. Of course it has some light and shade, but it's not a patchwork quilt of different styles like the previous two albums. It's powerful, passionate, focused and there's not a gram of fat on it. The songs are distinctive, clever and very strong.

Is it Glam Rock? Perhaps it is but if so it's operating at a very different level from the Glitter Band and Sweet. There's undoubtedly a certain debt to the New York Dolls.

I bought this album as a teenager and I played it many, many times (I'm trying to avoid using the "played it to death" cliche again here). Listening to it again yesterday I was really impressed by the production - the bass sound has a pleasing bottom end thump with a little bit of growl and the guitars are crunchy and loud.

It's very loosely a concept album although it's not obvious. It's hard to pick a standout tune. Any one of them would be a standout on another record - with the exception perhaps of It Ain't Easy which I've never been fond of. But partly that's because as a kid I was heavily invested in the cult of Bowie as a songwriter, and it's a cover. Maybe Hang On To Yourself isn't quite as strong as the others, either. But it's still a punchy little tune. I definitely like it.

This must surely be one of the top ten most iconic albums of all time. It's comfortably the most iconic Bowie album although actually I don't think it's his best.

[Slim]

Aladdin Sane [April 1973]

Brilliant record, this. Hadn't heard it for years. It wasn't as well-received as Ziggy (and I've never liked it quite that much either), but it has some of Bowie's very best work.

I'd say that the best tunes here (the title track, Cracked Actor, Time, Jean Genie) are as strong as or stronger than anything on Ziggy. But it doesn't perhaps gel quite so well; it's not quite so well-defined. It doesn't have the same artful mystique, and although there is a concept here, it's not nearly so obvious. Bowie himself described his Aladdin Sane persona as a "pale imitation" of Ziggy.

Still - disregarding the point that it's a follow-up to one of the greatest records of all time, Aladdin Sane is nonetheless, in its own right, a pretty fantastic album. The songwriting is clever to the point of sheer genius in parts. There are some powerful, stylish rockers. It's all recorded very nicely.

Bowie recruited a virtuoso pianist called Mike Garson to record this one and he improvises a dissonant, avant-garde jazz solo on the title track. It's a bit like a Gershwin tune being crowbarred in where it shouldn't, and yet it works.

My only misgiving really is the inclusion of a Stones cover, Let's Spend The Night Together. It certainly improves on the original, for me anyway. It swaggers nicely. And yet it seems a bit humdrum, for an album that largely contains stellar, very distinctive tunes.

[Slim]

Pin Ups [October 1973]

I'd never listened to this album until yesterday. One of its tunes, Sorrow, was a hit single a long time ago and I do remember that. But I always found the idea of Bowie doing an album of covers more than faintly ridiculous. On a fundamental level it seems inexplicable to me, like Michelangelo doing a sabbatical as a painter and decorator.

Apparently it was intended as a "stopgap" although it came out only six months after Aladdin Sane.

So anyway I had a listen yesterday. Mostly it's pretty simple, straightforward rock'n'roll. Of course David's highly mannered voice gives it all a distinctive touch. I liked I Can't Explain which has a slow, brooding, heavy feel that the Who original doesn't. I quite liked See Emily Play, which really does work as a nice vehicle for the vocal. It has a bit more rock sensibility than the original, and some of the Bowie out-there production touches.

I was quite interested to hear that Friday On My Mind has a bit of the old Tony Newley vocal affectation familiar from the earliest Bowie albums.

But overall it just feels lightweight and disposable. When you consider that it's sandwiched by the exquisite Aladdin Sane and (as we shall see) the mind-scaldingly brilliant Diamond Dogs, it's really a very odd proposition indeed.

[The Picnic Wasp]

Those titles really transport me to early secondary school days, with the slightly older kids walking around with their purchases from Listen Records in Cambridge St. Thinking back, I was really young for my age and didn't appreciate the benefits of being at a school in the city centre. Fearful days if I'm honest.

[Slim]

Diamond Dogs [May 1974]

This thread collapsed because I knew I was not going to be able to express my thoughts and feelings about Diamond Dogs in a forum post. Actually I don't think I could do that if I attempted to write a book about it. So I kept putting it off until it had hardened into a sort of mental block.

Still - I do want to listen to the rest of the Bowie canon so I decided just to dive in and give it a go.

To me this is an extraordinary record; as I've already alluded it just defies description. It's so theatrical that it almost feels like a multimedia experience. I think it might be the cleverest and most powerful record ever recorded. It's an aural immersion into the most gripping dystopian theatre.

Highslide Image Viewer

It has its cake and eats it - it's catchy and it's glam rock. But it's tense drama at the same time. There are wonderful production touches that make it unsettling in the best possible way - the echoey, backwards piano that bursts into Sweet Thing, the strange, warbly Dalek voice effects in the title track and elsewhere. The faintly out of tune sax, played by Bowie himself. In hindsight it may simply have been out of tune because he wasn't an accomplished player but in effect it just adds to the dark, stark, cold, unnerving landscape that this record inhabits. Bowie plays most of the guitar parts, as well.

This is of course a concept album, based on Orwell's 1984. As it happens I'd already read that book once the first time I heard this album (I think in 1975). It does definitely help, to get the references. To feel them. Especially for We Are The Dead which is an absolutely killer, dark, slow, menacing tune. I got goosebumps listening again today.

There are touches of soul, touches of funk, a lot of glam and yet the whole thing is very coherent. The glam rockers similarly slot into place alongside the other-wordly dystopian sci-fi but in the best tradition of concept albums, it feels like a single, powerful statement. Not a note out of place and it has aged beautifully. It feels no more dated to me than it did fifty (yikes) years ago.


"We are the dead", he said.

"We are the dead", echoed Julia dutifully.

"You are the dead", said an iron voice behind them.

They sprang apart. Winston's entrails seemed to have turned into ice. He could see the white all round the irises of Julia's eyes. Her face had turned a milky yellow. The smear of rouge that was still on each cheekbone stood out sharply, almost as though unconnected with the skin beneath.

"You are the dead", repeated the iron voice.

"It was behind the picture", breathed Julia.

[Thenop]

Diamond Dogs [May 1974]

This thread collapsed because I knew I was not going to be able to express my thoughts and feelings about Diamond Dogs in a forum post.

It appears you just did, quite well I might add. It makes me want to listen to it, I like all things dystopian, although I am not sure like is the best word to describe my weird fascination.

Thank you.

[Slim]

Young Americans [ March 1975]

Well this is a remarkable album, though not necessarily in a good way. I think this must be a reasonable candidate for the most alienating album of all time. Ten months after the progressive theatrics / glam rock / dystopian drama high art of Diamond Dogs, David had teamed up with a bunch of American players steeped in the soul and funk traditions, most notably including the funk guitar player Carlos Alomar. And he made a pretty straightforward mixed bag soul/funk record.

I hated this as a teenager. I still don't love it now although it does have some very classy moments - I suppose everyone will be familiar with the title track, undoubtedly a smooth, well-crafted tune - deservedly a classic '70s hit. My favourite tune though is Win, which has a gorgeous, slow-burning intensity. You can't really not like Fame, either. It funks hard.

Listening back today I was struck by the audacity of the record - for a white singer best known for glam rock to be making a record like this in the company of some very accomplished players with a pedigree in black American music is quite a brave thing, really. I suppose being off his head on cocaine helped. But blue-eyed soul was not the established genre then that it was a few years later.

It's a shame Bowie chose to cover Across the Universe; always a substandard Beatles song. He does funk it up in a manner you wouldn't have believed possible for such a dreary, flat tune. But it's clumsy and his vocal performance on it is hammy.

The then-unheard-of Luther Vandross sings backing vocals here and there as well as arranging vocal parts.

A real outlier.