Angus Fretwell

David Bowie
David Bowie is an English singer and multi-instrumentalist known for reinventing himself
and his music, he widely considered an ‘innovator’ for his work in the 1970s. Over the
course of the last five decades, Bowie has released 25 albums, plus many more singles,
extended plays, compilations, soundtracks, and live albums. He has been recognized by the
BBC as one of the ‘100 Greatest Britons’, and ranked at #39 on the Rolling Stone magazine’s
‘100 Greatest Rock Artists’.
David Bowie’s first release was his self-titled album released in 1967 - however, none of the
material from this album managed to reach charts. He first gained recognition when he
released ‘Space Oddity’ in 1969 to coincide with the moon landing; the song tells the story of
Major Tom, an astronaut who is lost in space. It was featured during the Apollo 11 coverage
by the BBC.
The next year Bowie released another album, ‘The Man Who Sold the World,' which
replaced the acoustic style of the ‘Space Oddity’ album with a heavy rock backing by
guitarist Mick Ronson. The cover of the album pictured Bowie wearing a dress - one of the
first examples of his ‘androgynous’ appearance.
‘Hunky Dory’ was released in 1971, with a return of an acoustic style, similar to that of
Space Oddity. The album and it’s accompanying single ‘Changes’ were not major hits, but
started Bowie’s rise to fame that would see him four top-ten albums and eight top-ten
singles over the following two years.
In 1972, David released his concept album ‘The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the
Spiders from Mars’ the album combined the styles of the previous two albums, as well as
the glam-rock style introduced by bands such as Marc Bolan’s ‘T. Rex.' The album contained
many of Bowie’s best known songs, such as ‘Ziggy Stardust,' ‘Moonage Daydream, and
‘Suffragette City.'
The ‘Ziggy Stardust’ character and Bowie’s rising popularity lead to a large scale tour, where
Bowie further explored his androgynous appearance with his red mullet and eccentric
outfits. Later that year, Bowie worked with his influence and rock-and-roll idol Lou Reed (of
Velvet Underground). He produced Reed’s second breakthrough solo album ‘Transformer,'
which he also recorded backing vocals for.
In 1973, Bowie released his first number-one album ‘Aladdin Sane’ that featured the
number-two hit ‘The Jean Genie’ and the number-three hit ‘Drive-In Saturday.' The album
cover featured Bowie’s famous ‘lightening bolt’ make-up. Upon the release of Aladdin Sane,
Bowie toured again, performing more ‘Ziggy’ shows, featuring songs from both the ‘Aladdin
Sane’ and ‘Ziggy Stardust’ albums.
After Bowie’s early ‘Glam Rock’ albums he released a number of later albums of different
genres, including Soul and R&B albums such as ‘Young Americans’ and ‘Station to Station,'
his ‘Berlin’ albums, a collaboration with Brian Eno, and 80s albums such as ‘Scary Monsters
(and Super Creeps)’ and ‘Let’s Dance.' In recent years, Bowie has collaborated and
performed with newer artists; performing with artists such as Placebo, Arcade Fire, and
Trent Reznor (of Nine Inch Nails), who produced the single from his album ‘Earthling,’
entitled ‘I’m Afraid of Americans’.