new introductory bit here.

This is a reviews page based on my own collection, which just keeps growing despite itself. If it isn't listed here, it's because I don't own it yet, or I haven't gotten around to it yet.

Also, bother your local "new rock" radio station and make sure they are playing "new rock" and not "Rock the Casbah," which is not new.

note: entries in red text indicate my pick for the artist's best available album. A gold numeral indicates the POPocalypse winner of the year's best album; second- and third-place winners are in blue. Green lettering indicates an obviously exploitative record company compilation without apparent artist input.

Bowie was no overnight success. He earned his dues. Between 1964 and 1969, he released eight singles, all of which missed the chart, and the critical dud of a debut, David Bowie (Deram, 1967). Finally he hit top 5 with the "Space Oddity" single... and then watched the follow-up album Man of Words, Man of Music (reissued in 1972 as Space Oddity) bombed, swiftly followed by five more failed singles and two more full albums.

Oddity, Bowie's first RCA album, sows the seeds of a great career, but has a few pitfalls. The musicianship is pretty good, but the tone is sometimes very dated. "Space Oddity" and the murder/madness epic "Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed" start things off fine, and "Letter to Hermione," an ode to a lost lover, is a fine set of lyrics, but the overlong "Memory of a Free Festival" and "Cygnet Committee" are too pompous for their own good. By early 1971, he was still finding his feet and deciding what he wanted to do across the nine tracks of The Man Who Sold the World. "The Width of a Circle" is a minor epic, and all the songs are pretty good, but it lacks a consistency his later work would have. The last of his chart failures was Hunky Dory, one of the best albums of the 70s and still my favorite Bowie LP. It starts with the double punch of "Changes" and "Oh! You Pretty Things" and, on the second half, features biting "tributes" to Warhol, Dylan and Reed. In between, there's the sublime "Life on Mars" and the beautiful "Quicksand." It's simply a masterpiece.

Despite some critical praise and a growing cult following, Bowie was still a one-hit wonder riding the coattails of a novelty song when somebody had the bright idea to follow that hit up with more outer space imagery. The resulting Ziggy Stardust instantly became one of the three or four most important albums in rock, beautifully written and played, and defining of a generation of glam kids looking for a hero. Powerful and passionate, this features the legendary "Hang on to Yourself," "Starman," "Suffragette City" and "Rock n' Roll Suicide." Teamed with "the Spiders from Mars," a backing band consisting of Mick Ronson, Trevor Bolder, Mick Woodmansey and Mike Garson, Bowie created a self-image of Ziggy Stardust, an alien warning the disaffected and the lovelorn of impending planetary catastrophe, and the kids of London just loved it. Marc Bolan, who had worn the "teen idol" crown, lost it overnight. All of Bowie's previous RCA albums charted, his shows sold out, and he had hit singles in abundance.

Aladdin Sane was very much a sequel, and naturally an inferior one. That's not to detract from its awesome songs, including "Drive-In Saturday" (UK #3) and "Panic in Detroit," wherein the eyes of Ziggy the space alien were turned on America for inspiration. It's still a great record. 1971's "Life on Mars" was reissued to keep the space oddity on the charts, and Bowie closed out the year with Pin-Ups. A lot of people really dislike Bowie's covers album, which, alongside Bryan Ferry's These Foolish Things (released the same day in England in '73), created the modern "cover album" concept. Yet while Ferry played his hand with a variety of different and irreverent styles, Bowie and the Spiders tried to duplicate the noisy sound of 1965 London. As a result, no matter how good the album is, and it is very interesting, it's unquestionably Bowie's most dated work. The key tracks are versions of Pink Floyd's "See Emily Play" and the spectacular version of the Merseys' "Sorrow." With that, the Spiders took a last bow. Only Mike Garson remained as Bowie began the first of his many public metamorphoses.

1974 was the year of Diamond Dogs, a conceptual post-apocalyptic rock opera of sorts, inspired by Orwell's 1984. His classic single "Rebel Rebel" is stuck in the middle of it all, and it's kind of unclear what relevance it has to the rest of the proceedings. It's interesting but not compelling. At the end of the year, he released David Live. Bowie was among the forefront of artists releasing live double LPs in the mid-70s to recoup enormously expensive stage shows. In this case, it's an interesting study of how the Diamond Dogs US tour started picking up a distinctly American vibe, thanks in no small part to tour opener Luther Vandross. His delivery is affected and some of the arrangements are slowed down, though it has to be said that guitarist Earl Slick is no Mick Ronson. The American vibes became plastic soul as David returned to the studio, finding inspiration in the classic sound of Philadelphia and delivering eight pastiches on Young Americans. Probably his most disappointing 70s album, this did prove a worldwide chart smash, and a commercially rewarding tune co-written with John Lennon, "Fame," gave him quite a signature tune for a few years.

Bowie recorded Station to Station while finding inspiration in some very odd places, notably totalitarianism and fascist imagery. The result, which created his "thin white duke" persona, is an essential part of the 1970s, a noisy and dangerous little epic. Across six long songs, David details his fears of the future. The writing and production are excellent. Shortly afterwards, he began working with two men who would help ensure Bowie's place as a huge, innovative force in rock music: Iggy Pop and Brian Eno.

He produced and played on two of Iggy's albums. The first, The Idiot, was recorded in June 1976, after which Bowie moved to Berlin and turned his already high cocaine intact up to gargantuan levels. Eno joined him for 1977's Low, Bowie went on tour with Iggy, then he produced Iggy's Lust for Life and then he recorded his classic album "Heroes", the one with the anthem of a title track that every pop/rock act with any aspiration of grandiosity either covers or emulates at some point in their career. This output, while prodigious and brilliant, was too experimental for US audiences. The Iggy albums missed the US top 50, "Heroes" only dented the top 40, and Stage, his second live album, missed it altogether. Stage is a mostly failed experiment; even with future King Crimson stalwart Adrian Belew assisting, most of the tracks lack energy, and the song listing was rearranged from the actual stage order of the numbers to something approaching a "history of Bowie," from earliest to most recent. Even in England, where Bowie's chart fortunes and media profile were unparalleled, his chart fortunes were waning. Low's "Be My Wife" failed to chart and Stage's live version of "Breaking Glass" missed the top 50.

1979's Lodger, his final work with Eno for 15 years, helped restore his public standing. Another excellent work, Lodger is a schizophrenic little beast, led up the charts by the stomping "Boys Keep Swinging" single and some very innovative music videos. There was, of course, a stunning video for 1980's UK #1 "Ashes to Ashes," the lead single from Scary Monsters, but the album was lost in America. Despite a top 20 peak, it quickly fell off the chart and none of the singles could get past #70. The album's sound and look was a huge influence on the early 80s new romantics in England, and many consider it Bowie's last great work.

After Monsters, Bowie took some time away from LPs, allowing his unsatisfying RCA contract to lapse while issuing singles, like a hit duet with Queen called "Under Pressure" and the later theme to the film Cat People. There were also compilations out the wazoo as RCA milked their property for every conceivable dime. He also starred in the film Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence before signing to EMI for the hugely successful Let's Dance, about which the nicest thing to say is that it's very commercial and made him filthy stinking rich. Now dressed in fine suits and with a blond pompadour, Bowie successfully remade "China Girl," one of his older Iggy numbers, into a global hit. Nothing on the album is necessarily bad, but he had produced so much better before.

You can hear genius start to curdle on the 1984 follow-up, Tonight. Back into the studio after Dance's global success and under huge corporate pressure to sell millions again, Bowie was moved to rerecord another couple of tracks he'd previously written with Iggy Pop, as well as two extremely bad covers of the very unsuitable "God Only Knows" and "I Keep Forgetting." Admittedly, "Blue Jean" was one of the nicer singles of '84, but nothing else here, except arguably "Loving the Alien," is at all good. Global mega-success didn't suit Bowie, and much of the product of the day, including a risible duet with Mick Jagger on "Dancing in the Streets," the theme from Absolute Beginners, and "Underground," the lead single from the awful Henson film Labyrinth (in which he starred), was commercially successful but artistically bankrupt. There was one minor product of interest, "This is Not America," a 1985 duet with the Pat Metheny Group, which was a minor hit (and which I like more than anybody else).

About 1987's Never Let Me Down, little should be said. Easily and admittedly his worst product, this is a horrendous, raucous, terribly produced record, full of embarassing examples of sub-REO Speedwagon cock rock. "Day-In, Day-Out" was by far his worst single, and every decent idea on the album vainly fought against a horrible production and mix. If anyone else had made this album, then no one would own it. Worse, the accompanying "Glass Spider Tour" was a gaudy, overproduced spectacle of nonsensical rock excess, hammered mercilessly even by Bowie's staunchest supporters. Obviously a major rethink was needed.

After nearly two years out of the public eye, Bowie re-emerged as one-fourth of the band Tin Machine, where he hoped that his celebrity would be overlooked in favor of traditionally down and dirty rock riffs. Unfortunately, the rock riffs weren't very good, and three albums and three years later, the band was retired. He re-emerged as a solo artist, released the bomb single "Real Cool World" (from the even bigger bomb film Cool World) and took his careful time reviving his flagging career.

Black Tie, White Noise, released through the indie Savage Records, didn't do much in America (in fact, he's not been in the top 20 album or singles charts since 1985), but it was an underrated effort that includes the shoulda-been hit "Jump They Say" (at least it went top 10 in England), along with inspired covers of Cream, Scott Walker and Morrissey tracks and the instrumental piece Bowie wrote for his wedding to Iman. The production is flattering and spacious, and nobody could argue that this was the best Bowie album in at least a decade, but there was more to come. Reteaming with Eno and getting remix assistance from Trent Reznor brought 1995's Outside to the grunge masses, and the US underground belatedly hailed Bowie as a massive influence. Outside's first two singles missed the UK top 30 (and the US top 90), but "Hallo Spaceboy," a remarkable number with contributions from the Pet Shop Boys, was a minor UK hit.

1997's Earthling (also spelled Eart hl ing) feels like a conceptual follow-up to Station to Station, but on the cutting edge of late '90s industrial grunge. Many of the songs are easily his best in years, and "I'm Afraid of Americans" brought him back to the respectable range of the US singles chart. It also meant one of the biggest American publicity rushes of his career. Oddly, the lead single, the damn fine "Telling Lies," was a complete bomb (UK #83), while the second release, "Little Wonder," made the top 20. Cementing his credibility recovery, hours... was among the best albums of 1999 (a great year for music), and Bowie's best in about 19 years. This is a spectacular look at fear and mortality, with a great (and, in light of all his 90s grunge-fetish, unexpected) use of acoustic guitar. The promotion was minimal and it missed the US top 40, despite the lead-off single, the beautiful ballad "Thursday's Child," which was available in a nifty double-CD format with extra mixes, bonus songs, and a great video.

If ever an artist has worked enough to deserve to take it easy, it's Bowie. However, he remained active throughout 2000, releasing a set of BBC sessions from the early 70s packaged with an excellent new live album while taking advantage of all the fun that multimedia and the Internet can offer one of rock's most progressive and challenging geniuses.

An album called Toy was expected in 2001. It never appeared, possibly leading to the end of his relationship with Virgin, and the quite unbelievably good Heathen came out ten days ago and I haven't stopped playing it since. (6/02)

DAVID BOWIE: Sound + Vision (1989, ****)
A splendid compilation of key, rare and previously unreleased tracks from 1969-80, setting a standard for box sets that many fail to reach. The fourth disc is a CD-V for "Ashes to Ashes" that also features three unreleased 1972 live numbers.

DAVID BOWIE: The Singles 1969-1993 (1993, UK #9, **)
There are two editions of this album; the British and American editions have different track listings. Neither contains all the singles issued over the advertised period.

DAVID BOWIE: Earthling in the City promo CD (1997)
A six-song sampler for Earthling, containing three remixes of songs from this album, as well as live versions of "Little Wonder," "Pallas Athena" and "The Heart's Filthy Lesson."

DAVID BOWIE: The Deram Anthology, 1966-1968 (1997, **)
Bowie released twenty songs across three singles and his first album while signed to Deram. This excellent compilation -- excellent assuming you like this early, Anthony Newley-inspired material -- collects all twenty, along with seven Deram rarities that showed up on later cash-in releases. It's packaged with a great essay and reproductions of the original sleeves.

DAVID BOWIE: Bowie at the Beeb (2000, UK #7, ****)
A collection of Bowie's BBC sessions -- there were quite a few between 1968 and 1972 -- had been on various record companies' minds for some time, but several planned releases fell by the wayside for some reason or other. Finally, Virgin and the BBC compiled 37 very good performances, wrapped it in a great package, and then dropped the ball by including the same performance of "Ziggy Stardust" twice, necessitating a third replacement disc available by mail. Despite the fumble, it remains a great listen, even if the intrusive attempts at humor by DJ John Peel on disc one aren't funny even the first time. Meanwhile, the failure to collect all the songs has ensured the bootleggers still have toys with which to play.

DAVID BOWIE: I Dig Everything: The 1966 Pye Singles (2001, ***)
Bowie and his band, the Lower Third, recorded three singles for the Pye label in 1966, all of which failed. Nevertheless, they're not bad. I like them better than his later Deram material. This CD features all six songs, very dated in that mod way, but also very entertaining.

DAVID BOWIE: Moonage Daydream (Santa Monica, 10/20/72, 2001, Dorian Graey)
The Santa Monica show has been bootlegged and pirated more than practically any concert performed by anybody. This edition is one of the more recent releases, but it, like some of its CD predecessors, lacks the final song, "Rock n'Roll Suicide."

DAVID BOWIE: The Duke of L.A. (Los Angeles, 9/5/74, Papillon)
The sound quality of this boot is pretty decent, but the Diamond Dogs tour wasn't very good in the first place and this isn't a sparkling performance. A soulful, slowed-down "Moonage Daydream" lacks every grain of the original's energy, and "It's Gonna Be Me" lasts for the longest seven and a half minutes of your life. David also speaks between songs in an odd, cod-Japanese accent for some reason. Not recommended.

DAVID BOWIE: The Thin White Duke (New York, 3/23/76, "1976," Audiofon)
A brilliant 11-song set recorded live at Nassau Colisseum, this starts with a storming "Station to Station" and includes a great version of "Rebel Rebel." Incredibly poor packaging, great recording.

DAVID BOWIE: 50th Birthday Bash (New York, 1/9/97, 1997, BPCD)
When Bowie turned fifty, he threw a big concert for himself in Madison Square Garden with some guest performers like Lou Reed, Robert Smith and Billy Corgan. This is a great concert, and incredibly listenable. It's taken from a pay-per-view TV special and is a great quality recording.

DAVID BOWIE: Absolutely Fabulous (aka Via Satellites from Paradiso) (1997, Gambretto)
This is a collection of live recordings from 1997, including a 9-song concert from Amsterdam to promote Earthling and five songs from various USTV appearances that year. Among this is a stomping, furious "Scary Monsters" from SNL. The sound quality is superb, but there are a few dropouts on the original source tape on a few songs.