David Bowie (1969 album)

Template:Short description Template:For Template:Good article Template:EngvarB Template:Use dmy dates {{safesubst:#invoke:Unsubst-infobox||$params=italic_title,name,type,longtype,artist,cover,border,alt,caption,released,recorded,venue,studio,genre,length,language,label,director,producer,compiler,chronology,prev_title,prev_year,year,next_title,next_year,misc|$extra=italic_title,longtype,border,caption,language,director,compiler,chronology,year,misc|$aliases=italic title>italic_title,Italic title>italic_title,Name>name,Type>type,image>cover,Cover>cover,Border>border,Alt>alt,Caption>caption,Longtype>longtype,Artist>artist,Released>released,Recorded>recorded,Venue>venue,Studio>studio,Genre>genre,Length>length,Language>language,Label>label,Director>director,Producer>producer,Compiler>compiler,Chronology>chronology,Misc>misc|$flags=override|$B={{#ifeq:{{#invoke:Is infobox in lead|main|[Ii]nfobox [Aa]lbum}}|true|{{#if:Template:Has short description | |{{#if: Template:Start date | Template:Short description}}}}}}{{#invoke:Infobox|infobox}}Template:Template otherTemplate:Category handlerTemplate:Main other{{#invoke:Check for unknown parameters|check|unknown=Template:Main other|preview=Page using Template:Infobox album with unknown parameter "_VALUE_"|ignoreblank=y|italic_title |type |name |image |cover |border |alt |caption |longtype |artist |released |recorded |venue |studio |genre |length |language |label |director |producer |compiler |prev_title|prev_year|next_title|next_year|chronology|year|misc}}{{#if:{{#invoke:String|match|error_category=Music infoboxes with Module:String errors|A|1=David Bowie1967The World of David Bowie1970studioDavid BowieDavidBowiePhilips.jpgA headshot of a young man with long, shaggy hair surrounded by turquoise-colored circles, with the words "David Bowie" at the top1969 UK releaseDavid BowieTemplate:Start date20 June, 16 July – 6 October 1969Trident (London)Template:FlatlistTemplate:DurationPhilipsTemplate:Flatlistx|2=</?t[drh][ >]|nomatch=}}|Template:Main other}}Template:Main other}}

David Bowie (commonly known as Space Oddity)Template:Efn is the second studio album by the English musician David Bowie, originally released in the United Kingdom on 14Template:NbspNovember 1969 through Mercury affiliate Philips Records. Financed by Mercury on the strength of "Space Oddity", the album was recorded from June to October 1969 at Trident Studios in London. Gus Dudgeon produced "Space Oddity", while Tony Visconti produced the rest of the album. It featured an array of collaborators, including Herbie Flowers, Rick Wakeman, Terry Cox and the band Junior's Eyes.

Departing from the music hall style of Bowie's 1967 self-titled debut, David Bowie contains folk rock and psychedelic rock songs, with lyrical themes influenced by events happening in Bowie's life at the time, including former relationships and festivals he attended. "Space Oddity", a tale about a fictional astronaut, was released as a single in July 1969 and became Bowie's first commercial hit, reaching the UK top five.

The album was a commercial failure due to a lack of promotion, despite receiving some positive reviews from music critics. For its release in the United States, Mercury retitled the album Man of Words/Man of Music and used different artwork. RCA Records reissued the album under the title of Space Oddity following Bowie's commercial breakthrough with Ziggy Stardust in 1972, using a contemporary photo of Bowie as the artwork. The reissue charted in both the UK and the US.

David Bowie has received mixed reviews in later decades, with many finding a lack of cohesiveness. Bowie himself later stated that it lacked musical direction. Debate continues as to whether it should stand as Bowie's first "proper" album. David Bowie has been reissued numerous times, with bonus tracks and variance on the inclusion and listing of the hidden track "Don't Sit Down". Labels have used both David Bowie and Space Oddity as the title, with Space Oddity being used for a 2019 remix by Visconti.

Background

David Bowie released his music hall-influenced self-titled debut studio album through Deram Records in 1967. It was a commercial failure and did little to gain him notice, becoming his last release for two years.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn After its failure, Bowie's manager Kenneth Pitt authorised a promotional film in an attempt to introduce Bowie to a larger audience. The film, Love You till Tuesday, went unreleased until 1984,Template:Sfn and marked the end of Pitt's mentorship to Bowie.Template:Sfn

At the request of Pitt,Template:Sfn Bowie wrote a new song for the film, "Space Oddity", a tale about a fictional astronaut.Template:Sfn Its title and subject matter were influenced by Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968).Template:Sfn Bowie demoed the song in January 1969, recording the final Love You till Tuesday version on 2Template:NbspFebruary.Template:Sfn In April, Bowie recorded demos of tracks with guitarist John Hutchinson, including "Janine", "An Occasional Dream", "I'm Not Quite" ("Letter to Hermione"), "Lover to the Dawn" ("Cygnet Committee") and another demo of "Space Oddity". In May, Bowie secured a record contract with Mercury Records on the strength of "Space Oddity". The contract granted him enough finances to make a new studio album, to be distributed through Mercury in the United States and its affiliate Philips Records in the UK.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

Recording

To produce the new album, Pitt hired Tony Visconti, the producer of Bowie's later Deram sessions.Template:Sfn Visconti saw "Space Oddity", the chosen lead single, as a "novelty record" and passed the production responsibility for the song to Bowie's former engineer Gus Dudgeon.Template:Sfn Dudgeon recalled: "I listened to the demo and thought it was incredible. I couldn't believe that Tony didn't want to do it".Template:Sfn Comparing the two producers in a 1969 interview, Bowie stated:Template:Sfn

Gus is the technician, the arch 'mixer'. He listens to music and says, 'Yes, I like it – it's a groove.' His attitudes to music are very different from a lot of people in the business. With Tony Visconti, who's producing my LP, it's part of his life. He lives with music all day long, it's going on in his room, he writes it, arranges it, produces it, plays it, thinks it, and believes very much in its spiritual source – his whole life is like this.{{#if:|

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A gray-haired man with glasses and a black shirt standing in front of a microphone

The producer Tony Visconti in 2007

Recording for the new version of "Space Oddity" and its B-side "Wild Eyed Boy from Freecloud" took place on 20Template:NbspJune 1969 at London's Trident Studios; Mercury wanted the single released ahead of the Apollo 11 moon landing. The lineup consisted of Bowie, Herbie Flowers (bass), Rick Wakeman (Mellotron), Terry Cox (drums), Junior's Eyes' guitarist Mick Wayne and an orchestra arranged by Paul Buckmaster.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn After the single's release on 11Template:NbspJuly, recording for the rest of the album continued five days later, with work commencing on "Janine", "An Occasional Dream" and "Letter to Hermione". Visconti recruited the rest of Junior's Eyes minus their vocalistTemplate:Nbsp– Wayne and Tim Renwick (guitars), John 'Honk' Lodge (bass) and John Cambridge (drums)Template:Nbsp– as the main backing band for the sessions;Template:Sfn Bowie hired Keith Christmas as an additional guitarist. Beatles' engineer Ken Scott also joined the sessions.Template:Sfn According to Renwick, Bowie was "kind of nervous and unsure of himself", and gave little direction during the sessions, which the author Paul Trynka attributed to numerous events in Bowie's personal life at the time. Visconti had little production experience at the time but remained enthusiastic during recording.Template:Sfn

Recording continued on and off for the next few months. Bowie wrote "Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed" following his father's death on 5Template:NbspAugust. Eleven days later, he participated in the Beckenham Free Festival, commemorating "Memory of a Free Festival" after the event;Template:Sfn recording for the song began on 8Template:NbspSeptember.Template:Sfn According to the biographer Nicholas Pegg, Bowie's "disillusion" with the "slack attitude" of hippie culture caused him to reshape the lyrics of "Cygnet Committee".Template:Sfn "God Knows I'm Good" was attempted at Pye Studios in Marble Arch on 11Template:NbspSeptember, but scrapped due to problems with the recording equipment. The song was re-recorded at Trident five days later. Recording completed on 6Template:NbspOctober.Template:Sfn

Music and lyrics

The music on David Bowie has been described as folk rock and psychedelic rock,Template:Sfn<ref name="ex">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> with elements of country and progressive rock.Template:Sfn According to the biographer David Buckley, Bowie based the music on the dominant styles of the times "rather than developing a distinct music of his own".Template:Sfn Kevin Cann finds the music encompasses "a fusion of acoustic folk leanings with a growing interest in electric rock". Cann continues that David Bowie marked a turning point for the artist, in that lyrically he began "drawing on life" rather than writing "winsome stories".Template:Sfn Marc Spitz considers the album one of Bowie's darkest, due to the death of his father. He writes that it reflects the artist's "darkening vision" and depicts "a man coming of age in a world that is increasingly depraved and barren".Template:Sfn Susie Goldring of BBC Music calls David Bowie a "kaleidoscopic album [that] is an amalgamation of [Bowie's] obsessions – directors, musicians, poets and spirituality of a distinctly late-60s hue".<ref name="Goldring BBC">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Songs

"Space Oddity" is a largely acoustic number augmented by the eerie tones of the composer's stylophone, a pocket electronic organ. Some commentators have also seen the song as a metaphor for heroin use, citing the opening countdown as analogous to the drug's passage down the needle prior to the euphoric "hit", while noting Bowie's admission of a "silly flirtation with smack" in 1968.Template:Sfn "Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed" reflects a strong Bob Dylan influence,Template:Sfn with its harmonica, edgy guitar sound and snarling vocal. Spitz describes the song as an "extensive hard rock jam",Template:Sfn while Buckley calls it a "country-meets-prog-rock collision of ideas".Template:Sfn A hidden track, subsequently titled "Don't Sit Down", featured at the end of the song on the original UK LP, but was excluded from the US Mercury release and RCA reissue of the album.Template:Sfn

"Letter to Hermione" was a farewell ballad to Bowie's former girlfriend Hermione Farthingale, who is also the subject of "An Occasional Dream", a gentle folk tune reminiscent of the singer's 1967 debut album. "God Knows I'm Good", Bowie's observational tale of a shoplifter's plight, also recalls his earlier style.Template:Sfn "Cygnet Committee" has been called Bowie's "first true masterpiece" by Pegg.Template:Sfn Commonly regarded as the track on David Bowie most indicative of the composer's future direction, its lead character is a messianic figure "who breaks down barriers for his younger followers, but finds that he has only provided them with the means to reject and destroy him".Template:Sfn Bowie himself described the song at the time as a put down of hippies who seemed ready to follow any charismatic leader.Template:Sfn "Janine" was written about a girlfriend of Bowie's childhood friend George Underwood.Template:Sfn It has been cited as another track that foreshadowed themes to which Bowie would return in the 1970s, in this case the fracturing of personality, featuring the words "But if you took an axe to me, you'd kill another man not me at all".Template:Sfn

The Buddhism-influenced "Wild Eyed Boy from Freecloud" is presented in a heavily expanded form compared to the original guitar-and-cello version on the B-side of the "Space Oddity" single; the album cut features a 50-piece orchestra. "Memory of a Free Festival" is Bowie's reminiscence of an arts festival he had organised in August 1969. Its drawn-out fade/chorus ("The Sun Machine is coming down / And we're gonna have a party") was compared to the Beatles' "Hey Jude";Template:Sfn the song has also been interpreted as a derisive comment on the counterculture it ostensibly celebrates.Template:Sfn The background vocals for the crowd finale features Bob Harris, his wife Sue, Tony Woollcott and Marc Bolan.Template:Sfn The outtake "Conversation Piece" has been described as featuring "a lovely melody and an emotive lyric addressing familiar Bowie topics of alienation and social exclusion".Template:Sfn

Title and packaging

The album was released in the UK under the same eponymous title as Bowie's 1967 debut, a move Trynka calls "bizarre".Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The original UK cover artwork featured a facial portrait of Bowie taken by British photographer Vernon Dewhurst, exposed on top of a work by Hungarian artist Victor Vasarely with blue and violet spots on a green background. The artwork, titled CTA 25 Neg, was designed by Bowie and Mercury executive Calvin Mark Lee, who enthusiastically collected Vasarely's works; Lee is credited as CML33. The back cover was an illustration by Underwood and depicted lyrical aspects from the album, stylistically similar to that of the Visconti-produced Tyrannosaurus Rex album My People Were Fair and Had Sky in Their Hair... But Now They're Content to Wear Stars on Their Brows (1968).Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn According to Underwood, the sketches included "a fish in water, two astronauts holding a rose [and] rats in bowler hats representing the Beckenham Arts Lab committee types [Bowie] was so pissed off with".Template:Sfn Pegg says these items appear in the final picture, along with a Buddha, a lit joint, an "unmistakable" portrait of Farthingale and "a weeping woman (presumably the shoplifter in 'God Knows I'm Good') being comforted by a Pierrot", which he notes is "remarkably similar in appearance" to the "Ashes to Ashes" character Bowie later adopted.Template:Sfn Underwood's illustration is referred to on the sleeve as Depth of a Circle, which according to Bowie was a typo by the record label; he intended it to read Width of a Circle, a title he used for a song on his next album, The Man Who Sold the World (1970).Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Apart from Bowie, none of the musicians who played on David Bowie were credited on the original pressings, due to the majority being under contract with other labels in the UK; song lyrics were presented on the inner gatefold sleeve.Template:Sfn

Template:Multiple image For the US release in 1970, the album was renamed Man of Words/Man of Music, although Cann writes that this phrase was added to the cover to describe the artist and was not intended to replace the title.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Mercury also changed Vasarely's artwork in favour of a different, but similar photograph by Dewhurst, placed against a plain blue background. Cann criticises this artwork, stating that it "suffered from sloppy technical application and the image appeared washed out as a result of poor duplication of the transparency".Template:Sfn The musicians were credited on this release, while song lyrics still appeared on the inner gatefold. Cambridge later said that he "was really pleased to see I was credited inside" in 1991.Template:Sfn

In 1972, as part of a reissue campaign undertaken by RCA Records in the wake of the commercial breakthrough of Bowie's fifth studio album Ziggy Stardust, David Bowie was repackaged with the title Space Oddity, after the opening track.Template:Efn For this release, the front cover was updated with a new photograph of Bowie taken the same year by photographer Mick Rock at Haddon Hall, Beckenham. The sleeve notes proclaimed that the album "was NOW then, and it is still now NOW: personal and universal, perhaps galactic, microcosmic and macrocosmic".Template:Sfn

Release and promotion

"Space Oddity" was released as a single on 11Template:NbspJuly 1969, with "Wild Eyed Boy from Freecloud" as the B-side.Template:Sfn The single initially favoured poorly on the charts but reached number five on the UK Singles Chart by early November, becoming Bowie's first hit.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The single's success in the UK earned Bowie a number of television appearances throughout the rest of 1969, including his first appearance on Top of the Pops in early October.Template:Sfn In mid-December, Bowie recorded a new version with Italian lyrics, titled "Ragazzo solo, ragazza sola" (meaning "Lonely Boy, Lonely Girl"),Template:Sfn which was released as a single in Italy in 1970 and failed to chart.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

Philips issued David Bowie in the UK on 14Template:NbspNovember 1969,Template:EfnTemplate:Sfn with the catalogue number SBLTemplate:Nbsp7912.Template:Sfn Cann states that Mercury considered releasing "Janine" as a follow-up single to "Space Oddity", but were uncertain about the song's commercial appeal and scrapped it.Template:Sfn With little promotion from the label, the album was a commercial failure, barely selling over 5,000 copies by March 1970.Template:Sfn The author Christopher Sandford attributed its failure to the majority of the album bearing little resemblance to "Space Oddity".Template:Sfn

RCA's 1972 reissue, released on 10Template:NbspNovember,Template:Sfn reached number 17 on the UK Albums Chart, remaining on the chart for 42 weeks.<ref name="UK chart">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> It also peaked at number 16 on the US Billboard Top LPs & Tape chart in April 1973, remaining on the chart for 36 weeks.<ref name="US chart">Template:Cite magazine</ref> The album's 1990 reissue charted at number 64 in the UK.<ref name="UK chart" />

Critical reception

David Bowie received mixed reviews from music critics on release.Template:Sfn Penny Valentine of Disc & Music Echo was positive, describing the album as "rather doomy and un-nerving, but Bowie's point comes across like a latter-day Dylan. It is an album a lot of people are going to expect a lot from. I don't think they'll be disappointed."Template:Sfn A reviewer for Music Now! offered similar praise, calling it "[d]eep, thoughtful, probing, exposing, gouging at your innards" and concluded: "This is more than a record. It is an experience. An expression of life as others see it. The lyrics are full of the grandeur of yesterday, the immediacy of today and the futility of tomorrow. This is well worth your attention."Template:Sfn Nancy Erlich of The New York Times, in a review published over a year after its release, offered praise, calling it, "a complete, coherent and brilliant vision".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Other reviewers offered more mixed sentiments. A writer for Music Business Weekly found that "Bowie seems to be a little unsure of the direction he is going in", criticising the various musical styles found throughout, ultimately describing the record as "over-ambitious".Template:Sfn A reviewer for Zygote praised "Space Oddity" and "Memory of a Free Festival", but felt the album as a whole lacks cohesiveness and is "very awkward to the ear". The reviewer concluded that "Bowie is erratic. When he succeeds, he's excellent; when fails, he's laborious."Template:Sfn The Village Voice critic Robert Christgau considered this album and The Man Who Sold the World to be "overwrought excursions".<ref name="Christgau">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Subsequent events

Bowie's follow-up to "Space Oddity", "The Prettiest Star", was recorded in January 1970 and released as a single on 6Template:NbspMarch, with the David Bowie outtake "Conversation Piece" as the B-side. A love song to his soon-to-be-wife Angie and featuring guitar from Marc Bolan, it failed to chart.Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn At the label's request, Bowie remade "Memory of a Free Festival" for release as the next single, which was split across and A- and B-sides.Template:Sfn The two-part single was released on 26 June and again, failed to chart.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn By this time, Bowie had completed recording The Man Who Sold the World,Template:Sfn which featured a shift in musical style towards hard rock.Template:Sfn Around the same time, Bowie fired Pitt due to continuing managerial disputes and hired Tony Defries as his new manager.Template:Sfn

Legacy

Template:Music ratings David Bowie has continued to attract mixed reviews from critics, with many criticising its lack of cohesiveness. Dave Thompson of AllMusic wrote: Template:"'Space Oddity' aside, Bowie possessed very little in the way of commercial songs, and the ensuing album emerged as a dense, even rambling, excursion through the folky strains that were the last glimmering of British psychedelia."<ref name="Thompson AllMusic" /> Douglas Wolk of Pitchfork found that Bowie presents numerous ideas throughout the record, but does not know what to do with them, writing, "he wears his influences on his sleeve and constantly overreaches for dramatic effect".<ref name="Wolk Pitchfork" /> Record CollectorTemplate:'s Terry Staunton agreed, saying: "Space Oddity may be regarded as the singer's first 'proper' album, though its mish-mash of styles and strummy experiments suggest he was still trying to settle on an identity."<ref name="Record Collector" />

Reviewing its 40th anniversary remaster, Mike Schiller of PopMatters stated that although it's far from Bowie's best, the record as a whole is "not half bad", standing as a "landmark" in Bowie's catalogue, and offering a glimpse at a man transitioning into the artist we've come to know".<ref name="Schiller PopMatters" /> PitchforkTemplate:'s Stuart Berman found that the record's "prog-folk hymnals" were a precursor to the "artful glam-rock" sound that made Bowie a star.<ref name="Berman Pitchfork">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Reviewing for The Quietus, John Tatlock felt the album does not stand as Bowie's first proper album, nor does it stand out on its own merit. He concludes that "it captures its creator at a fascinating crossroads, and is much more than a fans-only curio".<ref name="Tatlock Quietus">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Rob Sheffield, in the Spin Alternative Record Guide (1995), considered the album to contain "overripe hippie ballads", with only "Space Oddity" as "a sign of things to come."<ref name="Weisbard & Marks 1995" /> The music writer Simon Reynolds wrote that the "rush-recorded" album, "centred around Bowie's twelve-string guitar", is arguably his worst album until the mid-1980s, adding: "The debut, charming and tuneful, conveys that Bowie's heart is in it, his delight in the jokes and play-acting palpable. None of that comes through in the second album."Template:Sfn

Template:Quote box Biographers have differing views on David Bowie. While Buckley calls it "the first Bowie album proper",Template:Sfn NME editors Roy Carr and Charles Shaar Murray have said, "Some of it belonged in '67 and some of it in '72, but in 1969 it all seemed vastly incongruous. Basically, David Bowie can be viewed in retrospect as all that Bowie had been and a little of what he would become, all jumbled up and fighting for control..."Template:Sfn Trynka similarly states that the record has an "endearing lack of artifice", making it a "unique" entry in the artist's catalogue.Template:Sfn Pegg calls the album "a remarkable step forward from anything Bowie had recorded before".Template:Sfn He highlights "Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed", "Wild Eyed Boy from Freecloud" and "Cygnet Committee" as showcasing Bowie's evolution as a lyricist, but ultimately believes the "monolithic reputation" of "Space Oddity" does the album more harm than good.Template:Sfn Spitz opines that while it is not as iconic as his 1970s works. Space Oddity "is first-rate as trippy rock records go".Template:Sfn Sandford writes that "Space Oddity" aside, the record lacks a "voice", "punch" and "clarity", finding the songs vary from "mundane" (the two tributes to Farthingale) and "mawkish" ("God Knows I'm Good"), but ultimately finds moments of brilliance like his 1967 debut, naming "Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed" and "Janine".Template:Sfn

Reissues

David Bowie was first released on CD by RCA in 1984. In keeping with the 1970 Mercury release and the 1972 RCA reissue, "Don't Sit Down" remained missing. The German (for the European market) and Japanese (for the US market) masters were sourced from different tapes and not identical for each region. In 1990, the album was reissued by Rykodisc/EMI with "Don't Sit Down" included as an independent song and three bonus tracks.Template:Sfn This release, titled Space Oddity, used the 1972 cover photograph as its cover, while also incorporating a reproduction of the 1970 US front cover.<ref>Template:Cite AV media notes</ref> It was issued again in 1999 by EMI/Virgin, without bonus tracks but with 24-bit digitally remastered sound and again including a separately listed "Don't Sit Down". The Space Oddity name was retained, while the original UK portrait was restored.<ref>Template:Cite AV media notes</ref>

In 2009, the album was released by EMI/Virgin, under its original David Bowie title, as a remastered 2-CD special edition, with a second bonus disc compilation of unreleased demos, stereo versions, previously released B-sides, and BBC Radio session tracks. "Don't Sit Down" was again a hidden track.<ref name="2009 reissue">Template:Cite AV media notes</ref> The 2009 remaster became available on vinyl for the first time in June 2020, in a picture disc release (with artwork based on the 1972 RCA reissue).<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Other reissues that have followed used the original David Bowie title and kept the UK artwork.Template:Sfn<ref name="five years box set" /> In 2015, the album was remastered for the Five Years (1969–1973) box set.<ref name="five years box set">Template:Cite AV media notes</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> It was released in CD, vinyl and digital formats, both as part of this compilation and separately.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>

In 2019, David Bowie was remixed by Visconti, and released, with the Space Oddity title, in the CD boxed set Conversation Piece, and separately in CD, vinyl and digital formats. The new version of the album added the outtake "Conversation Piece" to the regular sequencing of the album for the first time, while omitting "Don't Sit Down".<ref name="2019 Mix RS">Template:Cite magazine</ref><ref name="2019 mix CoS">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Cite AV media notes</ref>

Track listing

All tracks are written by David Bowie.Template:Sfn

Personnel

Album credits per the 2009 reissue liner notes and the biographer Nicholas Pegg.Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite AV media notes</ref>

• David Bowie – vocals, acoustic guitar, stylophone ("Space Oddity"), chord organ ("Memory of a Free Festival"), kalimba
• Tim Renwick – electric guitar, flute, recorder
• Keith Christmas – acoustic guitar
• Mick Wayne – guitar
• Rick Wakeman – Mellotron, electric harpsichord
• Tony Visconti – bass guitar, flute, recorder
• Herbie Flowers – bass guitar
• John "Honk" Lodge – bass guitar
• John Cambridge – drums
• Terry Cox – drums
• Benny Marshall and friends – harmonica, backing vocals ("Memory of a Free Festival")
• Paul Buckmaster – cello

Production

• Tony Visconti – producer
• Gus Dudgeon – producer ("Space Oddity")
• Ken Scott – engineer
• Malcolm Toft – engineer
• Barry Sheffield – engineer

Charts

Template:Album chart

Chart performance for David Bowie

Year	Chart	Peak Position
1972	Australian Albums (Kent Music Report)<ref name="auchart">Template:Cite book</ref>	21
	Template:Album chart
1973	Canadian Albums (RPM)<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation	CitationClass=web }}</ref>	13
	Finnish Albums (Suomen virallinen lista)<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>	27
	Spanish Albums (Promusicae)<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>	8
	US Billboard Top LPs & Tape<ref name="US chart" />	16
2016	Template:Album chart
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2019	Template:Album chart
2020	Template:Album chart
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	Template:Album chart

References

Sources

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External links

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