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Ziggy Stardust on CD

RCA US PCD1-4702 (1984)

 

1984 CD Issues:

RCA Germany (PD 84702) 1984 (deleted in 1988) - grey and silver CD face
RCA Japan - Booklet printed in US (PCD1-4702) (deleted in 1988) - silver CD face with blue ring

In 1984 RCA released THE RISE AND FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST AND THE SPIDERS FROM MARS on compact disc along with the rest of Bowie's RCA catalogue. This made Bowie the first major rock star to have his entire output available in digital form. However, there was a drawback. Instead of using the original master tapes - RCA used the heavily equalised tapes that had been used for pressing LPs. As a result, the sound of the RCA CDs while largely OK, was not what it could have been.

RCA Japan PCD1-4702 (1984) CD face

In 1988 the RCA Bowie CDs were deleted from production when Bowie chose not renew with the company. Bowie did not immediately reassign the CD rights to another company because he did not want his back catalogue reissued as "budget" items. As a result THE RISE AND FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST AND THE SPIDERS FROM MARS (1972) became one of the most "demanded but unavailable" rock CDs in this period.

 

RYKO/EMI 1990 & 1994 releases

Ryko, an independent US company specialising in high quality CD releases, was willing to release Bowie albums at full price if they could also include bonus tracks of rare or previously unreleased material. Bowie agreed. EMI was sub-contracted to release the albums world-wide.

Ryko/EMI 1990 & 1994 reissues of Ziggy Stardust

 

EMI Japanese 1996 release

Japanese EMI TOCP 8864 (1996)

In 1996 THE RISE AND FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST AND THE SPIDERS FROM MARS (1972) was issued in Japan on CD (EMI TOCP 8864, released on 24/4/96).  It is the same CD as the 1990 Ryko/EMI releases but presented in a white CD case with the spine written in Japanese. The CD face is plain silver with just a track listing. It has the same number of tracks and bonus tracks as the Ryko/EMI re-issue.

 

EMI / VIRGIN 1999 release

The first batch of the seventeen re-issues from DAVID BOWIE'S back catalogue, including THE RISE AND FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST AND THE SPIDERS FROM MARS (EMI 7243 521900 0 3) were released on 6 September 1999 in the UK by EMI Records. EMI has also issued a seventeen track promo CD sampler DAVID BOWIE (CDLRL015) for the re-issue series.  The second batch will be released on 20th September 1999. All seventeen releases will be issued as one batch on Virgin Records in North America around 27 September 1999.

Each album has been digitally re-mastered at the world famous Abbey Road Studios. The albums were digitally transferred from, wherever possible, the original analogue masters at 24 bits resolution. They were processed using Sonic Solutions NoNoise technology and mastered to 16 bit for CD using Prism SNS Noise Shaping.

The packaging for each CD includes booklets up to sixteen pages. They feature the original album artwork, a selection of photos and with the exception of Pin Ups, the full lyrics. While the original integrity of the artwork remains intact, the back inlays and spines of the CD's have been designed to achieve a continuity across all seventeen albums.

While the CDs have no bonus tracks they all are "enhanced" - i.e. each include a multimedia presentation about BowieNet.

More detail and review of the Ziggy Stardust EMI/Virgin 1999 Reissue

---This page last modified: 04 Jan 2019---