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Review of the Ziggy Stardust album:
Star gazing Bowie

by R.R. (June 1972)

DAVID BOWIE AND THE SPIDERS FROM MARS: "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust" (RCA Victor LSP 4702. £2.19)

David's new album is liberally sprinkled with stardust throughout - "Starman", the amazing single which surprisingly hasn't yet shown in the charts, although its one of the best songs he has brought out in a commercial sense, "Star", "Lady Stardust" - including Ziggy himself.

Ziggy is a vague character that somehow forms a link through the album, as a Rock N Roll star who had to abdicate because of the pressures put on him.  He sounds remarkably like a friend of David's.

However, this is a secondary line, because the music stands up on its own as some of the best rock music to arrive on our minds for years.  Bowie gets much of his influence from the Underground's Lou Reed, and benefits by it.  "Suffragette City" is one of the best songs he does onstage, and unlike so many other bands/artists, he reproduces the same excitement and incredible flamboyance on record.

David looks like a superstar, onstage he projects himself like a superstar, and by his music deserves to be a superstar.  "Moonage Daydream" is a song David wrote for his protégé band Arnold Corns some time ago and has changed the arrangement slightly to suit his own style.

Like much of his material, it is space music and is probably near the right time now, rather than his "Space Oddity" of a few years ago.  His last two albums were good, this is excellent.

Rating ****

---This page last modified: 13 Dec 2018---