David Bowie: 13 of His Greatest Songs

Why 13? David Bowie has always been different, so, instead of a top 10 or top 20, a top 13 seems in keeping with the man himself.

David Bowie is one of music's great solo artists. A gifted singer and songwriter, English-born Bowie has famously been a chameleon throughout his career (not literally, of course). From Ziggy Stardust to Aladdin Sane to the Thin White Duke, David Bowie is one of the most inventive performers in pop and rock history. If he never records another song, his legacy is already secure. Following heart problems in 2004, David Bowie is now in semi-retirement. Here's my personal list of thirteen Bowie classics.

1. Space Oddity (1969)

Making the top 5 of the UK singles chart during the week of the Moon landing in 1969, Space Oddity was Bowie's breakthrough song - coming at the age of 22. Even today it sounds ahead of its time. Cold, almost robotic vocals in part, before it explodes into a color of sound. Cosmic indeed.

2. Starman (1972)

Boy George said that seeing David Bowie perform Starman on British TV chart show Top of the Pops inspired him to make music his calling. From the classic album, Ziggy Stardust, Starman did "blow our minds" - if not as much as any extra-terrestrial visitor surely would have done, or will do... A moving, but intellectual, singalong, where Bowie suggests an alien visitor would have such a superior intellect and civilization we simply wouldn't be able to cope.

3. Moonage Daydream (1972)

Moonage Daydream challenges Starman as the finest song on Ziggy - helped greatly by the late, great Mick Ronson's beautiful guitar solo. As powerful as the album version is, the live performance of this song, during Ziggy's final gig, reveals it as the highlight of the whole show.

4. Life On Mars (1971)

Yes, David had a thing about space. But the late 1960s and early 1970s were a time when we thought, by 2011, man would have a Moon base up and running, and would have landed on Mars. Oh well... Bowie's humorous lyrics, as to what type of life might inhabit Mars, spares it from getting too pretentious. From the acclaimed album, Hunky Dory.

5. Heroes (1977)

Heroes was an example of Bowie changing musical tack again. This Brian Eno influenced beauty showed David Bowie mixing dance music with electronic. A song which has gained in stature over the years.

6. Fame (1975)

David Bowie's first US number one single. Having John Lennon sing backing vocals couldn't have harmed the song's success, of course. This song from Bowie's Thin White Duke period saw an amalgam of styles, with dance music beginning to influence Bowie's music more and more. The Bee Gees began to experiment with dance music around the same time.

7. Under Pressure (1981)

Under Pressure could hardly fail with Queen and Bowie belting out this melancholy anthem. The harmonizing between Freddie Mercury and David Bowie was one of the highlights of 1980s music. A UK number one.

8. The Jean Genie (1973)

Another example of David Bowie's often strange lyrics. Produced by the cut-up method, Bowie would write out phrases and randomly put them together. From the Aladdin Sane album, this is a more hard-edged twist on Bowie's very early curio, The Laughing Gnome.

9. Rebel Rebel (1974)

The very spiky, but hypnotic, guitar sound is supplied by none other than Bowie himself. From Diamond Dogs, Rebel Rebel is consistent with the Orwellian concept of the album, but stands alone as a great track.

10. Ashes to Ashes (1980)

Major Tom is a washed up junkie in this 1980 British chart topper. It's a song which was influenced by the ethereal electronic music of the British New Romantic scene, including the likes of Steve Strange's Visage. The Ashes to Ashes video featured Bowie dressed up as a clown walking along a beach, and getting a finger wagging from an old lady, who disapproves of the Major's fall from grace!

11. China Girl (1983)

Backed up by an endearing video, the song itself is one of a cluster of more (by Bowie standards) commercial songs emerging from Bowie at this time, also including Let's Dance and Modern Love. Though after the furore over his Fascistic comments in the 1970s, it's surprising to see another Fascistic reference in this song. China Girl made the top 10 in the US and UK.

12.Let's Dance (1983)

One of Bowie's more openly commercial songs, Let's Dance is the only Bowie song, so far, to have topped the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. My own personal memory of this song isn't great. It's of getting kicked by a drunken Australian, who was attempting to dance to this number at a 1987 Wembley Stadium Bowie concert.

13. Everyone Says 'Hi' (2002)

Only a minor UK hit, but a very personal song from David Bowie, with the title taken from an expression his late Father regularly used. As my own Dad died in the year before this song was released, it resonates with me, personally, too. A song which also shows just, despite all the bizarre theatrics, what a poignant voice Bowie has.

I await with interest your own lucky 13...

Sources

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Bowie dismisses Stardust claims

David Bowie Discography at Discogs

Starman Lyrics - David Bowie

Personal Knowledge