David Bowie - Young Americans

‘The squashed remains of ethnic music written and sung by a white limey’ was Bowie’s own take on this 1975 LP. Steve Sutherland hears the 180g reissue with fresh ears.

- Steve Sutherland

Three obsessions, two failures and a frustrated soul mate – that’s how this begins. Failures first. It’s 1974 and David Bowie wants to make a theatrical production of George Orwell’s novel, 1984. The deceased writer’s estate refuse him permission so he’s left with a bodge he calls Diamond Dogs.

Some of the songs are left over from the stymied 1984 enterprise, some just extensions on the futuristic themes he’s already covered and presently feels incarcerated by, with Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane. Bowie’s in a rut – a glorious rut, but a rut all the same. And he’s stuck touring his rut ad infinitum across America.

Meanwhile, a fair whack of the money he’s making is busy being blown by his manager Tony Defries, whose MainMan company in investing in a kind of comedic Broadway production loosely based on the tragic life of Marilyn Monroe. It costs a quarter of a million dollars, is called Fame and closes, slaughtered by the critics, after only one night – painful proof, as if Bowie really needs it, that the legacy of stardom offers no guarantees.

So he then compensates with new obsessions: Bruce Springsteen, a fresh artist on the scene, is a guy who appears to be reviving West Side Story as contemporary social commentary, exploring the gaps between the fantasises of the land of the free and mundane realities. Bowie will record some Springsteen covers then ditch them, too distracted and phoney to be convincing when he tries on their romance for size.

SHEER MADNESS