When the Starman fell to Earth with a bump

A NEW BOOK ABOUT DAVID BOWIE CHARTS THE MUSIC LEGEND'S 'LOST DECADES'.BY ALEXANDER LARMAN

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David Bowie on the Let's Dance tour in 1983

of his best-known and most-loved songs, Life on Mars? - and The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, a lavish concept album revolving around the idea of Bowie as the eponymous Ziggy, a "rock 'n' roll messiah" who comes to Earth when the planet is doomed.

He presented himself as a master of reinvention, a man who would switch bands, collaborators and musical styles from one year, even one month, to the next.

He recorded boundary-pushing new-wave rock in Berlin with Brian Eno, resulting in such albums as Low and “Heroes”, and produced the dazzling Station to Station during a period when he was apparently living off cocaine, red peppers and milk, and storing his urine in jars for fear it would be stolen by witches.

He released one of his greatest albums in 1980, Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps), and then followed it up with his bestselling LP, 1983's Let's Dance, in which the once-uncompromising rocker successfully transformed himself into a pop idol.

Idea after idea flowed from him and he received adulation that his jealous peers could only dream about. And then it went wrong.

If Bowie had sold his soul to the devil to achieve earthly success, Satan came to collect at some point in 1987, when his client released his first truly dire album, Never Let Me Down.

His previous release, Tonight, had been rocky too, but was saved by its singles. There was no such redemption for this release, which sold relatively poorly and was laughed at by critics and music lovers alike.