DAVID BOWIE

Most listenerns are probably familiar with early "David Bowie", because of his breakthrough album "Space Oddity (1969)", but the music on this album is a far cry from the music style on "Space Oddity (1969)". While the music may not be as interesting or adventurous as the music on it's successor, "David Bowie" is still a pretty fascinating psychadelic tinged rock album. Especially the storytelling type lyrics which feature both humourous, odd and at times quite dark themes, are greatly enjoyable. How about "Uncle Arthur", which tells the story about a guy who after a short fling with a girl, who can't cook a decent meal, moves back in with his mother or the rather bizarre "Please Mr. Gravedigger".

The instrumentation is probably where the album could have been a bit more interesting. David Bowie does toy with both waltz time, citar, tuba, and some sound effects too, but most tracks are still clearly singer/songwriter styled with an acoustic guitar and vocals as the foundation. Not that it's necessarily an issue when the tracks are as charming as these generally are, but some of these tracks almost beg for more elaborate arrangements. When the tracks feature more elaborate arrangements, it´s often because of excessive use of strings and the string arrangements are often so dominant that they seldom do the tracks any favours.

While "David Bowie" is overall a promising debut album, it´s still a bit of an oddity in his discography (although there are plenty of those), and he would go on to release more interesting material only a few years down the line. However if you enjoy early Pink Floyd psychadelia (the least distorted tracks) or 1966 - 1967 The Beatles, this could easily be an album you'd be able to appreciate. A 3 - 3.5 star (65%) rating is warranted.

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