Bowie’s ‘American’ phase yields 12-disc package

It is this “American” phase that is celebrated on the bumper, 12disc package Who Can I Be Now?, which spans the period from 1974’s Diamond Dogs to 1976’s Station To Station, augmenting the original records with rarities.

It also contains a “new” album, The Gouster, recorded in the run-up to 1975’s Young Americans.

Bowie called the songs he was writing at that time “plastic soul”, but his love of black American music was genuine and The Gouster, named after the dress code of streetwise US teens, is upfront in its debt to disco.

Some songs from these sessions later found their way on to Young Americans, but others will be unfamiliar, including lush ballad It’s Gonna Be Me.

Station To Station, the next stop on Bowie’s American pilgrimage, found the singer living in LA and reportedly existing on a diet of milk, red peppers and cocaine – it is no wonder the album’s six lengthy tracks bristle with restlessness and paranoia. – Daily Mail