Suffragette City

The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars, 1972

ANDY SCOTT, SWEET

“Sweet and Bowie were on the same label, RCA, at the time, and there was a guy who used to play us Bowie’s rough mixes. I heard that Bowie offered Suffragette City to Mott The Hoople as a single before All The Young Dudes. He wrote that song with them in mind, but ended up recording it himself. I remember talking to Mick [Tucker, Sweet drummer] and saying: ‘If he’s not going to fucking do that song, we’d love to do it.’

“It came from the area we really wanted to move into. The guitar sound is what makes it for me – a Les Paul with a wah-wah pedal slightly backed off. Later the following decade, after I became a producer, a well-respected Swedish guy told me: ‘The guitar sounds of you and Mick Ronson defined the 1970s.’ That made me very happy indeed.”

LEE AARON

“I first heard Suffragette City on the yellow transistor radio I’d got for my tenth birthday. It was