What albums did David Bowie produce?
Creative collaboration and the fruitful process of volleying ideas around a team in the pursuit of art was a key feature of David Bowie‘s superstar musical development. Enthralled with svengalis and muses before his glam explosion, his embrace of androgynous dress-up that led to the Martian exotica of Ziggy Stardust was keenly pushed by his first wife Angie, and his easy command of stage presence and theatrical posture captured so thrillingly on DA Pennebaker’s classic 1973 concert film was earnestly informed by his time as a student of mime artist and choreographer Lindsay Kemp.
Not dubbed the musical chameleon for nothing, Bowie jumped ship as glam grew stale and immersed himself in the Philadelphia soul scene for Young Americans, then looked to the Cold War capital for his synth-soaked Berlin trilogy. This breathless creative pace was fuelled in part by a hopeless cocaine addiction but also by consciously surrounding himself with the right characters to mutually coax greatness. During his whirlwind 1970s blur, John Lennon, Brian Eno, Mott the Hoople, and Luther Vandross all played a part in Bowie’s acclaimed run of LPs.
From early on, Bowie fancied himself a visionary jack of all trades. Aside from his celebrated acting roles on stage and screen, expressionist painting pieces, and even a dally in the financial world with his late-1990s ‘Bowie bonds’, he was keen to flex his production chops for other artists. Having worked with the legendary Tony Visconti on many of his signature records, Bowie certainly had learned from the best.
He jumped into old friend and backup singer for ‘It Ain’t Easy’ Dana Gillespie’s Weren’t Born a Man, Bowie and Spiders from Mars guitarist Mick Ronson co-producing two tracks, including her version of ‘Andy Warhol’ originally written with Gillespie in mind. Not only did he gift Mott the Hoople with their defining ‘All the Young Dudes‘, but he also produced the UK top ten chart-topper and saved the group from the brink of breaking up.
So, what albums did Bowie produce?
There are six albums in total that Bowie sat behind the mixing desk for, but only across three artists. One was the long-shelved sessions recorded with lover and soul collaborator Ava Cherry. A part of The Astronettes trio who provided backup vocals on the Diamond Dogs tour, Bowie oversaw production at London’s Olympic Studios and only saw release on 1995’s People From Bad Homes.
As glam crept into New York City, acerbic songsmith Lou Reed sought Bowie’s production command on his seminal Transformer record, famed for its signature ‘Walk On the Wild Side’ and ‘Satellite of Love’ cuts and documenting his panda eyes Frankenstein’s monster look. Huge fans of his former The Velvet Underground avant-garage rock, Bowie and Ronson helped deliver the acclaimed slice of pop decadence, Ronson’s string arrangements on ‘Perfect Day‘ later lauded by Reed on the Classic Albums TV show.
The lion’s share of Bowie’s production grapple was heaped upon the sinewy punk force of nature, Iggy Pop, handling four of his records. The pair knocking their heads together unleashed 1973’s animalistic Raw Power while still fronting The Stooges and the Berlin accompaniments of The Idiot and Lust for Life, the latter with recording engineer Colin Thurston, even featured Bowie as a member of Pop’s backing band in place of touring his own Low, consumed in the little German-rehab life they had forged together.
As Bowie’s sonic inspirations rubbed off on the fantastic run of Berlin LPs, he also saw to it to dump his misguided, late-1980s Glass Spider gloss all over Pop’s seventh LP Blah-Blah-Blah, longtime Queen collaborator David Richards sharing culpability for Pop’s silliest record. Still, it gave him a much-needed hit, still standing as Pop’s most commercially successful effort.
