"Don't bother with anything after Scary Monsters," said a friend of mine after the sudden death of David Bowie last year prompted me to finally undertake my long-planned mission to acquaint myself with his 25 albums.
It was advice from a man who knows far more about music than I, having once had a wall full of thousands of vinyl albums, like some extra cast member of High Fidelity, but what a tragedy it would have been to consider the Brixton-born genius – and in his case the word is used very much advisedly – to have peaked with that 37-year-old release.
To listen to the works of this mind-bogglingly creative master chronologically from his eponymous and downright odd debut half a century ago to last year's stunningly ambiguous ★ is an aural adventure without equal.
The run of five releases from Space Oddity in 1969 to Aladdin Sane four years later is a string of albums surely unparalleled for range and quality. This clutch of modern masterpieces that caught the attention of the world contain most of the monster hits and are usually cited as the high-point of this musical visionary's career but, for me, Bowie's masterpieces arrived more than 20 years later and, sorry Steve, that puts them after Scary Monsters.
I think Bowie was at his best when he immersed the listener in his post-apocalyptic concept pieces – and can only imagine how moving such experiences must have been for teens who tore into their bedroom sanctuaries clutching newly-released vinyl – rather than for a 40-something taking his first faltering steps into music with Spotify.
The deliciously, darkly grim world of Diamond Dogs was Bowie's first assured foray into such territory, although he had served notice of his ability to paint such ambitious musical canvasses on his debut album, dismissed as an unfocused, music-hall aberration at the start of his career but which contains the brilliantly dismal, Malthusian We Are Hungry Men and Please Mr Gravedigger as well as the jolly Kinks-esque Uncle Arthur.
The brilliant despair of 1974's Diamond Dogs reached it's apogee – and that of Bowie's entire career – in 1995's Outside, an album which interspersed stunning tracks like The Hearts Filthy Lesson, Hallo Spaceboy – Bowie's original hard-edged release rather than the Pet Shop Boys aberration – and I Have Not Been to London Town with narrative pieces introducing the story of an investigation into the horrendous fad of art crime – grisly murder as art. It is a thing of genius, and would have to be to better the drum 'n' bass masterpiece Earthling which Bowie brought out two years later in the most fecund phase of an astonishing career.
Earthling showcases Bowie's ability, time and again, to dip his toe into brash new forms of music, in this case jungle, and then show the revolutionaries how to do it properly. Little Wonder may be my favourite Bowie song, although there are so many other candidates, and that and I'm Afraid of Americans alone, put Earthling up there among the greatest albums of all time. These two releases also eloquently illustrate how rewarding locking yourself away to follow the great man's career can be, it was scarcely imaginable as I was carried on the John Carpenter sine wave brilliance of Heroes and, especially, Low that it would get any better. The first two albums of Bowie's Berlin trilogy are Bowie – and Brian Eno – mastering ambient to show Tangerine Dream, Karftwerk, The Orb et al how it's done.
Let's Dance, derided by many as Bowie selling out, is an upbeat pop delight that among its oh-too-brief eight offerings includes the brilliant title track, Modern Love and China Girl as well as Cat People (Putting Out Fire), another candidate for Bowie's best single as he's never as good as when he sings like someone doing an unconvincing impression of himself; surely only Bowie could ever be that meta.
There are few duds in a collection of 25 albums – 1973's Pin Ups and 1987's Never Let Me Down are the only two I could happily go without hearing again, although even the latter offers Time Will Crawl.
It's impossible to list all the numerous highlights along the way, whether it be Bowie's take on God Only Knows, his homage to Lovecraft's Ancient Ones in The Supermen, the wonderfully bizarre Chant of the Ever-Circling Skeletal Family ("bra, bra, bra, bra, bra, bra, bra, bra...") or his attempts to make up foreign languages in The Secret Life of Arabia and Warszawa.
Brilliantly, and reassuringly for fans of this musical prophet, there is no limp tailing off in his near half-century of output and far from being a late-flowering in his career, Bowie's final two albums, The Next Day and ★ stake credible claims to being his best, and come only a hair's breadth short in my opinion.
By turns uplifting, experimental and almost impossible to interpret, the self-reverential nature of both releases, their celebration of his work and musings on his imminent death are not just to be indulged but to be celebrated by his fans.
With Space Oddity, The Man Who Sold The World, Hunky Dory, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars and Aladdin Sane, Bowie had cemented his immortality 44 years ago. In the decades beyond that he went further again and again.
Treat yourself, have a listen and you know what? Tin Machine is a pretty good album too.
