6. Young Americans (1975)

Young Americans was a more natural, streamlined continuation from the grand concepts of Diamond Dogs. To create a more authentic soulful sound that the previous album had hinted at, Bowie changed his backing band once again, hiring musicians from the funk and soul scenes, including David Sanborn on saxophone and a certain Luther Vandross, who would soon find huge fame in his own right, on vocal arrangements. Young Americans also marks the start of one of Bowie’s most important musical relationships, that with guitarist Carlos Alomar, who would work with him for over 12 years, making his first appearance.

Many initially regarded it as an entertaining stylistic diversion, but Young Americans is in many ways the first time the world saw Bowie truly shape-shift, setting the trend upon which his career would be based. It also made Bowie one of the first British musicians to openly engage with black musical styles, the ornate amalgam of rock and Philly soul amazingly never threatening to overwhelm Bowie’s vocals.

It begins and ends incredibly strongly – the opening title track is a stone-cold Bowie classic, and the irresistibly funky John Lennon-featuring ‘Fame’ closing the eight-track collection. These two highlights bookend a consistent collection, including the hypnotic mantra-like ‘Right’. A querulous cover of The Beatles’ ‘Across The Universe’ somewhat interrupts proceedings towards the end, but otherwise Young Americans is a well-conceived and brilliantly executed vision for what would become ‘plastic soul’. No other established rock musician in 1975 was trying anything even remotely like this.

While the musical style was now miles from the glam-rock that had broke him in Britain just three years previously, causing his chart placings in his homeland to steadily decline by 1975, Young Americans was Bowie’s first significant success in America. Shoring up his UK popularity that same year was a re-release for ‘Space Oddity’, which hit the top of the charts. However, it was also a year of upheaval for Bowie, as he fired his manager Tony DeFries in an acrimonious and costly split, and his drug habit was spiralling rapidly out of control. Even amid that turmoil, Bowie was beginning another creative hot streak. (LISTEN)

In his own words: On Young Americans’ ‘plastic soul’ sound: “the squashed remains of ethnic music as it survives in the age of Muzak rock, written and sung by a white limey.”

Highlights: ‘Young Americans’; ‘Fascination’; ‘Right’; ‘Fame’