On this day, 18 years ago, DAVID BOWIE released the iSelect free compilation CD from THE MAIL ON SUNDAY newspaper.

In the liner notes, David Bowie comments on each of the twelve tracks he selected for the album. It makes fascinating reading...

David Bowie: 'For this CD compilation I've selected 12 of my songs that I don't seem to tire of. Few of them are well known, but many of them are still sung at my concerts. Usually by me. I'll start off with the hit.'

Life On Mars?

This song was so easy. Being young was easy. A really beautiful day in the park, sitting on the steps of the bandstand. 'Sailors bap-bap-bap-bap-baaa-bap.' An anomic (not a 'gnomic') heroine. Middle-class ecstasy.

I took a walk to Beckenham High Street to catch a bus to Lewisham to buy shoes and shirts but couldn't get the riff out of my head. Jumped off two stops into the ride and more or less loped back to the house up on Southend Road.

Workspace was a big empty room with a chaise longue; a bargain-price art nouveau screen ('William Morris,' so I told anyone who asked); a huge overflowing freestanding ashtray and a grand piano. Little else.

I started working it out on the piano and had the whole lyric and melody finished by late afternoon. Nice.

Rick Wakeman came over a couple of weeks later and embellished the piano part and guitarist Mick Ronson created one of his first and best string parts for this song which now has become something of a fixture in my live shows.

Sweet Thing/Candidate/Sweet Thing.

I'd failed to obtain the theatrical rights from George Orwell's widow for the book 1984 and having written three or more songs for it already, I did a fast about-face and recobbled the idea into Diamond Dogs: teen punks on rusty skates living on the roofs of the dystopian Hunger City; a post-apocalyptic landscape.

A centrepiece for this would-be stage production was to be Sweet Thing/Candidate/Sweet Thing, which I wrote using William Burroughs's cut-up method.

You write down a paragraph or two describing several different subjects creating a kind of story ingredients-list, I suppose, and then cut the sentences into four or five-word sections; mix 'em up and reconnect them.

You can get some pretty interesting idea combinations like this. You can use them as is or, if you have a craven need to not lose control, bounce off these ideas and write whole new sections.

I was looking to create a profligate world that could have been inhabited by characters from Kurt Weill or John Rechy - that sort of atmosphere. A bridge between Enid Blyton's Beckenham and The Velvet Underground's New York. Without Noddy, though.

I thought it evocative to wander between the melodramatic Sweet Thing croon into the dirty sound of Candidate and back again. For no clear reason (what's new?) I stopped singing this song around the mid-Seventies.

Though I've never had the patience or discipline to get down to finishing a musical theatre idea other than the rock shows I'm known for, I know what I'd try to produce if I did.

I've never been keen on traditional musicals. I find it awfully hard to suspend my disbelief when dialogue is suddenly song. I suppose one of the few people who can make this work is Stephen Sondheim with works such as Assassins.

I much prefer through-sung pieces where there is little if any dialogue at all. Sweeney Todd is a good example, of course. Peter Grimes and The Turn Of The Screw, both operas by Benjamin Britten, and The Rise And Fall Of The City Of Mahagonny by Weill. How fantastic to be able to create something like that.

The Bewlay Brothers.

The only pipe I have ever smoked was a cheap Bewlay. It was a common item in the late Sixties and for this song I used Bewlay as a cognomen - in place of my own. This wasn't just a song about brotherhood so I didn't want to misrepresent it by using my true name.

Having said that, I wouldn't know how to interpret the lyric of this song other than suggesting that there are layers of ghosts within it. It's a palimpsest, then.

The circumstances of the recording barely exist in my memory. It was late, I know that. I was on my own with my producer Ken Scott; the other musicians having gone for the night.

Unlike the rest of the Hunky Dory album, which I had written before the studio had been booked, this song was an unwritten piece that I felt had to be recorded instantaneously.

I had a whole wad of words that I had been writing all day. I had felt distanced and unsteady all evening, something settling in my mind. It's possible that I may have smoked something in my Bewlay pipe. I distinctly remember a sense of emotional invasion.

I do believe that we finished the whole thing on that one night. It's likely that I ended up drinking at the Sombrero in Kensington High Street or possibly Wardour Street's crumbling La Chasse. Cool.

Lady Grinning Soul.

Mike Garson's piano opens with the most ridiculous and spot-on re-creation of a 19th Century music hall 'exotic' number. I can see now the 'poses plastiques' as if through a smoke-filled bar. Fans, castanets and lots of Spanish black lace and little else. Sexy, mmm? And for you, Madam?

This was written for a wonderful young girl whom I've not seen for more than 30 years. When I hear this song she's still in her 20s, of course.

A song will put you tantalisingly close to the past, so close that you can almost reach out and touch it. The sound of ghosts again.

Win.

This is not, you may be speechless to learn, an ode to Winifred Atwell, though I almost wish it were for she was a real winner. In the Fifties in England it was virtually impossible for a ten-year-old to hear boogiewoogies and rags unless our Winifred was playing them on her 'other' piano.

At home in Trinidad she'd been brought up with blues and R&B and had played it for the American GIs who were based at what is now the main airport. Winnie was the first black artist in Britain to sell one million records. She was tops.

No, this song is about, er, winning. David Sanborn is on sax. He was experimenting with sound effects at the time and I'd rather hoped he would push further into that area, but he chose to become rich and famous instead. So he did win really, didn't he?

Some Are.

A quiet little piece Brian Eno and I wrote in the Seventies. The cries of wolves in the background are sounds that you might not pick up on immediately. Unless you're a wolf. They're almost human, both beautiful and creepy.

Images of the failed Napoleonic force stumbling back through Smolensk. Finding the unburied corpses of their comrades left from their original advance on Moscow. Or possibly a snowman with a carrot for a nose; a crumpled Crystal Palace Football Club admission ticket at his feet. A Weltschmerz [world weariness] indeed. Send in your own images, children, and we'll show the best of them next week.

Teenage Wildlife.

So it's late morning and I'm thinking: 'New song and a fresh approach. I know, I'm going to do a Ronnie Spector. Oh yes I am. Ersatz, just for one day.'

And I did and here it is. Bless. I'm still enamoured of this song and would give you two Modern Loves for it any time. It's also one that I find fulfilling to sing onstage. It has some nice interesting sections to it that can trip you up, always a good kind of obstacle to contend with live.

Ironically, the lyric is something about taking a short view of life, not looking too far ahead and not predicting the oncoming hard knocks. The lyric might have been a note to a younger brother or my own adolescent self.

The guitars on this track form a splintery little duel between the great Robert Fripp and my long-time friend Carlos Alomar.

Repetition.

By virtue of the instrument's classical baggage, Simon House's violin touches a vein of pure Goth on this recording. There's a numbness to the whole rhythm section that I try to duplicate with a deadpan vocal, as though I'm reading a report rather than witnessing the event. I used to find this quite easy to accomplish.

I decided to write something on the deeply disturbing subject of wife abuse in the manner of a short-form drama.

I had known more instances of this behaviour than I would have preferred to have been made aware of and could not for the life of me imagine how someone could hit a woman, not only once but many, many times.

Fantastic Voyage.

It's almost quaint, this one. It has a strong feel of the Fifties variety show to it. A cavil in passing - if I'd been in the position of the mid-Sixties Rolling Stones, I definitely would have gone on the Sunday Night At The London Palladium show's revolving stage.

They had refused to stand on the roundabout with the other acts at the end of the show, as it didn't fit in with their rebellious image. I was surprised to read that the American entertainer Judy Garland also refused a whirl, as she was too emotionally upset. Who knew?

I would have been shyly clawing my way past Jimmy Tarbuck to get on. I remember my mother being excited about the first time this show appeared on television in 1955.

My father had bought our set for Princess Elizabeth's coronation in 1953 and it had opened up a new world for us. Guy Mitchell was apparently an exciting part of this world as my mother went all schoolgirl when he came on screen and sang She Wears Red Feathers (And A Hula Hula Skirt).

This song's chord structure (Fantastic Voyage, I mean, not She Wears Red Feathers) appeared on the album Lodger in two forms. First, as it appears here and then further in as Boys Keep Swinging (they were men's dresses, I tell you). Both the tempo and top-line melody are rewritten.

I did this again on the album Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps). It proved nothing. Thinking about it, Guy Mitchell would have done this song proud.

Loving The Alien.

I'm trying to come up with a little-used word for each song entry. I've not got one for this song. And this song is not, it may surprise you to know, another ode to little green Martians. Oh, recidivism, that'll fit.

Time Will Crawl

There are a host of songs that I've recorded over the years that for one reason or another (clenched teeth) I've often wanted to re-record some time in the future. This track from Never Let Me Down is one of those.

I've replaced the drum machine with true drums and added some crickety strings and remixed. I'm very fond of this new version with its Neil Young of Shortlands accents. Oh, to redo the rest of that album.

One Saturday afternoon in April 1986, along with some other musicians I was taking a break from recording at Montreux studios in Switzerland. It was a beautiful day and we were outside on a small piece of lawn facing the Alps and the lake.

Our engineer, who had been listening to the radio, shot out of the studio and shouted: 'There's a whole lot of s*** going on in Russia.'

The Swiss news had picked up a Norwegian radio station that was screaming - to anyone who would listen - that huge billowing clouds were moving over from the Motherland and they weren't rain clouds. This was the first news in Europe of the satanic Chernobyl.

I phoned a writer friend in London, but he hadn't heard anything about it. It wasn't for many more hours that the story started trickling out as major news.

For those first few moments it felt sort of claustrophobic to know you were one of only a few witnesses to something of this magnitude.

Over the next couple of months a complicated crucible of impressions collected in my head prompted by this insanity, any one of which could have become a song. I stuck them all in Time Will Crawl. That last sentence rhymes.

Hang On To Yourself (live).

Ziggy and the Spiders had played around 50 UK shows total, and this Santa Monica performance, from October 20, 1972, would be our 12th in America.

Although of only bootleg quality and despite the drums and bass being casually miked, I hope you can feel our real thrill here of presenting the band to a radio audience for the first time. I necessarily took the most centre-stage position as easily as an old ham from Bromley Repertory would, though in reality I was deadly nervous.

This was our first live American radio broadcast, so it was a big deal. We fluffed a lot of stuff that night, but the enthusiasm and pride stand 10ft tall.

One astounding thing about Mainman, my management at the time, is that for the 18 months of the Spiders' life-cycle (and after, actually) they never arranged for us to play anywhere in Europe where Ziggy was a proverbial monster. No tours, no shows, not even Paris.

I never understood that and was pretty miserable about it at the time, but now realise how naive and unprepared my management was for the serious job of actually managing.

© David Bowie 2008.

On this day, 26 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at the BBC Radio Theatre, Portland Place, London in 2000 to a specially invited audience.

I wrote in my diary... 'An awesome performance tonight by David and the band, even more so considering David was clearly under the weather with "half a bronchitis on top of the laryngitis" and a ticklish throat. Ever the professional, he kept soldiering on, with the aid of a breathing type menthol thingy-inhaler... he even joked around with the inhaler doing Frank Booth impressions from the 'Blue Velvet' movie'.

The full set list ran as follows:

       01. Wild Is The Wind.
       02. Ashes To Ashes.
       03. Seven.
       04. This Is Not America.
       05. Absolute Beginners.
       06. Always Crashing In The Same Car.
       07. Survive.
       08. The London Boys.
       09. I Dig Everything.
       10. Little Wonder.
       11. The Man Who Sold The World.
       12. Fame.
       13. Stay.
       14. Hallo Spaceboy.
       15. Cracked Actor.
       16. I'm Afraid Of Americans.
Encore:
       17. Ziggy Stardust.
       18. The Jean Genie (instrumental fill in).
       19. All The Young Dudes.
       20. Starman.
       21. "Heroes".
       22. Let's Dance.

Check out his performance of The London Boys below, which wasn't part of the original broadcast on BBC.

On this day, 55 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at Glastonbury Fayre for the first time in 1971.

David is pictured here leaving the Eavises' farmhouse. For the performance he wore a blue Magician's cloak and a hat purchased from 'The Universal Witness' boutique on the Fulham Road in London.

Photographs © Gabi Nasemann...

      

FACTORY INTERNATIONAL present THE LIGHTROOM production DAVID BOWIE: YOU'RE NOT ALONE which is coming to Manchester, showing at North Warehouse, Aviva Studios, Water Street, Manchester M3 4JQ from 8th December 2026 until 10th January 2027.

Booking for General Tickets begins this Thursday 18th June.

Be transported into the many worlds of David Bowie. Through iconic performances, rarely-seen interviews and never-before-exhibited material, discover the creative mind, spirit and soul of one of the world's greatest, most visionary artists.

Featuring Bowie himself as its sole voice, David Bowie: You're Not Alone is both a multimedia spectacle and an intimate self-portrait.

The show brings together iconic performance footage, rarely heard interviews and never-before-seen material selected from thousands of hours of film in the vaults of the David Bowie Archive in New York.

From Space Oddity through Diamond Dogs and "Heroes" to ★, David Bowie: You're Not Alone is a celebration of Bowie's boundless curiosity as a force that connected people across continents and generations, as well as his enduring cultural impact today.

A combination of performance footage, photography, drawings, lyrics, personal notes, sketches and narration from Bowie come together to craft the most vivid, detailed and immersive visual exploration yet of the iconic artist's life and work.

Using the incredible Lightroom visual technology and spatial audio behind David Hockney: Bigger & Closer (not smaller & further away), The Moonwalkers and VOGUE: Inventing the Runway, this 360 degree immersive experience sees Bowie invite you into his many worlds.

Whether you're reliving the magic or discovering it for the very first time, this is your ticket to the landmark Bowie performances that changed culture forever.

For more details, tickets and information, please visit factoryinternational.org website.

Also in London now extended until 10th January 2027 at Lightroom, 12 Lewis Cubitt Square, Kings Cross, London - more details

• On this day, 54 years ago, DAVID BOWIE released his immortal The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars album in 1972...

• On this day, 9 years ago, DAVID BOWIE Cracked Actor (Live Los Angeles '74) 2CD was released in 2017...

• On this day, 9 years ago, DAVID BOWIE Be My Wife 40th Anniversary 7" Picture Disc Single was released in 2017...

Here is the news... according to the latest world official chart releases for DAVID BOWIE...

The Record Store Day 2026 release HALLO SPACEBOY 12" neon pink vinyl EP reached the following positions:

Croatia Toplista Prodaje: #7 / - /
Greece Official IFPI Charts Top-100 Albums Sales Chart (Combined): #72 / #69 /
Hungary Album Top 40 Chart (Physical): #20 / - /
UK Official Vinyl Singles Chart: #4 / #6 / #5 / #6 / #15 / (total 5 weeks)
UK Official Physical Singles Chart: #5 / #6 / #6 / #8 / #18 / #61 / #71 / #54 / (total 8 weeks)
UK Official Singles Sales Chart: #5 / #19 / #68 / - / - / (total 3 weeks)

The Bowie / Jagger collaboration DANCING IN THE STREET has re-entered the UK Official Physical Singles Chart at #71.

Published next month is CONSTELLATION "HEROES": Tracing David Bowie's Berlin Album Song By Song by HANS MEERTENS.

Synopsis: Constellation "Heroes" traces David Bowie's 1977 album as the centre of a wider orbit: a charged zone of resonance and cultural signal. Analytical, imaginative and historically attuned, the book maps a web of connections from Chris Burden to Blackstar, from Tokyo to German Expressionism, from Cold War unease back to Bromley. Framed by Bowie's Berlin era, it unfolds track by track, linking sonic detail to lyrical shape and production to artistic intent, following the currents that infused the record.

It explores the modernist artefact as a site of fracture and invention, between East and West, past and future, voice and persona. It considers how meaning unfolds through sound and staging, language and gesture, and how Bowie channels temporal tension into a force both intimate and unstable. Rather than fixing its meaning, it opens multiple pathways through the album, allowing "Heroes" to emerge as luminous and unresolved.

For readers drawn to Bowie's Berlin years, including The Idiot, Low, Lust For Life, Lodger and the Isolar II Tour, this is an immersive and deeply considered inquiry into one of his most enduring creative periods. "Heroes" becomes a prism of identity and dislocation, still transmitting from the city that shaped it: volatile, elusive, alive.

About the Author: Hans Meertens is a Dutch artist, writer and illustrator whose work is shown internationally and held in private, museum and corporate collections. He studied fine art in the UK, Belgium and the Netherlands, and refined his practice through residencies in New York City. After teaching art in Amsterdam, he now mentors art academy students with additional support needs, volunteers with the foundation Drawing for Children, and makes music on the side in a post-rock band. He is the author of On Track... Iggy Pop 1977-1999: Every Album, Every Song, a detailed survey of Iggy's solo output from that era. A long-time admirer of David Bowie, he turns his focus in this book to a defining work at the heart of his enduring fascination with Bowie's universe.

This 176-page paperback is to be published on 3rd July and is available to pre-order NOW!

Today marks the 34th anniversary of DAVID and IMAN's wedding ceremony at Saint James Episcopal Church, in Florence, Italy in 1992.

The best man was David's son Duncan, with chief usher Alan Edwards.

Iman's maid of honour was her best friend Bethann Hardison.

Besides immediate family, among the sixty-eight invited guests were Yoko Ono, Brian Eno and his wife Anthea, Bono Vox, Eric Idle and his wife Tanya, Geoff MacCormack, George Underwood, Corinne Schwab, Jennifer Ichida (Duncan's then girlfriend), Hervé Léger (who designed Iman's dress), Thierry Mugler (who designed David's suit) and hair arranged by Teddy Antolin. Teddy was a very special guest - in a way responsible for what was happening that day, because it was he who introduced David and Iman at a dinner party two years previously in Los Angeles.

During the ceremony, Geoff MacCormack read Psalm 121 during the service and David's cousin Kristina Amadeus read from Corinthians.

You can click here to read an article from Hello! magazine entitled 'The Wedding of David Bowie and Iman' by Brian Aris from the BW press archive.

Here is the news... according to the latest world official chart releases for DAVID BOWIE...

The Record Store Day 2026 release HALLO SPACEBOY 12" neon pink vinyl EP reached the following positions:

Croatia Toplista Prodaje: #7 / - /
Greece Official IFPI Charts Top-100 Albums Sales Chart (Combined): #72 / #69 /
Hungary Album Top 40 Chart (Physical): #20 / - /
UK Official Vinyl Singles Chart: #4 / #6 / #5 / #6 / #15 / (total 5 weeks)
UK Official Physical Singles Chart: #5 / #6 / #6 / #8 / #18 / #61 / #71 / (total 7 weeks)
UK Official Singles Sales Chart: #5 / #19 / #68 / - / - / (total 3 weeks)

Today marks the anniversary of DAVID BOWIE's first ever lead vocal single release 'Liza Jane' credited to Davie Jones with The King Bees, which was released 62 years ago today, 5th June 1964 on the Vocalion Pop label (V 9221).

Featuring seventeen-year-old Davie Jones (vocals and saxophone), George Underwood (guitar), Roger Bluck (guitar), Francis Howard (bass) and Robert Allen (drums).

Although credited to Leslie Conn, David's then manager who negotiated a one-single deal with Decca Records, George Underwood said the song was originally an old Negro spiritual that the band played around with and came up with this R'n'B song.

Leslie Conn's recollection of the events in 1997:

"I can tell you that I have got a pretty retentive memory, but that is something I can't clearly recall. I used to write songs except that I don't write music and I don't play piano. When the boys were jamming to kind of come up with some ideas to make a record, they came up with some six bar blues, which everyone uses. As they were doing that, I came up with my own idea, which came from nowhere, and we improvised and the song came together. I mean, I would never take credit for something that I never did and I know David wouldn't have agreed for me to sign the contract as writer if he had wrote it himself. I would never have stolen someone else's song on principle. I know that I'm quite vague on that and I can't be absolutely sure how it all came about, but I know that I did come up with a lot of ideas. As for the production of the song that was most certainly me, I arranged and organised the whole thing and I always produced the material I was arranging with Decca at that time. George Underwood is definitely wrong on that point.

"There is a funny story while were still on the subject of 'Liza Jane'. When David and I parted company I went off to live and work in Majorca for a few years and one day I was on the phone to my mother and she said, 'what shall I do with those records I have in the garage' which were a few hundred copies of 'Liza Jane'. So I replied, 'Throw them out', and she did. The last time David came up here he said, 'Have you got any of those records we made, you know they're worth over a hundred pounds each!' I told him I got my mother to throw them all out! We had to laugh."

Backed with 'Louie Louie Go Home', written by Paul Revere and Mark Lindsay, which was incidentally pencilled in as the A-side, both songs were recorded in a seven-hour session at Decca Studios in Broadhurst Gardens, West Hampstead.

The single was re-released by Decca in September 1978 (catalogue number F 13807) and beware there are counterfeit Vocalion copies in circulation. Produced in the USA in 70s, the tell-tale difference between the original and the illegal pressings is the matrix number. On the original 1964 issue the matrix number is machine stamped on the vinyl and on the fake copies it is handwritten.

The official press release for the single from the press room of the Dick James Organisation in May 1964 read...

INTRODUCING DAVIE JONES WITH THE KING-BEES... AND THEIR FIRST DISC 'LIZA JANE'

Pop Music isn't all affluence. Just ask new seventeen year old recording star Davie Jones. Time was (two months ago, in fact) when he and his group were almost on their uppers. No money, bad equipment. Then Davie had a brainwave. "I had been reading a lot in the papers about John Bloom," says Davie. "So I put pen to paper and wrote him a letter." David told Bloom that he had the chance of backing one of the most talented and up-and-coming groups on the pop scene. All he had to do was advance the several hundred pounds it requires to outfit a pop group with the best equipment.

Davie didn't get the money, but he did get a telegram next day from John Bloom giving the phone number of Artist's Manager Leslie Conn. Davie got in touch, he was rewarded with a booking at Bloom's Wedding Anniversary Party. "We were a dismal failure", recalls Davie. "It was a dinner dress affair and we turned up in jeans and sweat shirts and played our usual brand of rhythm and blues. It didn't go down too well. Still we'll know better next time."

However, all's well that ends well. Leslie Conn liked the earthy type of music the group played, arranged an audition with Decca Records which resulted in a contract and the first release by David Jones with the King-Bees. "Liza Jane", released by Decca (Vocalion 9221) on June 5th.

DAVIE JONES WITH THE KING-BEES MET AT BARBERS

Davie Jones met up with his four member backing group the King-Bees when he visited his local barber shop in Bromley. In between clips he got chatting to the four lads, also there to be sheared, about their musical interests, and before you could say "Short back and sides", they decided to join forces.

The group specialise in hard-driving, uncompromising R & B, a brand of music that has won for them a dedicated following in the London area, a following which should soon be spreading throughout the length and breadth of England on the strength of their first disc.

"LIZA JANE", is a beaty, action packed disc which features the direct no-holds-barred Davie Jones vocal delivery. The King-Bees supply a hard core, R & B backing and the whole thing is crowned by a catchy chorus featuring the line "Little Liza Jane".

DAVIE JONES - Seventeen years old, fair haired Davie first got interested in pop music when he was ten. His father's secretary (Davie's father in P.R.O. for Dr. Barnardo's homes) who had previously worked for a disc company, sent Davie a 'Demo' copy of a new Little Richard disc. As the phrase goes, Davie was "knocked out", and when he had scraped together a few pounds of his pocket money, bought a plastic saxophone. Eventually he progressed on to the real thing. Lessons were the next step. "My idol on saxophone has always been Ronnie Ross", says Davie, "So I looked up his name up in the phone book and asked him if he would give me lessons." Ross agreed, but after Davie played him a few bars Ross's comment was: "Right now we can start working on you, that was bloody awful!" Davie gave up his music to take his G.C.E. at 15, then left school and joined an advertising agency as a commercial artist, where he still works.

When he left school Davie was able to concentrated on his music again, this time mainly as a vocalist, playing dance halls and clubs in and around the Bromley area. Then came the hair-cut and the letter to John Bloom...

Davie's favourite vocalists are Little Richard, Bob Dylan and John Lee Hooker. Apart from the saxophone he also plays the guitar. He dislikes Adams apples, and lists as his interests Baseball, American Football and collecting Boots. A handsome six footer with a warm and engaging personality, Davie Jones has all it takes to get to the show business heights, including... talent.

Well worth checking out is a rather fabulous cover-version of DAVID BOWIE's 'Janine' by PAUL ROBERTS.

The track features on his brand new album AGENTS OF MISFORTUNE released 31st May on digital, CD and LP formats.

This is the sixth studio album from Paul which features ten fantastic new tunes, including a spectacular cover of 'Janine' and the single 'Steady Now'.

A sonic journey through classic pop, electro-funk, haunting ballads and guitar fuelled rock, this truly is one of Paul's most epic adventures to date.

The album comes with a 12-page lyric booklet and sleeve notes by Bowie biographer and long-time friend of Paul, David Buckley.

For those unaware, Paul replaced Hugh Cornwell in The Stranglers in 1990 until 2006 and appeared on and co-wrote eight studio albums with the band.

As a side project to The Stranglers, he also played and recorded solo, as Paul Roberts and The Faith Band, The Faith Band, and Soulsec.

His latest album is now available on digital and streaming platforms including: Amazon / iTunes

Streaming: Apple Music / Spotify / Deezer

• On this day, 14 years ago, DAVID BOWIE released the 40th Anniversary Edition of The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars album...

• On this day, 22 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at Tommy Hilfiger at Jones Beach Theatre, in Wantagh, New York, USA during his A Reality World Tour...

• On this day, 25 years ago, DAVID BOWIE held an official chat in the BowieNet chatrooms - [Read chat log]...

• On this day, 30 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at the Budokan Hall in Tokyo, Japan during his Outside World Tour in 1996...

• On this day, 36 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at the Starplex Amphitheatre in Dallas, USA during his Sound+Vision World Tour in 1990...

• On this day, 43 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at Wembley Arena in London, England during his Serious Moonlight World Tour in 1983...

• On this day, 48 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at the Scandanavium in Gothenburg, Sweden during his 1978 World Tour...

• On this day, 53 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at the Gaumont Theatre in Worcester, England during his 1973 World Tour...

• On this day, 54 years ago, DAVID BOWIE performed at the Public Hall in Preston, England during his 1972 UK Tour #1...

• On this day, 61 years ago, DAVIE JONES and THE LOWER THIRD performed at the Pavilion Ballroom in Bournemouth, England in 1965...

• On this day, 70 years ago, REEVES GABRELS was born. Sending Happy Birthday wishes! Have a really wonderful day...

Taking place next week is DAVID BOWIE - PHOTOGRAPHS BY GEOFF MACCORMACK exhibition at SIXTEEN GALLERY in Cheltenham.

Opening on Thursday 11th June at 11am - until Wednesday 17th June at midday.

Geoff MacCormack, life-long friend of David Jones/David Bowie, shared a remarkable journey that began with discovering the birth of rock 'n' roll together as eight-year-olds and continued through worldwide travels in the mid-1970s.

This exhibition presents a series of photographs of David Bowie taken by Geoff throughout their shared time.

About the Artist: As a band member on Bowie's first major world tour as Ziggy Stardust, to the recording sessions for Station To Station, Geoff took the occasional photograph.

Geoff has exhibited his images in highly successful shows across the USA, St Petersburg (Russia), and the UK. He is the author of two books, Station To Station and Rock 'n' Roll With Me, and has also co-written a new book with Jérôme Soligny, called Music Lover due to be released later this year.

Geoff will be in attendance at the gallery throughout the week, and will be selling and signing his book 'Rock 'n' Roll With Me'.

Venue: Sixteen Gallery.
Dates: 11th-17th June.
Address: 16 Rotunda Terrace, Montpelier St, Cheltenham GL50 1SW.
Website: sixteengallery.com

Geoff says "All prints as well as my book will be available to purchase, and I will be around to sign books. See you there."

Taking place next month on Saturday 11th July is THE RISE AND FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST reimaged starring David McAlmont, Brian Molko, Camille O'Sullivan, Peaches and Nadine Shah at the Royal Festival Hall, London SE1 8XX, England at 7.30pm.

DAVID BOWIE's defiant fifth album is reimagined in incandescent fashion by David McAlmont, Brian Molko, Camille O'Sullivan, Peaches and Nadine Shah.

Fiona Brice arranges and orchestrates Bowie's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars with a stellar line-up of guest vocalists.

Released in 1972, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars is Bowie's seminal glam rock concept album. It follows Ziggy Stardust, an androgynous, bisexual, extra-terrestrial rock star sent to Earth as a messiah before an impending apocalypse.

The show features some of the album's greatest songs, performed in spectacular fashion, by a line-up including: remarkable art-pop vocalist, David McAlmont; the lead singer and guitarist of Placebo, Brian Molko; singer and master of musical reinterpretation, Camille O'Sullivan; the fearless musician, producer, director and performance artist, Peaches; and Mercury Prize-nominated songwriter and musician, Nadine Shah.

Fiona Brice is a British solo artist, classically trained composer, arranger and multi-instrumentalist (violin, viola, piano and voice).

Beth Greenacre is the visual director of this event. Greenacre is a curator, advisor and consultant with over 20 years of experience collecting artworks for private and corporate collectors, commercial and non-for-profit organisations. Greenacre worked with David Bowie as curator of his art collection for more than 16 years.

For more details, information and tickets, please visit southbankcentre.co.uk website.

HOLY HOLY have announced their 2026 Tour - The Final Tour - 'A Celebration of Bowie'.

Gigs have been announced at the following venues:

SEPTEMBER
3rd: Glasgow O2 Academy
4th: Leeds O2 Academy
5th: Liverpool O2 Academy
8th: Oxford O2 Academy
9th: Southampton 1865
10th: London O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire
11th: Bristol O2 Academy
12th: Manchester O2 Ritz
16th: Birmingham XOY
17th: Newcastle-upon-Tyne O2 City Hall
19th: Hull Connexin Live
20th: Lytham St Annes Lowther Pavilion
21st: Salisbury City Hall
23rd: Netherlands Haarlem, PHIL
24th: Belgium, Lueven Het Depot
27th: Ireland Dublin The Academy
28th: Ireland Dublin The Academy
29th: Belfast The Limelight 1

More details and tickets available via the Ticketmaster.co.uk website.

For those of you who use FACEBOOK - check out the private DAVID BOWIE WONDERWORLD Group.

Feel free to join in with the other 105,600 plus members, add yourself and invite your Bowie fan friends. You never know what might get posted, or who you might meet...

• DAVID BOWIE: YOU'RE NOT ALONE shows at North Warehouse, Aviva Studios, Water Street, Manchester M3 4JQ, England from 8th December 2026 until 10th January 2027. Booking for general tickets begins Thursday 18th June - more details

• DAVID BOWIE: YOU'RE NOT ALONE opened on 22nd April now extended until 10th January 2027 at Lightroom, 12 Lewis Cubitt Square, Kings Cross, London - more details

• BOWIE: LIVE ON THE LOCH charity two-day event with David Bowie's band from 2000 at Cameron House, Loch Lomond, West Dunbartonshire, Scotland G83 8QZ on 7th/8th November. In aid of Save The Children - more details

• DAVID BOWIE: MUSIC LOVER: The Inside Story of David Bowie's Record Collection by GEOFF MacCORMACK and JÉRÔME SOLIGNY, hardcover, 224-pages - to be published on 15th September - more details

• HOLY HOLY 2026 Tour - The Final Tour - 'A Celebration of Bowie' gigs in September - tickets on sale now - more details

• THE RISE AND FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST reimaged starring David McAlmont, Brian Molko, Camille O'Sullivan, Peaches and Nadine Shah at the Royal Festival Hall, London SE1 8XX, England on Saturday 11th July at 7.30pm - more details

• CONSTELLATION "HEROES": Tracing David Bowie's Berlin Album Song By Song by HANS MEERTENS, paperback, 176-pages - to be published on 3rd July - more details

• HEROES: DAVID BOWIE AND BERLIN by TOBIAS RÜTHER, paperback, 184-pages - to be published on 1st July - more details

BLACK STARS: DAVID BOWIE et les Légendes de la Musique Afro-Américaine by LAURENT BEZIZ, French version, paperback - published on 31st May - more details

DAVID BOWIE: FOREVER AND EVER: An Illustrated Biography by CLAUDIO FABRETTI, hardcover, 208-pages - published on 28th May - more details

DAVID BOWIE: FROM BERLIN WITH MODERN LOVE by LIAM COLNER, paperback, 144-pages - published on 15th May - more details

PETER & THE WOLF narrated by DAVID BOWIE, limited edition, yellow vinyl, 180g LP, released on 24th April reissued by Music On Vinyl - more details

Exhibition: BOWIE MIO FRATELLO di David Lawrence, features photographs by Philippe Auliac, Denis O'Regan and more at Spazio Musa, Via della Consolata, 11, 10122 Torino, Italy. Opened 17th April until 12th July, open 11.00-18.00, closed Mondays - more details

Photo Exhibition: BOWIE BY SUKITA in Sweden, Gothenburg, at the former Konsthallen, Gotaplatsen 7 opened 11th April until 30th August - more details

BOWIE ODYSSEY 76 (SPECIAL EDITION) by SIMON GODDARD, hardcover, 200-pages - published on 9th April - more details

BOWIE ODYSSEY 76 by SIMON GODDARD, paperback, 200-pages - published on 9th April - more details

CLEVELAND MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY exhibition 'Cosmic Voyager - A Tribute to David Bowie' opened 3rd April until 30th August in the Nathan and Fannye Shafran Planetarium, shows daily at 4pm (except Mondays) - more details

All numbered copies SOLD OUT! Handful of unnumbered copies remaining. DAVID BOWIE - THE YEAR OF THE SCAVENGER luxury collector's book from MAYAK PUBLISHING covering the 1974 period - available to purchase now - to claim your exclusive £10 discount use WONDER10 at checkout, 710-pages - mayakpublishing.co.uk

Exclusive DAVID BOWIE lino-cut print available to PURCHASE - don't hang around, these are ALL the remaining original left-over stock from 42 years ago, once they've gone, they've gone!