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The Best of Bowie
Greatest hits album by
Released15 December 1980 (1980-12-15)
Recorded1969-1979
Genre Rock
Length58:17
Label K-tel
ProducerDavid Bowie, Gus Dudgeon, Ken Scott, Tony Visconti, Harry Maslin
David Bowie chronology
Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)
(1980)
The Best of Bowie
(1980)
Christiane F.
(1981)
David Bowie compilation chronology
Changesonebowie
(1976)
The Best of Bowie
(1980)
Changestwobowie
(1981)
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic [1]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music [2]

The Best of Bowie is a compilation album by English singer-songwriter David Bowie, released in 1980 by K-tel. The cover was based on the 12-inch single sleeve design of Bowie's " Fashion". [3] It made No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart.

In addition to including the rare 7" edits of "Fame" and "Golden Years", the compilation contains unique edits of "Life on Mars?" and "Diamond Dogs", ostensibly to allow all 16 tracks to fit on one LP. Early copies of the LP had a sticker on the back cover showing the track listing. If the sticker was removed, the original track listing could be seen, showing " Drive-In Saturday" (from Aladdin Sane, 1973) as track 7 in place of the live version of "Breaking Glass", which explains the latter's appearance out of chronological sequence here.

Track listing

All songs written by David Bowie, except where noted.

Side one
  1. " Space Oddity" – 5:07
  2. " Life on Mars?" (K-tel edit) – 3:34
  3. " Starman" – 4:07
  4. " Rock 'n' Roll Suicide" – 2:56
  5. " John, I'm Only Dancing" (Sax version) – 2:37
  6. " The Jean Genie" – 4:03
  7. " Breaking Glass" (Live from Stage) (Bowie, Dennis Davis, George Murray) – 3:27
  8. " Sorrow" (Bob Feldman, Jerry Goldstein, Richard Gottehrer) – 2:51
Side two
  1. " Diamond Dogs" (K-tel edit) – 4:36
  2. " Young Americans" – 5:05
  3. " Fame" (Edit) (Bowie, John Lennon, Carlos Alomar) – 3:25
  4. " Golden Years" (Edit) – 3:20
  5. " TVC 15" (Edit) – 3:28
  6. " Sound and Vision" – 3:00
  7. " "Heroes"" (Edit) (Bowie, Brian Eno) – 3:26
  8. " Boys Keep Swinging" (Bowie, Eno) – 3:15

Charts

Chart (1981) Position
Austrian Albums ( Ö3 Austria) [4] 12
Dutch Albums ( Album Top 100) [5] 4
Swedish Albums ( Sverigetopplistan) [6] 25
UK Albums ( OCC) [7] 3

References

  1. ^ Connolly, Dave. Review: Best of David Bowie [K-Tel]. Allmusic. Retrieved on 5 June 2013.
  2. ^ Larkin, Colin (2011). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (5th concise ed.). Omnibus Press.
  3. ^ Roy Carr & Charles Shaar Murray (1981). Bowie: An Illustrated Record: pp.114-115
  4. ^ "Austriancharts.at – David Bowie – The Best of Bowie" (in German). Hung Medien.
  5. ^ "Dutchcharts.nl – David Bowie – The Best of Bowie" (in Dutch). Hung Medien.
  6. ^ "Swedishcharts.com – David Bowie – The Best of Bowie". Hung Medien.
  7. ^ "Official Albums Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company.