Time (David Bowie song)

Time (David Bowie song)

Infobox Single
Name = Time


Caption =
Artist = David Bowie
from Album = Aladdin Sane
A-side =
B-side = "The Prettiest Star"
Released = start date|1973|04|13 cite web |author= |url=http://www.5years.com/aladdin.htm |title=Aladdin Sane (1973) |work=The Ziggy Stardust Companion |accessdate=2008-07-10 ] (US)
Format = 7" single
Recorded = Trident Studios, London
9 December 1972
24 January 1973
Genre = Glam rock
Length = 3:38 (7" single edit)
5:14 (Full-length album version)
Label = RCA 0007 (US)
Writer = David Bowie
Producer = Ken Scott, David Bowie
Certification =
Chart position = Did not chart
Last single = "Drive-In Saturday"
(1973)
This single = "Time"
(1973)
Next single = "Let's Spend the Night Together"
(1973)
Misc = Extra tracklisting
Type = Studio
Album = Aladdin Sane
prev_track = "Cracked Actor"
prev_no = 5
this_track = "Time"
track_no = 6
next_track = "The Prettiest Star"
next_no = 7
"Time" is a song written by David Bowie in New Orleans in November 1972 during the American leg of his first Ziggy Stardust tour. It was released as the opening track on Side Two of the album "Aladdin Sane" in April 1973. An edited version of the song supplanted the release of the single "Drive-In Saturday" in the United States and Japan. [ [http://www.5years.com/aladdin.htm "Aladdin Sane" at The Ziggy Stardust Companion] ]

The piece has been described as "burlesque vamp", [Kris Needs (1983). "Bowie: A Celebration": p.29] and compared to the cabaret music of Jacques Brel and Bertolt Brecht/Kurt Weill.Ben Gerson (19 July 1973). [http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/davidbowie/albums/album/283449/review/6067692 "Rolling Stone" review of "Aladdin Sane"] ] Keyboardist Mike Garson said that he employed "the old stride piano style from the 20s and I mixed it up with avant-garde jazz styles plus it had the element of show music, plus it was very European."David Buckley (1999) "Strange Fascination - David Bowie: The Definitive Story": pp.185-187] Co-producer Ken Scott took credit for the idea of mixing the sound of Bowie's breathing right up front when the music paused, just before guitarist Mick Ronson launched into his cacophonous solo.

The song's best-known couplet is "Time - he flexes like a whore / Falls wanking to the floor"; RCA allowed it to remain in the US single edit, being unfamiliar with the meaning of the British term "wanking".Nicholas Pegg (2000). "The Complete David Bowie": p.218] However when Bowie came to perform the song on the US television special "The 1980 Floor Show" in August 1973, he slurred the line in such a way as to render it "Falls "swanking" to the floor". [http://www.5years.com/encyt.htm "Time" at The Ziggy Stardust Companion] ] Conversely, RCA cut the line "In quaaludes and red wine" from the single, while Bowie retained it for "The 1980 Floor Show". The phrase "Billy Dolls" refers to Billy Murcia, late drummer for the New York Dolls.

Like its parent album, "Time" has divided critical opinion. Biographer David Buckley calls the full-length version "five minutes of wired perfection" and the lyrics "poetic and succinct", while "NME" critics Roy Carr and Charles Shaar Murray have described the words as sounding "strained and incomplete", concluding that "with such a weak lyric, the overly melodramatic music sounds faintly absurd".Roy Carr & Charles Shaar Murray (1981). "Bowie: An Illustrated Record": pp.54-55]

Track listing

# "Time" (Bowie) – 3:38
# "The Prettiest Star" (Bowie) – 3:27

The Japanese release featured "Panic in Detroit" on the B-side.

Production credits

* Producers:
** Ken Scott
** David Bowie

* Musicians:
** David Bowie: vocals, guitar
** Mick Ronson: guitar
** Trevor Bolder: bass
** Mick Woodmansey: drums
** Ken Fordham: saxophone
** Mike Garson: piano

Live versions

* It was recorded at the farewell concert at the Hammersmith Odeon, London, on start date|1973|7|3, later released on "Ziggy Stardust - The Motion Picture".
* The live version recorded for "The 1980 Floor Show" on start date|1973|10|20 was released on the semi-legal album "RarestOneBowie" in 1994.
* A live version from the 1974 "Diamond Dogs" tour was released as a bonus track on the Rykodisc release of "David Live" in 1990. The 2004 reissue of "David Live" inserted "Time" into its correct position in the concert track listing.
* Another live recording from the 1974 tour was released on the semi-legal album "A Portrait in Flesh".

Other releases

*It appeared on the Japanese compilation "The Best of David Bowie".
*The single edit of the song was released on the bonus disc of the "Aladdin Sane - 30th Anniversary Edition" in 2003.

Cover versions

* Cinema Strange - "Goth Oddity - A Tribute to David Bowie" (1999)
* David J's Cabaret Obscura - ".2 Contamination: A Tribute to David Bowie" (2006)
* Hazel O'Connor - Single
* Rozz Williams - Live recording

Notes

References

Pegg, Nicholas, "The Complete David Bowie", Reynolds & Hearn Ltd, 2000, ISBN 1-903111-14-5


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