Historia de la Musica Rock 4
	previously released material
	Released on 1981
	no chart information
	Find it at GEMM
9-47 002 cover

D ecca has sliced and diced these early Bowie tracks in so many guises it’s hard to keep tabs on them all. Track for track, this is identical to Another Face; it’s conceivable that Decca simply put a new label on the same piece of vinyl and packaged it as part of their Historia de la Musica Rock series (Bowie being the fourth in this series) for Spanish consumers. So if you’re not a Bowie collector, you might feel the need to move on. However, Bowiephiles will certainly want these early songs in some form or another, and this product is as good a way as any to hear them. Historia mixes tracks from the Love You Till Tuesday album with contemporaneous singles, tossing in an old bone with Bowie’s first single as David Jones and The King Bees, “Liza Jane” b/w “Louie, Louie, Go Home.” That single is little more than a fuzzy curio, not quite up to the standards of The Kinks’ earliest kuts, but it’s a kindness to cash-strapped collectors who might spend more than $100 for the original. Now, for the unusual orange rating. Usually I flag these cash-in compilations as the pitfalls they are, but the sound and selection on this album rises slightly above the rest. Similar to Genesis’ first record (which Decca has also reswizzled beyond recognition), Bowie’s early material could be arresting on occasion. “The London Boys,” “Maid of Bond Street,” “There Is A Happy Land” and “The Laughing Gnome” are appreciably clever, Bowie emerging as an engaging performer and accomplished storyteller. In fact, many of these songs sound as though they were written for the stage, and at the time (1967) Bowie was still in a position to parlay his talents into a successful theatre career. Luckily, he chose music, and the rest is history.

9-47 002 back cover

TRACK LISTING

1. RUBBER BAND    2:15
2. THE LONDON BOYS    3:18
3. THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO TONY DAY    2:50
4. THERE IS A HAPPY LAND    3:11
5. MAID OF BOND STREET    1:44
6. WHEN I LIVE MY DREAM    3:19
7. LIZA JANE    (Conn)    2:14
8. THE LAUGHING GNOME    3:03
9. IN THE HEAT OF THE MORNING    2:45
10. DID YOU EVER HAVE A DREAM    3:45
11. PLEASE MR. GRAVEDIGGER    2:34
12. JOIN THE GANG    2:16
13. LOVE YOU TILL TUESDAY    3:00
14. LOUIE, LOUIE, GO HOME    (Paul Revere/Mark Lindsay)    2:09
    
    All songs written by David Bowie unless noted

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