David Bowie – Collection (05)

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1 Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed

2 The Width of a Circle

3 Andy Warhol

4 Soul Love

5 Cracked Actor

6 Sweet Thing

7 Somebody Up There Likes Me

8 Word on a Wing

9 Always Crashing in the Same Car

10 Beauty and the Beast

11 Repetition

12 Teenage Wildlife

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There have been so many David Bowie collections that recycle the same overly familiar songs that it's almost refreshing to see that EMI's 2005 compilation The Collection doesn't contain "Space Oddity," "Changes," "Rebel Rebel," "Ziggy Stardust," "Young Americans," "Golden Years," and "Heroes."

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Then, you take a closer look at the track listing, which contains one song from every album from Space Oddity to Scary Monsters: "The Width of a Circle," "Andy Warhol," "Soul Love," "Somebody up There Likes Me," "Word on a Wing," "Beauty and the Beast," "Teenage Wildlife."

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Good songs all, all songs that rarely show up on comps (apart from the Sound + Vision box that is), but not necessarily ones that make for a useful compilation, particularly if this album is for people who are looking to dig deeper than a Best of Bowie disc since these aren't necessarily the best remaining tracks from the rest of the albums.

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Plus, if you're that interested in Bowie album tracks, you'd be better off getting the proper '70s albums, since they range from brilliant to the merely interesting.

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That said, these are good songs, and the album is reasonably entertaining. It's just impossible to tell who this album is for.

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David Bowie - Lodger [79]

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1 Fantastic Voyage

2 African Night Flight
3 Move On
4 Yassassin (Turkish For: Long Live)
5 Red Sails
6 D.J.
7 Look Back in Anger
8 Boys Keep Swinging
9 Repetition
10 Red Money

On the surface, Lodger is the most accessible of the three Berlin-era records David Bowie made with Brian Eno, simply because there are no instrumentals and there are a handful of concise pop songs.

Nevertheless, Lodger is still gnarled and twisted avant pop; what makes it different is how it incorporates such experimental tendencies into genuine songs, something that Low and Heroes purposely avoided.

"D.J.," "Look Back in Anger," and "Boys Keep Swinging" have strong melodic hooks that are subverted and strengthened by the layered, dissonant productions, while the remainder of the record is divided between similarly effective avant pop and ambient instrumentals.

Lodger has an edgier, more minimalistic bent than its two predecessors, which makes it more accessible for rock fans, as well as giving it a more immediate, emotional impact.

It might not stretch the boundaries of rock like Low and Heroes, but it arguably utilizes those ideas in a more effective fashion.

David Bowie - Aladdin Sane (73)

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1 Watch That Man
2 Aladdin Sane (1913-1938-197?)
3 Drive-In Saturday
4 Panic in Detroit
5 Cracked Actor
6 Time
7 The Prettiest Star
8 Let's Spend the Night Together
9 The Jean Genie
10 Lady Grinning Soul

Ziggy Stardust wrote the blueprint for David Bowie's hard-rocking glam, and Aladdin Sane essentially follows the pattern, for both better and worse.

A lighter affair than Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane is actually a stranger album than its predecessor, buoyed by bizarre lounge-jazz flourishes from pianist Mick Garson and a handful of winding, vaguely experimental songs.

Bowie abandons his futuristic obsessions to concentrate on the detached cool of New York and London hipsters, as on the compressed rockers "Watch That Man," "Cracked Actor," and "The Jean Genie.

" Bowie follows the hard stuff with the jazzy, dissonant sprawls of "Lady Grinning Soul," "Aladdin Sane," and "Time," all of which manage to be both campy and avant-garde simultaneously, while the sweepingly cinematic "Drive-In Saturday" is a soaring fusion of sci-fi doo wop and melodramatic teenage glam.

He lets his paranoia slip through in the clenched rhythms of "Panic in Detroit," as well as on his oddly clueless cover of "Let's Spend the Night Together."

For all the pleasures on Aladdin Sane, there's no distinctive sound or theme to make the album cohesive; it's Bowie riding the wake of Ziggy Stardust, which means there's a wealth of classic material here, but not enough focus to make the album itself a classic.