David Bowie - Who Can I Be Now - Non-Album Tracks (1974-1976)

Sometimes, these stray track compilations of mine can be a hodgepodge mainly for die-hard fans of a particular artist. But I think this album of David Bowie's is quite strong. If you like his music, you should grab these mp3 files.

This album covers his 1975 "Young Americans" soul phase for the most part, so it's stylistically consistent. (The last song dates to the 1976 "Station to Station" era.) About half of the songs are covers, but Bowie puts his unique stamp on them. The cover medley "Foot Stompin' - I Wish I Could Shimmy like My Sister Kate" predates his recording of his big hit "Fame," but note how some parts of that hit song can already be heard in this.

In 1976, Bowie lent a very big hand to Iggy Pop. Not only did he produce Pop's album "The Idiot" (which was released in early 1977), but he co-wrote every single song on it. Then he did the same in 1977 for Pop's next album, "The Passenger," writing or co-writing the vast majority of the songs there too. Unfortunately, "Sister Midnight" appears to be the only one of these songs that Bowie did himself in that era. (He would later make a big hit out of the co-write "China Girl," record a version of the co-write "Neightborhood Threat" to his 1984 album "Tonight," and also perform  the co-write "Lust for Life" in concert in 1996.) Perhaps somewhere in some vault there are more recordings of Bowie doing these songs.

This album is 52 minutes long.

UPDATE: On May 18, 2023, I updated the mp3 download file. I found two very rare unreleased Bowie originals, "I Am a Laser (The Gouster)" and "Shilling the Rubes." Bits of these had been floating around the Internet. I had included a partial, edited version of "Shilling the Rubes," with some parts repeated to make it a fuller song. But now I can toss that version away and replace it with the full, unedited version. 

In 2016, an archival box set called "Who Can I Be Now" included an album called "The Gouster" that is an early version of his 1975 album "Young Americans." Sadly, that didn't include either "I Am a Laser (The Gouster)" and "Shilling the Rubes," even though they gave the album the title "The Gouster," which is the subtitle of one of those songs! So, sadly, it seems these two songs will remain unreleased. But at least now we have the full versions with great sound quality.

01 Knock On Wood (David Bowie)
02 Here Today, Gone Tomorrow (David Bowie)
03 Foot Stompin' - I Wish I Could Shimmy like My Sister Kate (David Bowie)
04 Shilling the Rubes (David Bowie)
05 I Am a Laser [The Gouster] (David Bowie)
06 John, I'm Only Dancing Again (David Bowie)
07 It's Hard to Be a Saint in the City (David Bowie)
08 After Today (David Bowie)
09 Who Can I Be Now (David Bowie)
10 It's Gonna Be Me (David Bowie)
11 Sister Midnight (David Bowie)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15240142/DavidB_1974-1976_WhoCnIBeNow_atse.zip.html

For the album cover, I used a 1975 photo of Bowie.