"Time" is a song by English singer-songwriter

David Bowie David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, he is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the ...

. Written in

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

Ziggy Stardust Tour, it was recorded in London in January 1973 and released as the opening track on side two of the album ''

Aladdin Sane ''Aladdin Sane'' is the sixth studio album by English musician David Bowie, released on 20April 1973 through RCA Records. The follow-up to his breakthrough '' The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars'' (1972), it was the ...

'' that April. An edited version of the song supplanted the release of the single " Drive-In Saturday" in the United States, Canada and Japan. It was also released in France and South Africa, while early Spanish copies of '' David Live'' included a free copy of the single.

Production and style

The piece has been described as "

burlesque A burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects.

vamp", and compared to the

cabaret Cabaret is a form of theatrical entertainment featuring music, song, dance, recitation, or drama. The performance venue might be a pub, a casino, a hotel, a restaurant, or a nightclub with a stage for performances. The audience, often dinin ...

music of

Jacques Brel Jacques Romain Georges Brel (, ; 8 April 1929 – 9 October 1978) was a Belgian singer and actor who composed and performed literate, thoughtful, and theatrical songs that generated a large, devoted following—initially in Belgium and France, l ...

and

Bertolt Brecht Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known professionally as Bertolt Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a ...

Kurt Weill Kurt Julian Weill (March 2, 1900April 3, 1950) was a German-born American composer active from the 1920s in his native country, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for his fru ...

. Keyboardist

Mike Garson Michael David Garson (born July 29, 1945) is an American pianist, who has worked with David Bowie, Nine Inch Nails, St. Vincent, Duran Duran, Free Flight and The Smashing Pumpkins. Early career Garson went to Lafayette High School in Brookl ...

said that he employed "the old stride piano style from the 20s and I mixed it up with

avant-garde jazz Avant-garde jazz (also known as avant-jazz and experimental jazz) is a style of music and improvisation that combines avant-garde art music and composition with jazz. It originated in the early 1950s and developed through to the late 1960s. Orig ...

styles plus it had the element of show music, plus it was very European." Co-producer

Ken Scott Ken Scott (born 20 April 1947) is a British record producer and engineer known for being one of the five main engineers for the Beatles, as well as engineering Elton John, Pink Floyd, Procol Harum, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Duran Duran, the Jeff B ...

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 Michael Ronson (26 May 1946 – 29 April 1993) was an English musician, songwriter, arranger, and producer. He achieved critical and commercial success working with David Bowie as the guitarist of the Spiders from Mars. He was a session music ...

launched into his cacophonous solo. The song's best-known couplet is "Time – he flexes like a whore / Falls wanking to the floor";

RCA The RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded as the Radio Corporation of America in 1919. It was initially a patent pool, patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Westin ...

allowed it to remain in the US single edit, being unfamiliar with the British term " wanking". However, when Bowie came to perform the song on the U.S. television special ''

The 1980 Floor Show The 1980 Floor Show was a rock musical spectacle featuring English rock musician David Bowie as the protagonist, held at the Marquee Club in Soho, London, on October 18–20, 1973. It was broadcast in the United States by NBC on November 16, ...

'' in August 1973, he slurred the line in such a way as to render it "Falls ''swanking'' to the floor.""Time" at The Ziggy Stardust Companion
/ref> 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 New York Dolls were an American rock band formed in New York City in 1971. Along with the Velvet Underground and the Stooges, they were one of the first bands of the early punk rock scenes. Although the band never achieved much commercial suc ...

. Artist Tanja Stark suggests the infamous lyric may be a cryptic allusion to ‘Chronos’, the ancient Greek personification of 'Time' who was associated with 'magical semen', due to Bowie's well known fascination with mythology and esoterica. David Bowie said of the song "I’ve written a new song on the new album which is just called ‘Time’, and I thought it was about time, and I wrote very heavily about time, and the way I felt about time – at times – and I played it back after we recorded it and my God, it was a gay song! And I’d no intention of writing anything at all gay. When I’d listened to it back I just could not believe it. I thought well, that’s the strangest…"

Reception

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 Charles Shaar Murray (born Charles Maximillian Murray; 27 June 1951) is an English music journalist and broadcaster. He has worked on the ''New Musical Express'' and many other magazines and newspapers, and has been interviewed for a number of ...

have described the words as sounding "strained and incomplete", concluding that "with such a weak lyric, the overly melodramatic music sounds faintly absurd".

Track listing

All tracks written by

. # "Time" – 3:38 # "

The Prettiest Star "The Prettiest Star" is a song by English musician David Bowie, originally released on 6 March 1970 through Mercury Records as the follow-up single to " Space Oddity". A love song for his soon-to-be wife Angie, it was recorded in Janu ...

" – 3:27 The Japanese release featured " Panic in Detroit" on the B-side.

Personnel

According to Chris O'Leary: *

– lead and backing vocals, 12-string acoustic guitar, production *

– lead and rhythm guitars, backing vocals *

Trevor Bolder Trevor Bolder (9 June 1950 – 21 May 2013) was an English rock musician, songwriter and record producer. He is best known for his long association with Uriah Heep and his tenure with the Spiders from Mars, the backing band for David Bowie, a ...

– bass * Mick Woodmansey – drums *

– piano * Brian "Bux" Wilshaw – flute *

– production

Live versions

* It was recorded at the farewell concert at the

Hammersmith Odeon The Hammersmith Apollo, currently called the Eventim Apollo for sponsorship reasons, and formerly known as the Hammersmith Odeon, is a live entertainment performance venue, originally built as a cinema called the Gaumont Palace. Located in Ham ...

, London, on , later released on '' Ziggy Stardust: The Motion Picture''. * The live version recorded for ''The 1980 Floor Show'' on was released on the semi-legal album '' Rarestonebowie'' in 1994. * A live version from the first leg of the Diamond Dogs Tour was released as a bonus track on the

Rykodisc Rykodisc is an American record label owned by Warner Music Group, operating as a unit of WMG's Independent Label Group and is distributed through Alternative Distribution Alliance. History Claiming to be the first CD-only independent record la ...

release of '' David Live'' in 1990. The 2005 reissue of ''David Live'' inserted "Time" into its correct position in the concert track listing. * A live recording from the second leg of the same tour was released in 2017 on '' Cracked Actor (Live Los Angeles '74)''. * The song was performed live during the Glass Spider Tour, released on the '' Glass Spider'' (1988) concert video, and appeared again on the 2007 Special Edition (recorded at the Montreal Olympic Stadium on 30 August 1987).

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 ''

– 30th Anniversary Edition'', in 2003, and on ''Re:Call 1'', part of the ''

Five Years (1969–1973) ''Five Years (1969–1973)'' is a box set by English singer-songwriter David Bowie, released in September 2015. The period of Bowie's career from 1969 to 1973 is summarised over twelve discs and thirteen LP record, LPs. Exclusive to the box s ...

'' boxed set, in 2015.

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) * Momus – '' Turpsycore'' (2015) *

Rozz Williams Rozz Williams (born Roger Alan Painter; November 6, 1963 – April 1, 1998) was an American singer and songwriter known for his work with the bands Christian Death, Shadow Project (with musician Eva O), and the industrial project Premature Ejac ...

– Live recording *

J. G. Thirlwell James George Thirlwell (born 29 January 1960), also known as Clint Ruin, Frank Want, and Foetus (band), Foetus, among other names, is an Australian musician, composer, and record producer. He is known for Juxtaposition, juxtaposing a variety o ...

sampled the lines 'Wanking' and 'Falls wanking to the floor' for 'Self Destruction, Final', his remix of

Nine Inch Nails Nine Inch Nails, commonly abbreviated as NIN and stylized as NIИ, is an American industrial rock band formed in Cleveland in 1988. Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Trent Reznor was the only permanent member of the ban ...

' ' Mr. Self Destruct', which appears in '' Further Down the Spiral'' (1995)

Notes

References

Sources

* * * * {{Authority control 1973 singles David Bowie songs Songs written by David Bowie Song recordings produced by Ken Scott Song recordings produced by David Bowie LGBT-related songs