As we get ready for another host of rarities and re-releases set to be on their way for Record Store Day 2018, which comes on April 21st, we’ve just got news of three releases they’re all David Bowie and they’re all limited edition.
The first is a 3 x 12″ set Welcome to the Blackout (Live in London 1978) and it holds a whole host of secrets. The previously unreleased set offers fans a chance to listen back on history as we dive in to Bowie’s Isolla II tour and re-visit his dates at London’s Earls Court from’1978.
Welcome to the Blackout, a triple live album taken from Bowie’s Isolar II World Tour in 1978, to promote Low and “Heroes”. The singer ended the second, European leg of the tour with a trio of sold-out gigs at Earls Court in London from June into July, and while RCA’s mobile truck was on hand to record the dates, it was ultimately the live compilation Stage that became the first representation of the tour for mass audiences. Bowie and David Richards did, however, mix the tapes into a potential project in Montreux, Switzerland in the winter of 1979; that arrangement from the June 30th and July 1st shows is Welcome to the Blackout.
The performance features Bowie’s expanded band, with core members Carlos Alomar (rhythm guitar, George Murray (bass) and Dennis Davis (drums) joined by heavy-hitters including Adrian Belew on guitar, Hawkwind’s Simon House on electric violin, Utopia’s Roger Powell on keyboards and Sean Mayes on piano and string ensemble. (This band would follow Bowie to Montreux for the recording of Lodger in 1979.) None of this material has ever appeared on a Bowie-sanctioned release, although “Sound and Vision” (making its live debut) ended up on the unofficial 1995 collection RarestOneBowie.
The next is a 12″ single which features the full first recording of ‘Let’s Dance’ as well as a live version of the song. The final release is Bowie Now a previously only promotional album, only for the US, which is getting it’s first commercial release. It will feature tracks from both Low and Heroes .
The Bowie camp celebrated David’s birthday in 2018 with the digital unveiling of his original demo to the smash hit “Let’s Dance.” A longer version of that demo, as newly mixed by original producer Nile Rodgers, will make its physical debut for RSD on a new 12″ single. It’ll be paired with a rare live version of the same song, mixed by Bob Clearmountain and featured on the Serious Moonlight concert film.
finally, for rarity seekers and fans of Bowie’s Berlin trilogy, the 1978 promo album Bowie Now gets its first commercial reissue. This disc features album tracks from Low and “Heroes,” all sourced from Tony Visconti’s remasters of the albums as featured in last year’s box set A New Career In a New Town. The package is expanded to feature a new inner sleeve with a rarely seen image of the singer in Berlin in 1977.
The Releases
Welcome To The Blackout (Live London ’78) – 3 x LP unreleased live set
~ Let’s Dance (Full-length) – 12” single featuring full length version of the demo and live version
~ Bowie Now – White vinyl LP issue of US promo only compilation with new interior artwork –
The Fat Angel Sings 