A sequel to the 2015 box
Five Years 1969-1973, 2016's
Who Can I Be Now? (1974-1976) covers just three years but this stretch in the mid-'70s happens to be the peak of
David Bowie's superstardom. That much can be gleaned from the number of albums within the set: three studio albums --
Diamond Dogs,
Young Americans,
Station to Station, each released in a subsequent year -- along with the double live album
David Live from 1974. Four albums in three years is plenty but to that core canon
Who Can I Be Now? adds five additional alternate albums, each with varying degrees of rarities. There are full latter-day remixes of
David Live and
Station to Station -- the former from 2005, the latter from 2010 -- the concert album
Live Nassau Coliseum '76, which was added to the super deluxe 2010 reissue of
Station to Station, a bonus disc of single edits and stray songs entitled
Re:Call, plus an early version of
Young Americans called
The Gouster. The latter seems to bend the rules of this extensive
Bowie catalog reissue project, which is to preserve the officially released canon and keep unreleased tracks -- whether they surfaced on the '90s
Rykodisc reissues or remain unheard -- locked up in the vaults.
The Gouster contains "Who Can I Be Now?" and "It's Gonna Be Me," both originally released on the 1990
Ryko edition of
Young Americans, along with alternate versions of "Can You Hear Me?" and "Right," plus the disco version of "John, I'm Only Dancing," but otherwise it plays like
Young Americans, only not quite as good. Furthermore, its presence calls into question why the unreleased outtake "Shilling the Rubes" is left behind alongside the "Dodo" that showed up on the
Ryko CD of
Diamond Dogs: if the door is opened for some outtakes, it's hard not to miss those that are absent. Still, this is quibbling. The
Who Can I Be Now? box set remains as beautifully produced as
Five Years, and a deep dive into its contents produces many rewards. Perhaps the alternate album mixes are only slightly different, but it's hard not to be impressed by the rapid development of
Bowie's music during these three years. The distance between
Diamond Dogs and
Station to Station is vast, and the addition of the live albums accentuates how deeply he cared for strong, deeply etched funk to offset his art. Listening to all this music in a concentrated blast, such progression is a wonder to behold. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine
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