Pin Ups

By 1973, David Bowie was at his commercial peak. At the end of July, five of his six albums were in the top 40 and three were in the top 15, according to biographer David Buckley, an "unprecedented feat" for a solo artist.[2] Bowie's most recent LP, Aladdin Sane, came out in April,[3] but his label, RCA Records, wanted a new album by Christmas. Having just completed the Ziggy Stardust Tour, Bowie was exhausted from the extensive touring schedule. His manager at the time, Tony Defries, was negotiating for larger royalties with Bowie's music publisher and recommended he not record any new compositions until negotiations were finished.[4] Although he had intended his next project to be an adaptation of George Orwell's 1949 novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, he devised a record of cover versions as a "stopgap" album.[2]

On the final day of the tour, 3 July 1973, Bowie unexpectedly announced that "this is the last show we'll ever do". Although this was later understood to mean that Bowie was retiring the Ziggy Stardust character, the announcement came as a surprise to the audience, as well as the Spiders from Mars' members Trevor Bolder and Woody Woodmansey, who were not notified in advance of the speech.[2] This created tension between the two and Bowie.[5] They were further aggravated when they found out Mike Garson, who played piano on Aladdin Sane, was being paid a bigger wage than the Spiders, who were being paid the same amount as they were from before Bowie's stardom.[2] Garson subsequently informed Woodmansey over the phone that his services were no longer required.[5] Garson and Mick Ronson were guaranteed positions on the new album, alongside Aladdin Sane players Ken Fordham and Geoffrey MacCormack. Session drummer Aynsley Dunbar replaced Woodmansey and Bolder was invited back after bassist Jack Bruce of the band Cream declined.[5]

According to biographer Nicholas Pegg, Pin Ups was Bowie's tribute to bands that had inspired him as a teenager. Bowie later explained: "These are all bands which I used to go and hear play down the Marquee between 1964 and 1967. I've got all these records back at home."[5] According to biographer Chris O'Leary, he chose the tracks by "going through a stack of 45s in his rooms at the Hyde Park Hotel before leaving for France".[4] Musician Scott Richardson,[6] a Pretty Things fan, convinced Bowie to cover two of their songs. Other artists selected included the Yardbirds, the Kinks, Pink Floyd and the Who, all of whom O'Leary cites as actual influences on Bowie's music.[4] The final tracklist included the Pretty Things' "Rosalyn" and "Don't Bring Me Down", Them's "Here Comes the Night", Pink Floyd's "See Emily Play", the Mojos' "Everything's Alright", the Yardbirds' "Shapes of Things" and their rendition of Billy Boy Arnold's "I Wish You Would", the Easybeats' "Friday on My Mind", the Merseys' "Sorrow", the Who's "I Can't Explain" and "Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere", and the Kinks' "Where Have All the Good Times Gone".[4][7][8] Bowie had also considered re-recording his 1966 single "The London Boys" but the idea was discarded.[5] Rather than provide new arrangements for the tracks, the songs on Pin Ups stay true to the originals, albeit performed in glam rock and proto-punk styles.[9][10] Regarding this, Bowie explained: "We just took down the basic chord structures and worked from there ... Some of them don't even need any working on – like 'Rosalyn' for example. But most of the arranging I have done by myself and Mick, and Aynsley too."[5] Author Peter Doggett writes that only two tracks, "I Wish You Would" and "See Emily Play", contained varied arrangements from the originals.[7]

Pin Ups was recorded at the Château d'Hérouville in Hérouville, France, and lasted for three weeks,[7][11] from July to August 1973.[6][12] Having just recorded the album Tanx there, T. Rex frontman Marc Bolan recommended the studio to Bowie. The Château had also become popularised after Elton John recorded his 1972 album Honky Château there.[lower-alpha 2][5][13] It was co-produced by Bowie and Ken Scott and marked the final collaboration between the two.[14] O'Leary writes that rehearsing consisted of playing the band the original track a few times before recording began.[4] Tensions were high during the sessions. Bolder, believing he was unwanted, recorded his bass parts quickly and departed. Meanwhile, Richardson recalled Ronson overworking himself: "He did everything in the studio, he tuned everybody's instruments, he worked on all the arrangements ... [he had] a tremendous burden on him"; he also grew wary of his future after the collapse of the Spiders. Scott was facing personal issues on top of pressure from his management company to leave over MainMan not paying him royalties, while Bowie had, in O'Leary's words, an "increasingly remote and truculent attitude in the studio".[4]

A version of the Velvet Underground's "White Light/White Heat" was recorded during the sessions. It was never released; Bowie donated the backing track to Ronson for his 1975 solo album Play Don't Worry.[15] The Beach Boys' "God Only Knows" was also attempted during the sessions, but was left abandoned. Bowie would later cover it for the aborted Astronettes project in October 1973, while he officially covered it for 1984's Tonight.[16] The sessions were put on hold on 16 July for the recording of Scottish singer Lulu's covers of Bowie's tracks "Watch That Man" and "The Man Who Sold the World". The Pin Ups personnel contributed to the recording, including Bowie, Ronson, Garson, Bolder and Dunbar.[5][11]

Pin Ups was the first of two "1960s nostalgia" albums that Bowie had planned to release. The second would have contained Bowie covering his favourite American artists, but was never recorded. Rumoured tracks to have appeared for the project include the Stooges' "No Fun", the Lovin' Spoonful's "Summer in the City" and Roxy Music's "Ladytron".[5] Bowie also considered making a Pin Ups sequel: he had compiled a list of songs he wanted to cover, some of which showed up on his later releases of Heathen (2002) and Reality (2003).[17]

English model Twiggy (pictured in 1971) appears on the cover of Pin Ups with Bowie.

The cover photo for Pin Ups reflected the theme of swinging London by featuring 1960s supermodel Twiggy, who had previously been name-checked on Aladdin Sane's "Drive-In Saturday" as "Twig the Wonder Kid". The photo was taken midway through the sessions at a Paris studio by her then-manager and partner Justin de Villeneuve; he recalled in 2010: "Twiggy and I had first heard David mention her on Aladdin Sane ... We loved the album so much I called David and asked him if he would like to do a shoot with Twiggy. He jumped at the idea." Twiggy recalled in her autobiography In Black and White that she was "really quite nervous" meeting Bowie, but "he immediately put me at ease. He was everything I could have hoped for and more". During the shoot, Bowie and Twiggy had different skin tones, partially attributed to the latter just returning from holiday in California. The problem was solved by returning Aladdin Sane make-up designer Pierre Laroche, who used make-up masks to balance the tones out. Twiggy found the final result "enigmatic and strange", later calling it one of her favourite images and "possibly the most widely distributed photograph ever taken of me." The photo was originally slated to appear in Vogue magazine. Twiggy stated that the photo was met with apprehension from Vogue, who didn't want a man appearing on their front cover, so Bowie opted to use it as the album cover instead; de Villeneuve later recalled Vogue being infuriated by the decision.[5][8][18]

The original LP's rear sleeve featured two photos by photographer Mick Rock, one of a concert shot from the Ziggy tour and another of Bowie wearing a double-breasted suit cradling a saxophone. Bowie wrote in the book Moonage Daydream: "I chose the performance photos for the back cover as they were favourite Rock shots of mine. I also did the back cover layout with the colour combination of red writing on blue as it again hinted at Sixties psychedelia."[5][8] A discarded idea for the sleeve came from photographer Alan Motz, who told Sandford that he "wanted to shoot Bowie metamorphosing into an animal". This idea would be used for Bowie's next album, Diamond Dogs (1974).[19]

RCA issued the lead single "Sorrow", featuring a cover of Jacques Brel's "Amsterdam" as the B-side,[8][20] on 12 October 1973;[21] it had been delayed from its original release date of 28 September.[8] The single was a commercial success, peaking at number three on the UK Singles Chart[4] and stayed on the chart for 15 weeks, becoming one of his biggest hits.[2] Pin Ups followed suit a week later on 19 October,[8][22] issued with the catalogue number RS 1003,[5] only six months after his previous album Aladdin Sane.[6] On the album sleeve, Bowie was simply referred to as "Bowie". In America, the advertising campaign read: "Pin Ups means favourites, and these are Bowie's favourite songs. It's the kind of music your parents will never let you play loud enough!"[5] The album's release coincided with former Roxy Music singer Bryan Ferry's covers album These Foolish Things.[4][6] As Ferry had recorded his album weeks before Bowie began work on Pin Ups, Ferry was annoyed at the perceived copying of his project, calling it a "rip-off". According to Sandford, he allegedly went to his label Island Records to request they file an injunction to prevent Pin Ups from being released before These Foolish Things.[19] Instead, O'Leary writes that Bowie phoned Ferry to inform him of Pin Ups and requested permission to record a Roxy Music song.[4] Ferry later told Buckley, "At first I was a bit apprehensive, but Bowie's record turned out to be very different. I myself was always very anxious to be different from other people ... and to forge my own furrow."[2] In the event, both albums were released as planned and charted on the same day,[7] 3 November 1973.[19]

In the UK, Pin Ups came at the height of Bowie's popularity there. The album had advance copies of 150,000, which was 50,000 more than Aladdin Sane.[2] Upon release, it spent 39 weeks on the UK Albums Chart and peaked at number one, remaining there for five weeks,[23] matching the performance of Aladdin Sane.[5] It brought the total number of Bowie albums concurrently on the UK chart to six.[19] In the US, the album peaked at number 23 on the Billboard Top LPs & Tape chart and remained on the chart for 21 weeks.[24] O'Leary writes that Pin Ups was essentially a "new Bowie album" in America since only three of the original tracks that were released as singles had reached the top 40.[4] Sandford writes that by Christmas 1973, the album was selling 30,000 copies a week.[19] Upon release of the massive commercially successful Let's Dance (1983), Pin Ups returned to the UK chart again,[25] peaking at number 57.[5]

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[22]
Christgau's Record Guide	B−[26]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[27]
MusicHound	3/5[28]
Pitchfork	5.9/10[29]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide	[30]
Select	2/5[31]
Spin Alternative Record Guide	4/10[32]

Pin Ups received primarily negative reviews from music critics on release, with many criticising the songs as generally inferior to their original counterparts. In Rolling Stone, Greg Shaw was unfavorable, writing, "Although many of the tracks are excellent, none stands up to the originals."[33] He further believed that all the tracks were underproduced and believed Bowie's vocal performance to be the album's "true failure", believing his "excessively mannered voice" was "a ridiculously weak mismatch for the material" and that they were mixed too high to give the tracks the "edge" or "punch" they need to be effective.[33] He concludes his review by saying, "while Pin Ups may be a failure, it is also a collection of great songs, most of which are given a more than adequate, and always loving, treatment. Maybe the fairest conclusion to draw is that Bowie can't sing any other way, did the best he could, and the result isn't all that bad."[33]

In the NME, music critic Ian MacDonald expressed similar sentiments. He felt that by not differentiating the songs from the originals, it doesn't give much value to the covers. He ultimately agreed that the record failed to live up to expectations and predicted: "Unless he puts a banger under his own behind, I can foresee nothing but artistic frustration for Bowie in the next few years."[34] A writer for Sounds magazine also reacted negatively, declaring that Bowie "used R&B as a prop, not a springboard".[5] In Christgau's Record Guide, veteran critic Robert Christgau found the idea of the record good, but its overall execution subpar.[26] On the other hand, Billboard responded positively, stating that, "there's humor in this music if you want to take it as a look back in musical time."[5] Robert Hilburn was also positive in the Los Angeles Times. Describing it as a "light, unpretentious, high-spirited album", he hailed Pin Ups as "one of the year's most inviting albums" and one that deserves special attention.[35]

Retrospectively, Pin Ups continues to receive mixed-to-negative reactions. When reviewing the album as part of the 2015 box set Five Years (1969–1973), Douglas Wolk of Pitchfork was unfavorable. Although he believed the album was "more interesting in theory", he found that the execution was sloppy, believing that all the original versions were "vastly" superior and Bowie added nothing interesting to any of them. He further believed that it didn't help that the Spiders from Mars were falling apart when recording it.[29] Bruce Eder of AllMusic similarly found the album to be out of place with Bowie's output up to that point.[22] He continued, "Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane had established Bowie as perhaps the most fiercely original of all England's glam rockers, so an album of covers didn't make any sense and was especially confusing for American fans," further criticising the song choices as unknown. However, Eder went on to praise Bowie's cover of "Sorrow", arguing that it's a "distinct improvement" over the original.[22]

Retrospectively, Bowie's biographers have given Pin Ups mixed reactions. Buckley describes it as "uneven but beloved by many".[2] O'Leary attributes its "scattershot feel" and "lack of a coherent style" to the dysfunctional nature of its recording,[4] while Sandford acknowledges the album's lack of originality in the song arrangements.[19] Doggett calls Pin Ups "an exercise in Pop Art", meaning it was "a reproduction and interpretation of work by [another artist], intended for a mass audience".[7] James Perone, on the other hand, argues that Pin Ups predated the release of covers album by other English artists, such as John Lennon with Rock 'n' Roll (1975) and Elvis Costello with Almost Blue (1981) and Kojak Variety (1995).[36] Perone also recognises the album's musical influence, stating that Bowie's version of "Here Comes the Night" was a forerunner in the post-punk and new wave sound of the late 1970s and early 1980s, presaging songs such as Culture Club's "Karma Chameleon" (1983).[36] Furthermore, he contests that "Here Comes the Night" foreshadowed the soul oriented directions of Young Americans (1975) and Station to Station (1976), while "See Emily Play" evokes the avant-garde experimentations of the artist's late 1970s Berlin Trilogy.[36]

Some biographers have analysed the album as an experiment in nostalgia, which Doggett states "was already emerging as one of the dominant themes of the early seventies".[7] Furthermore, Pegg writes that "it remains perhaps glam rock's most cogent expression of its own inherent nostalgia, an affectionate reminder of the process that had led to the charts of 1973."[5] Meanwhile, Buckley states that the album "began an era of pop archeology" and that it "came at a time of uncertainty, a time when many cast backward glances as pop entered its first retroactive phase".[2] In the Spin Alternative Record Guide, critic Rob Sheffield agreed, characterising the album's "Swinging London oldies" as "atrophied nostalgia".[37]

In 2013, in a ranking of Bowie's albums up to that point, Gabriela Claymore of Stereogum placed Pin Ups at number 18 (out of 25), calling it "The only one of Bowie's '70s records you can safely call 'inessential'. She felt it was out of place coming off of Aladdin Sane, but nevertheless stated, "For what it is, it's quite good".[10] Following Bowie's death in 2016, Bryan Wawzenek of Ultimate Classic Rock ranked all of his 26 studio albums from worst to best, placing Pin Ups at number 21. He praised the song choices as "excellent", describing "Sorrow" as the highlight. However, he found that Bowie went "way, way, way over the top" on every other track. He concluded by stating: "In spite of all the effort, Pin Ups remains a slight affair."[38] In the context of Bowie's entire career, Eder views Pin Ups as an artistic statement, in that it represented a "swan song" for the Spiders from Mars and an "interlude" between the first and second phases of his international career, with his next album Diamond Dogs being the end of his glam rock era: "It's not a bad bridge between the two, and it has endured across the decades."[22]

Despite mixed reactions overall, some publications have praised Pin Ups as a covers album, calling it one of the finest in the genre. Pierre Perrone of The Independent and the writers of NME would classify Pin Ups as one of the best cover albums in 2013 and 2019, respectively, with the former describing it as "[t]he covers album that launched a thousand copycats."[9][39] Nevertheless, Eder states that today it is still dismissed by many as just another covers album,[22] including Wolk, who in 2015 described it as "quick-and-sloppy".[29]

Songs marked with a * were not recorded for the first time by the acts listed, but were popularised by them.

Album credits per the Pin Ups liner notes and biographer Nicholas Pegg.[5][1]

• David Bowie – vocals, guitar, tenor and alto saxophone, harmonica, arrangements, backing vocals, Moog synthesiser
• Mick Ronson – guitar, piano, vocals, arrangements
• Trevor Bolder – bass guitar
• Aynsley Dunbar – drums
• Mike Garson – piano, organ, harpsichord, electric piano
• Ken Fordham – baritone saxophone
• G. A. MacCormack – backing vocals

Production

• David Bowie – producer
• Ken Scott – producer
• Dennis MacKay – engineer
• Andy Scott – engineer

• Pin Ups at Discogs (list of releases)