Changes (David Bowie song)

"Changes" is a song by David Bowie, originally released on the album Hunky Dory in December 1971 and as a single in January 1972. Despite missing the Billboard top 40, "Changes" became one of Bowie's best-known songs. The lyrics are often seen as a manifesto for his chameleonic personality, the frequent change of the world today, and frequent reinventions of his musical style throughout the 1970s. This single is cited as David Bowie's official North American debut, despite the fact that the song "The Man Who Sold the World" was released in North America two years prior. This was the last song Bowie performed live on stage before his retirement from live performances at the end of 2006.

The song ranked number 128 on the Rolling Stone list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. It is one of four of Bowie's songs to be included in The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. On 27 November 2016, the Grammy Hall of Fame announced its induction, along with that of another 24 songs.

It charted for the first time on the UK Singles Chart on 15 January 2016 at number 49 following Bowie's death.

Music and lyrics
Bowie has said that the track "started out as a parody of a nightclub song, a kind of throwaway". The musical arrangement featured the composer's saxophone, Rick Wakeman's keyboards and Mick Ronson's strings, while the stuttering chorus has been compared to The Who.

The lyrics focused on the compulsive nature of artistic reinvention ("Strange fascination, fascinating me / Changes are taking the pace I'm going through") and distancing oneself from the rock mainstream ("Look out, you rock 'n' rollers"). The song has also been interpreted as touting "Modern Kids as a New Race", a theme echoed on the following album track, "Oh! You Pretty Things". Rolling Stone's contemporary review of Hunky Dory considered that "Changes" could be "construed as a young man's attempt to reckon how he'll react when it's his time to be on the maligned side of the generation schism".

Release and aftermath
The composer having agreed to Peter Noone covering "Oh! You Pretty Things", which later commentators have argued was the obvious single from Hunky Dory, "Changes" was chosen for a 45 release in January 1972. Like the album, it generated good reviews but negligible chart action, peaking just outside the US Top 40 and failing in Britain.

The song was a regular feature of Bowie's live performances as Ziggy Stardust in 1972–73, appearing again on the Diamond Dogs tour in 1974 and the Station to Station tour in 1976. According to Bowie, "it turned into this monster that nobody would stop asking for at concerts:  'Dye-vid, Dye-vid – do Changes!'  I had no idea it would become such a popular thing." The song is ranked at number 127 on Rolling Stone magazine's 2004 list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

In 2016, the song was ranked at number 74 by internet radio station WDDF Radio in their first top 76 of the 1970s countdown.

Track listing

 * 1) "Changes" (Bowie) – 3:33
 * 2) "Andy Warhol" (Bowie) – 3:58

Production credits

 * Producer:
 * Ken Scott
 * David Bowie
 * Musicians:
 * David Bowie: vocals, saxophone
 * Mick Ronson: string arrangement, Mellotron
 * Trevor Bolder: bass guitar
 * Mick Woodmansey: drums
 * Rick Wakeman: piano

Live versions

 * Bowie played the song for the BBC's Johnny Walker Lunchtime Show on 22 May 1972. This was broadcast in early June 1972 and eventually released on Bowie at the Beeb in 2000.
 * A performance recorded at Santa Monica Civic Auditorium on 20 October 1972 was released on Santa Monica '72 and Live Santa Monica '72. This version also appeared on the Japanese release of RarestOneBowie.
 * A previously unreleased live version from Boston Music Hall on 1 October 1972 was released in 1989 on the original Sound + Vision box set, but was not included in subsequent versions of this compilation. The same track was issued, however, on the bonus disc of the Aladdin Sane – 30th Anniversary Edition in 2003.
 * A live performance recorded at the Hammersmith Odeon, London, on 3 July 1973 was released on Ziggy Stardust – The Motion Picture in 1983.
 * A live version from the first leg of Bowie's 1974 tour was released on David Live; it was notable for Bowie singing the words "children that you shit on" as opposed to "spit on". This version was also released on the album Rock Concert (Netherlands 1979) and as a B-side of the Spanish version of the single "Knock on Wood". A live recording from the second leg of the 1974 tour (previously available on the unofficial album A Portrait in Flesh) was released in 2017 on Cracked Actor (Live Los Angeles '74).
 * A live performance recorded on 23 March 1976 was included on Live Nassau Coliseum '76, which was released as part of the 2010 reissues of the Station to Station album, on the 2016 collection Who Can I Be Now? (1974–1976), and as a stand–alone album in 2017.
 * A November 2003 live performance from the A Reality Tour is included on the A Reality Tour DVD, released in 2004, as well as the A Reality Tour album, released in 2010.

Other releases
Bowie hit compilations rarely omit "Changes" despite its lack of chart success – indeed, the retrospectives Changesonebowie (1976), Changestwobowie (1981) and Changesbowie (1990) have taken their titles from the song.


 * It has appeared on the following Bowie compilations:
 * The Best of David Bowie (Japan 1974)
 * Changesonebowie (1976)
 * Fame and Fashion (1984)
 * Sound + Vision (1989)
 * Changesbowie (1990)
 * The Singles Collection (1993)
 * The Best of David Bowie 1969/1974 (1997)
 * Best of Bowie (UK, US, Australia 2002)
 * The Platinum Collection (2006)
 * Nothing Has Changed (2014)
 * Bowie Legacy (2016)
 * It was released as the B-side of the UK rerelease of "Space Oddity" in 1975.
 * It appeared on two picture disc sets, Fashion and the RCA Life Time Disc Set.

Cover versions

 * Butterfly Boucher – recorded for the Shrek 2 soundtrack (2004), featuring Bowie on additional vocals.
 * Seu Jorge – a Portuguese version for the film The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou in 2004.
 * Lindsay Lohan has covered the song for the 2004 film Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen.
 * Shawn Mullins – released on The Faculty soundtrack, The First Ten Years and as single in 1998.
 * Piano rock band Jack's Mannequin has performed the song live.
 * Bananarama recorded this song in 1993 with producers Mike Stock and Pete Waterman but never officially released it.
 * The Puppini Sisters released this song on their 2016 album The High Life Their version was also remixed twice by Fill-Y and Martin Kolarides.