The Beatles - Ziggy Stardust and His Band on the Run (1973)
Ziggy Stardust and His Band on the Run was the sequel to Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, and released exactly three months after the latter on July 20, 1973. Recording for the album went about two months after the conclusion of the Spiders from Mars sessions to make way for new song ideas from John Lennon and Paul McCartney that would fit with the concept of the album. David Bowie had written his songs in a very short span of time, fitting with the idea that Bowie's songwriting and and stage presentation was growing at a rapid rate to the point of Lennon and McCartney having a hard time keeping up. Unlike Spiders from Mars, whose two paragraph story was featured prominently on its inner gatefold, there was no such story anywhere on Band on the Run. In fact, it was almost as if the Beatles had given up on the concept somewhere through the recording of the album, a fact McCartney would later confirm simply because they were getting bored of the whole thing. Even to the normal listener, it was clear that there was a story in there, such as the title track being about the band's escape, Walls and Bridges being the escape theme, Out the Blue summing up Ziggy's life on Earth, and Rock 'n' Roll Suicide being about Ziggy's second and final death. In later years, fan would connect the dots by creating their own story in order to keep the album interesting.
The album was received positively by critics and fans, as per usual. However, critics still had the same glaring problem with it that they had had from the previous album: Bowie had too many songs. It was easy to avoid with the previous album since it was a double LP, but now, Bowie had almost half of the songs on a single LP and was now the clear centerpoint of the group, as seen on the front cover, alienating old fans. In retrospect, this would be the last occurrence of this, with Lennon and McCartney asking for their job as leader back after the album's release. In later rereleases, both Ziggy albums would be released as one triple album titled The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. This further connected the second album to the first to make a more cohesive story.
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| Credit to MiketheGibus for making the Band on the Run part of the cover |
Bowie's songs are sourced from Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane. The rest are sourced from Band on the Run, Mind Games, Walls and Bridges, and Ringo. "Walls and Bridges" is "Beef Jerky" from Walls and Bridges.
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| Back cover |
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