Return to Base

Asked to name the most influential artist of the rock era, fans and musicians still regularly place David Bowie at the head of the pack. That reputation rests squarely on the astonishing trajectory and restless invention of a dozen albums that blasted off in 1969 with Space Oddity and fell to earth after 1980's Scary Monsters . His every release since then has struggled to escape the G-force of his fans' expectations, be it the wilful dissonance of Tin Machine or the ill-fitting Techno clothes he donned for Earthling (1997).

For his latest, Heathen , Bowie, who admits...