The principle of In the Can is straight forward. Two tracks have been selected from the same album to go head-to-head, and it’s up to you to decide which is the best. Certain L.P.s have been disqualified due to lack of quality (see Unfit for Human Consumption).

Pre Space Oddity

Space Oddity

The Man Who Sold The World

Hunky Dory

The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars

Aladdin Sane

Diamond Dogs

Young Americans

Station to Station

“Heroes”

Low

Lodger

Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)

Earthling

Hours

Heathen

Reality

Tags: Be my Wife, Big Brother, Black Country Rock, Blackout, Breaking Glass, D.J., Diamond Dogs, Drive in Saturday, Earthling, Fame, Fashion, Hang onto Yourself, Head-to-Head, hours, janine, Let me Sleep Beside You, Life on Mars, Panic in Detroit, Reality, Red Sails, Scary Monsters, station to station, Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed, V-2 Schneider, We are the Dead, Win

Fact!
Mandolins are mentioned in two David Bowie songs. The instruments’ first name check occurs in Wild-eyed boy from Freecloud; the second in Bowie’s perfectly executed, if grandiose, rendition of Dimitri Tiomkin’s Wild is the Wind.

In a staggering coincidence, both songs contain the word ‘wild’ in their titles.

Fact!
A cocaine-fuelled Bowie was once quoted as saying ‘Adolf Hitler was one of the first rock stars’, making David a latter-day genocidal tyrant, who fatally underestimates Russian military strength.

Fact!
David Jones was born on a Wednesday.

Fact!
Bowie shares his birthday, the Eighth of January, with Elvis Presley, but the Burger King of Rock and Roll entered the world on a Tuesday.

Fact!
Though the ‘Duke’ and the ‘King’ never perforned a duet, collaborations with dead singers Marc Bolan, Freddie Mercury, Bing Crosby, and John Lennon do all feature in Bowie’s back-catalogue.

Fact! Bowie’s 1982 composition Cat People (Putting Out Fire) reached the top spot of the Swedish and Norwegian Charts.

Nominate your own Barely Interesting Fact!

Tags: Barely Interesting facts, Bowie, Burger King of Rock and Roll, Cat People, Dimitri Tiomkin, Drive in Saturday, Elvis, freecloud, Friday on my Mind, January, Love you til Tuesday, mandolins, Monday, Norway, Sweden, Thursday's Child, Wednesday's Child, Well I might stretch it to Wednesday, Wild-eyed Boy