Behind the Album: ‘Hunky Dory,’ David Bowie’s Artistic Masterwork and Commercial Flop

Several songs that loom large in the legend of David Bowie appear on his 1971 album Hunky Dory. In fact, if you just looked at the track list you might assume it was a smash album, when it actually sunk without making much of a dent at the time.

Looking back, it’s clear to hear it now as a major artistic turning point for Bowie. Here is how Hunky Dory came to invigorating life.

Bowie the Songwriter

“Hunky Dory gave me a fabulous groundswell,” said David Bowie in 1997, speaking fondly of the album in an interview with Uncut. “I guess it provided me, for the first time in my life, with an actual audience—I mean, people actually coming up to me and saying, ‘Good album, good songs.’ That hadn’t happened to me before. It was like, ‘Ah, I’m getting it, I’m finding my feet. I’m starting to communicate what I want to do. Now: what is it I want to do?’”

It’s telling that he mentioned “good songs,” because when you break down why Hunky Dory hit differently than his previous records, it boils down to that. Not that he didn’t have excellent songs here and there on the previous three albums. But there clearly existed a greater concentration on getting the material just right this time around before taking it into the studio.

Bowie at the time was even considering focusing on being a songwriter-for-hire, which is why a few of the songs on Hunky Dory were farmed out to others before he recorded them. His commercial prospects had sunk low since the breakout single “Space Oddity” in 1969, to the point that many were wondering if he was going to be a one-song hype.

A transformation was taking place in his career, as Hunky Dory would be recorded for a new label, under new management, and with a new producer. On the latter front, Ken Scott took over from Tony Visconti. Scott was relatively new to production, and he figured he could test the waters on Bowie’s record since expectations would be low. Then he heard Bowie’s demos, and he realized this was something special and the pressure would be on to get the songs just right.

To record the songs, Bowie assembled three musicians (Mick Ronson, Woody Woodmansey, and Trevor Bolder) who would stick with him and become the Spiders from Mars behind his Ziggy Stardust on the next album. They were augmented on Hunky Dory by the piano-playing of Rick Wakeman, whose flourishes bring so much to the album’s ballads.

A Fresh Listen to Hunky Dory

From the opening moments of “Changes,” Hunky Dory establishes itself as Bowie’s singer/songwriter album. While the band gets to occasionally rock out (most notably on the Velvet Underground tribute “Queen Bitch”), they mostly leave room for Bowie’s lyrics and melodies to stand out. If anything, Wakeman, who is only present on a few songs, makes the biggest musical impact.

“Changes,” “Life on Mars?” and “Oh! You Pretty Things” certainly skew to the softer side of the musical spectrum, with soulful, high-drama, and vaudevillian undercurrents (respectively) emerging from them. They establish the knack that Bowie displayed throughout his career that few other artists could match by writing from a personal perspective and yet reaching out directly to the listeners at the same time.

And while he spends a good chunk of Hunky Dory paying tribute to his influences, with songs devoted to Bob Dylan, Andy Warhol, and Lou Reed, you could hear him synthesizing all of these elements almost effortlessly on the album into something uniquely his own. The album established his musical identity from which he could start exploring his various personae on his future music.

Don’t be fooled by the fact that Hunky Dory hit No. 3 on the UK charts, because that only happened after Bowie went nuclear with Ziggy Stardust and people went back to see what they’d missed. No, David Bowie, the superstar, wasn’t born on Hunky Dory. But Bowie, the unparalleled artist, certainly was.

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