“Day In, Day out” by David Bowie

"Day-In Day-Out" throws open Never Let Me Down, David Bowie's 17th studio album, and it went out as a single in March 1987 ahead of the record. Bowie wrote it alone and produced it with David Richards, then aimed this glossy R&B strut somewhere uncomfortable: America's homeless, and a young mother sinking lower and lower just to keep her child fed.

The band is stacked. Carlos Alomar and Sid McGinnis on guitars, Erdal Kızılçay covering bass, drums, keys and samples, a horn section of Lenny Pickett, Stan Harrison, Steve Elson and Earl Gardner, and Bob Clearmountain at the mixing desk. Some stations wouldn't touch the video, which still picked up an MTV nomination for Best Male Video. It became the album's most successful single, and Bowie gave it a fresh coat in 2018 for the Loving the Alien box.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.