“Moonage Day Dream” by David Bowie

"Moonage Daydream" is where Ziggy Stardust steps out of the shadows on David Bowie's 1972 album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, introducing himself as a bisexual alien rock star come to rescue an Earth running out of time. It had already had one life: Bowie first cut it in February 1971 with his short-lived side project Arnold Corns, released on B&C that May.

The version that counts came that November at Trident Studios in London, with the Spiders from Mars, Mick Ronson, Trevor Bolder and Mick Woodmansey, and Ken Scott co-producing. It's glam with a heavy-metal punch, Bowie honking on saxophone and strumming a 12-string, but the star is Ronson, whose screaming guitar solo and swooning string arrangement send the thing into orbit. It has since been hailed as one of Bowie's greatest songs, and in 2014 it turned up in Guardians of the Galaxy.

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