Day 264 | Cygnet Committee

This is one of the earliest Bowie songs that sounds like a Bowie song.  I have always found the lyrics to be impenetrable, but there’s pretty broad consensus (helped by some of Bowie’s own comments) that this is a condemnation of the hippie movement and the tendencies of hippies to follow false gurus.  The song evolved from an earlier draft called, “Lover to the Dawn,” which Bowie intended for his folk-trio, Feathers.  I will probably post that song later, but it is inferior.  So “Cygnet Committee” reflects Bowie’s blossoming as a young artist: I find most of what he did before to be pretty bad, but most of what he did after to be the music I listen to daily.  Bowie once commented that it is the best song on the album.  Album: Space Oddity