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David Bowie
Freddi & the Dreamer
Release Date: 1999
Label: Switch On
Rating:

Though just one David Bowie album (Hunky Dory) appeared during 1971, the singer was doing a lot of recording and songwriting that didn't make it onto official releases under his name that year. The hour of music on the 17-track bootleg Freddi & the Dreamer doesn't measure up to the high standards of his official early-'70s LPs. But for major Bowie fans, it's a very good supplement to what he was doing on official vinyl in 1971, and mostly boasts good-to-excellent sound that's superb by bootleg standards. Highlights include piano-and-vocal-only demos of "Lady Stardust" and "Right on Mother," the latter never released by Bowie, although Peter Noone did it on a B-side; several versions of "Looking for a Friend," which Bowie never put out on a studio release, though one (for the BBC, included here) did find official release after this bootleg came out; and an unreleased early version of "Moonage Daydream." Also here are the obscure singles oddly credited to "Arnold Corns," two of which ("Moonage Daydream" and "Hang onto Yourself") have Bowie on lead vocals, and two of which ("Man in the Middle" and "Looking for a Friend") are sung by Freddi Buretti (hence the witty bootleg title Freddi & the Dreamer). It seems highly doubtful that Gene Vincent is singing or playing with Bowie on one rough-sounding version of "Hang onto Yourself" here, as the track list on this bootleg claims. Other outtakes include the otherwise unavailable song "How Lucky You Are," a dramatic minor-key piano-based ballad; "Shadow Man," re-recorded in the early 2000s for a B-side; and the good-time, car-cruising rocker "Rupert the Riley," another tune never to find a home on anyone's legitimate release. It speaks highly of Bowie's material in this era that even his leftovers and early tryouts sound pretty good on their own, though with hindsight it can be seen that most of this wasn't up to the level of what he was doing on his more polished studio LPs. Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide