David Bowie’s Rare 1965 Recordings

Long before he took on the persona of Ziggy Stardust, David Bowie made recordings under his birth name David Jones. On September 18, 2026, those recordings from 1965 will be available on CD, LP, and digital formats and will include 22 tracks, highlighted by 10 previously unreleased recordings on the CD, digital editions, and six previously unheard tunes on vinyl.

A red vinyl pressing will be available exclusively through Bowie’s official website. Coinciding with the announcement, the previously unheard “I Want Your Love Now” has been released as the first preview of the collection.

The box set, David Bowie: The Shel Talmy Recordings, was produced by Talmy, who also produced and arranged hits such as “My Generation” by The Who and “You Really Got Me” from The Kinks.

The collection also features performances by Led Zeppelin and Yardbirds guitarist Jimmy Page, who was a session musician at the time, and keyboardist Nicky Hopkins, who would later collaborate with The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Who and others. Engineering duties were led by a young Glyn Johns, who would later become one of rock’s most sought-after and celebrated recording engineers.

Bowie released his first single, “Liza Jane,” in 1964 as Davie Jones with the King Bees. Talmy first crossed paths with Bowie in the epicenter of the U.K. music district, Denmark Street in London. Talmy signed David and the Manish Boys, a British R&B band, in late 1964. The band appeared on BBC’s Gadzooks! It’s All Happening. With so much focus on hair and appearance, Bowie learned early the importance of appearance and media attention.

A year later, Talmy began recording Bowie and his new group, Davie Jones & the Lower Third. In a 1993 interview with Q magazine, Bowie stated: “We had a thing about The Who. In fact, we used to play second support for them down in Bournemouth. That was the first time I met Pete Townshend and got talking to him about songwriting and stuff. I was hugely influenced by him. We had songs called “Baby Loves That Way,” “You’ve Got a Habit of Leaving’ – some really duff things. Townshend came into our soundcheck and listened to a couple of things and said, ‘You’re trying to write like me!’ I said: ‘Yeah, what do you think?’ He said: ‘Mmm, well, there’s a lot of bands around like you at the moment.’ I don’t think he was very impressed.”

Shel Talmy, who died in 2024, said in 2017. “I thought he absolutely was going to make it. The only unfortunate thing is that he and I were about six years ahead of the market.”

In the liner notes for the upcoming box set, music historian Alec Palao wrote: “The sounds here should not be judged by the standards of his later career, but by the standards of what was happening in Britain at that precise point in time. In which case, they speak as loudly of the excitement of London and its music scene in that pivotal year of 1965 as they do for the launch of its brightest future star.”

Buyers beware: Only 1,965 copies of the recordings are being pressed.

-Sharon Oliver

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