David Bowie (March 6, 1976) The First Synthetic Rock Star – NME Feature

Publication: New Musical Express

Date: March 6, 1976

Writer: NME Staff

A stark, electric portrait of David Bowie in the Station to Station era — a moment where the Thin White Duke, the American talk‑show circuit, and Bowie’s own philosophical spirals collided in a single, unforgettable NME feature. In early 1976, NME captured Bowie at his most contradictory: icy yet vulnerable, analytical yet impulsive, detached yet deeply emotional. The three-page feature follows him through reflections on fame, competition, media culture, and the strange, shimmering persona he had built — a figure he half‑inhabited and half‑observed. It stands as one of the clearest windows into Bowie’s 1976 psyche — brilliant, brittle, theatrical, and searching — just before the escape to Berlin.