Early David Bowie And The Lower Third Recording To Be Auctioned
An unheard early David Bowie and The Lower Third record is expected to sell for up to £12,000 at auction.
The late music icon recorded a number of songs with the group during the mid-’60s under his birth name Davy Jones, which he changed to David Bowie to avoid any confusion with The Monkees star of the same name.
And now their 1965 song I Want Your Love, a “full-on, The Who-style assault with slashing guitars and David Bowie’s distinctive vocals”, is set to go under the hammer.
The rare gem from The Lower Third is set to be sold at Wessex Auction Rooms in Chippenham, Wiltshire, on Thursday, 16 December.
A spokesman for the auction house told The Times newspaper: ‘‘This previously unreleased and unheard David Bowie recording has come to light from an amazing archive haul, and is by far the best of the bunch.
“The seller purchased the physical music archive of one of the world’s biggest publishing companies and therefore unearthed a raft of amazing demos and unheard tracks from huge artists.
“It takes months of work going through databases to get the info but we really have discovered the cream of the crop.”
Last year, an unreleased Bowie demo from the same period went for £18,000. I Do Believe I Love You was recorded in 1966, and had only been anticipated to fetch £5,000.
A number of demos and rare recordings by the Life On Mars singer have been auctioned off since his death from live cancer in 2016 aged 69.
Bowie’s first-ever studio recording sold for almost quadruple the asking price in 2018. The 1963 demo of his first band The Konrads’ track I Never Dreamed features the vocals of a 16-year-old Bowie, and – in a move similar to The Beatles early demos – was rejected by Decca Records.
Bowie’s former Konrads bandmate, David Hadfield, put the sought-after recording up for sale along with a whole host of unique memorabilia, after discovering them in a bread basket owned by his grandfather.
Omega Auctions put the items under the hammer causing a “bidding frenzy”, and the tape, which was estimated to fetch around £10,000, sold for £39,360.