★ cover
Released

It wasn’t quite David Bowie’s final work — his musical Lazarus debuted after the sessions, and even in the days before his death he’d demoed some new songs. But Blackstar, recorded in the shadow of his secret cancer diagnosis and released just a couple of days before his passing, was a moving, striking meditation on the end, recorded with a strong creative team of New York jazz musicians. Songs like “Lazarus,” the title track and especially the concluding “I Can’t Give Everything Away” served as a hail and farewell, a last example of his stunning artistic range.

Ned Raggett

Recommended by

Suggestions
Baroque cover

Baroque

Nadia Sirota
Un Dia cover

Un Dia

Juana Molina
Tribe cover

Tribe

Enrico Rava
Fetch cover

Fetch

Melt-Banana
Jefferson Friedman: Quartets cover

Jefferson Friedman: Quartets

Matmos, Chiara String Quartet
Counterfeit² cover

Counterfeit²

Martin Gore
Villfarande Barn cover

Villfarande Barn

Tord Gustavsen, Arve Henriksen, Kim Rysstad
The New Sound cover

The New Sound

Geordie Greep