It's a Drive-In Saturday

This advert for his 1973 single 'Drive-in Saturday' plays on Bowie's other-worldly persona; a cleverly cultivated image that had boosted his rocketship to stardom after three years of obscurity following Space Oddity in 1969. 

The image was a perfect complement to the music. David Bowie really was the rock hero from another planet for many of his teenage fans in 1972 and '73. His words and music sparked the imagination of a new generation of pop fans. 

The images from this period show an artist taking the early stylings of Glam Rock, which he helped to initiate, to a whole different level. 

The front cover of the Ziggy Stardust album plays up the other-worldliness perfectly, as if Bowie had just fallen to earth.  

Drive-in Saturday is one of the stand-out tracks on the follow-up album, Aladdin Sane and, for some fans it is one of Bowie's greatest songs. 

Its setting is a futuristic world where people have forgotten how to make love. When he played the song live, soon after he wrote it, Bowie said, "This is after a catastrophe of some kind, and people are living on the streets and some people are living in domes, and they borrow from one another and try to learn how to pick up the pieces."