| "Life on Mars?" | ||
|---|---|---|
| Single by David Bowie | ||
| From the album Hunky Dory | ||
| Single Released | 1973 (album release: 1971) | |
| Single Format | Vinyl record | |
| Recorded | Trident Studios | |
| Genre | ??? | |
| Song Length | 3:48 | |
| Record label | ??? | |
| Producer | Ken Scott | |
| Chart positions | 3 (UK) | |
| David Bowie single chronology | ||
| "Drive-In Saturday" 1973 |
"Life on Mars?" 1973 |
"The Laughing Gnome" re-release 1973 |
"Life on Mars?" is a song by David Bowie, first released in 1971 on the album Hunky Dory. The song featured guest piano work by Yes keyboardist Rick Wakeman.
The song has its origins from an occurrence where Bowie was asked to write English lyrics to a French song ("Comme d'habitude"), the song he came up with was "Even a Fool Learns to Love". The Canadian songwriter Paul Anka bought the rights to the original French version, and rewrote it into an English song called "My Way". Bowie's version was never released. "Life on Mars?" was Bowie's riposte to losing out on a fortune. "Life on Mars?" has identical chords to "My Way."
The song is about a girl visiting a cinema after an argument with her parents; the final sentence "is there life on Mars?" alludes to an otherwise unmentioned film that presumably poses the same question. The lyrics are fairly oblique, with confusing lines such as "It's on Amerika's tortured brow/That Mickey Mouse has grown up a cow."
The song was referenced by the Bush song "Everything Zen," which also featured the line "Mickey Mouse has grown up a cow."
"Life on Mars?" was finally released as a single in 1973, two years after it appeared on Hunky Dory. It reached #3 in the UK Singles Chart.
The song was covered in Portuguese by Seu Jorge for the soundtrack of the 2004 film The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, as well as in English by Michelle Branch for a promotional CD in 2005 from The Gap.
The forthcoming BBC television series Life on Mars is named after the song, which is the first thing its lead character hears after being transported back in time to 1973.