Live: Greyhound, Croydon

David Bowie and the Spiders From Mars performed at the Greyhound in Croydon on 25 June 1972.

It was the 42nd date of the Ziggy Stardust Tour, which had begun on 29 January.

The support acts on this occasion were Roxy Music and Trapeze. This was Bowie’s first encounter with Brian Eno.

Eno, looking quite the glam rocker at the time, was so bright and mercurial and we quickly found we shared a number of similar musical passions. We had both been lucky enough to have been present at Philip Glass’ first London show in 1970 and we wittered on about maybe working together at some point in the future. I was not to meet Ferry, to whom I was introduced by Amanda Lear, until a year or two later at a party in New York.

There was another significant event as a result of this show. Bowie and the Spiders were invited to perform ‘Starman’ on the BBC’s Top Of The Pops after their manager persuaded the show’s producer Mike Moran to see them play in Croydon.

Tony Defries had been trying to get us on Top of the Pops for ages, encouraging the producers to come down and see us, but then we did a gig at the Croydon Greyhound and the BBC crew all came down, along with the producer, and that’s when we were offered the show. We had already done a TV spot or two, but this was the big one, this was the show that everybody watched.