David Bowie, Station to Station (side A)

1976's Station to Station is not a canonical David Bowie album, and it doesn't have any obvious hits. It is definitely a weird and interesting one with particularly extreme production techniques. The only word that I can find to describe the sound is hollow. The frequency response is a bit scooped in the mid-range, and all of the individual sources are very dry and close-mic'ed. Extreme artificial reverbs and delays isolate these components by adding unnatural space, rather than adding any contextual unity that might act as glue. There are occasional textural explorations, like the one at the album's start, that foreshadow the insanity that would turn up on Low. Bowie's vocals are excellent, and the musicianship is tasteful and serves the songs nicely. Despite the lack of obvious or memorable hits, Station to Station features consistently powerful songwriting—only "Word on the Wing" seems to have aged, and it's still an odd and remarkable song.