Today I’m entering territory I’m not horribly familiar with – I honestly have not listened to a ton of David Bowie. I hit on this song today because I’ve been hearing it around a fair bit lately after not hearing it for a very long time, and also because it does come from the one Bowie album I am somewhat familiar with.

Suffragette City comes from Bowie’s fifth album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, released in 1972. The song was released as a B-side to the single Starman a few months before the album hit stores. Suffragette City later got its own single release in 1976 as part of the greatest hits compilation Changesonebowie. That single did fail to chart, though our song today is a beloved part of the Bowie catalog and can’t be contained by mortal constructs like lousy charts.

Bowie was joined on this song by his Spiders from Mars band on this effort. Bowie handled vocals and some guitar, while his legendary companion Mick Ronson did guitars, piano and synth. Trevor Bolder was on bass and Mick Woodmansey, whose last name is amazing, on drums. Bowie produced alongside Ken Scott.

Today’s song is a total rock and roll banger. It runs in the proto-punk space, with a fast tempo and a bit of boogie with the piano running along too. It does seem another nod from Bowie to The Velvet Underground, a group Bowie admired and had paid homage to previously. While clearly informing the punk rock to come, the song is also an early example of glam rock, something Bowie was a huge contributor to around this time. And the song’s false ending before a “wham, bam thank you ma’am!” and another run of the ending chorus is just great work.

In an interesting bit of trivia, Bowie at first tried to give the song to someone else. He wanted Mott the Hopple to record this track, it was Bowie’s way of trying to keep the troubled band from breaking up. Camp Hopple rejected this song but did record another Bowie-penned tune, All The Young Dudes.

Now comes the question – what the hell is this song about? And honestly, there are no clear-cut answers.

The only concrete thing that Bowie really offered is that he was inspired by Stanley Kubrik’s film A Clockwork Orange when making this album. Bowie wanted to incorporate some of the lingo and alternate language stuff that was in the film into his work. Bowie does mention droogie in the second verse, a very common term from the movie. It doesn’t really tell us what the song is “about” but it does give us an idea as to his headspace at the time and that he might be talking in code on purpose.

Beyond that, we are left to speculate. The term “suffragette” refers mostly to the drive to allow women to vote across various nations in the early 1900’s. The word can also be more loosely applied to refer to women’s liberation and/or feminist causes.

But our song today has precious little to do with women’s progress. The line “this mellow thighed chick just put my spine out of place” pretty well rules out any advancement of women’s causes or shattering of the glass ceiling here. The song is clearly Bowie addressing a friend named Henry, and Bowie is asking his friend not to come around because he’s wrapped up with a woman.

So what is really going on here? Well, there are two prevailing theories, both of which are coherent and make sense, so we can get right into them.

The most practical and seemingly fitting narrative is that the song is a coded communication of Bowie’s bisexuality. The friend Henry was a male lover, and Bowie was spending time at “suffragette city,” or hooking up with women for a spell instead. Bowie doesn’t want Henry around because things are swinging the other way right now. It’s a logical explanation that fits everything very well, though to my knowledge there is zero confirmation of this idea.

The other theory is a time-honored crutch for what rock songs are really about and also, well, a time-honored crutch for David Bowie – drugs. “Henry” is a slang term for heroin, and the song could be Bowie trying to shake the demon because he’s into a girl. It’s also a fair guess but again, I don’t see any evidence to corroborate the theory. I’m not a Bowie expert but he never seemed to be one to unveil the meaning behind his songs anyway so guessing is what we’re left with.

Whatever Suffragette City is about, this is one absolutely monster song that flexes real rock muscle and gets the job done. I hadn’t heard this song in many years when it came on a month or so back when I was eating at Arby’s, of all places. For whatever reason, the Arby’s right by my house has a pretty nicely curated selection of classic rock playing in the dining area. And Bowie has been popping up a lot lately on others’ blogs and in-person conversations so I figured it was as good a time as any to revisit this belter of a tune.