Trawling through Bowie’s extensive archives will always bring interest for future releases. The Gouster is an early working rendition of the 1975 Young Americans.

The Gouster will be released as part of the boxset David Bowie – Who can I Be Now? (1974 – 1976). Hard hitting fans will have heard some of the material before which featured on differing versions of Young Americans as bonus tracks.

The track list will look something like the below, but it is still to be fully confirmed:

Side 1

‘John, I’m Only Dancing (Again)’
‘Somebody Up There Likes Me’
‘It’s Gonna Be Me’

Side 2

‘Who Can I Be Now?’
‘Can You Hear Me’
‘Young Americans’
‘Right’

A preview of the sleevenotes provided by producer and Bowie collaborator Tony Visconti has been shared:

“Gouster was a word unfamiliar to me but David knew it as a type of dress code worn by African American teens in the ’60s, in Chicago.

“But in the context of the album its meaning was attitude, an attitude of pride and hipness. Of all the songs we cut we were enamoured of the ones we chose for the album that portrayed this attitude.”

Visconti continued to explain in further liner notes:

[Gouster was] “a type of dress code worn by African American teens in the ’60s, in Chicago. . . . in the context of the album meaning was attitude, an attitude of pride and hipness.”

Visconti continues that both of them “wanted to make a killer soul album . . . [The Gouster became] 40 minutes of glorious funk.”

The Gouster follows the previously released David Bowie – Five Years (1969 – 1973). The official release date and track listing will be later announced. Have a listen to snippet of these sessions, below: