Magazine Editors Reveal the Best David Bowie Song of All Time
Magazine Editors Reveal the Best David Bowie Song of All Time
Meredith GordonThu, March 26, 2026 at 1:25 AM UTC
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(Photo by Lester Cohen on Getty Images)
The editors at Mojo Magazine have taken on the seemingly impossible task of naming David Bowie’s best song of all time. While "Golden Years," "Space Oddity," and "Changes" come to mind when ranking Bowie’s best, Mojo has other ideas—and a convincing argument they do make.
Keep reading to see which Bowie song is named his best of all time and the thoughtful reasons why.
Mojo Magazine Names "Life on Mars?" Bowie’s Best
In its 2026 ranking, Mojo Magazine names David Bowie’s "Life on Mars?" the best David Bowie song of all time. Widely considered one of Bowie’s finest by fans and music critics alike, "Life on Mars?" was released in 1971 on the album Hunky Dory. The track showcases Bowie’s theatrical style, poetic lyrics, and genre-blending sound that became synonymous with the singer in the 1970s.
Cementing the song’s status in Bowie’s expansive catalog, Mojo writes:
“Cannily flattering his would-be tribe of disgruntled teenagers, he extrapolated his own impatience for fame into a generational hunger for grand transformation. The title refrain of Life On Mars?, an apparent non sequitur, could have been an opportunistic allusion both to the recent launch of Soviet probes to study the red planet and to Bowie’s own post-Space Oddity reputation, but, rocketed into the stratosphere by the singer, it also suggests a genuine yearning for new wonders. Something needs to happen. There must be more to life than this.”
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What Makes "Life on Mars?" So Iconic
Production and the questions the lyrics raise are also cited as reasons this song stands out as Bowie’s best.
“Mick Ronson’s extraordinarily cinematic arrangement gives Life On Mars? scale and transcendence, and it builds magnificently toward a glorious Hollywood finale before the fade-out gingerly returns us to reality. Ultimately, the song itself provides the escapism that its heroine craves—for all its images of bathos and decline, it’s the work of art that temporarily makes a straitened life seem bigger and brighter. A more transparent lyric would only have clipped its wings because it’s the insoluble ambiguity in Bowie’s imagery that allows it to be covered by both Barbra Streisand and The Flaming Lips, to speak to each listener in mysterious ways. The question mark continues to hang over this magnificently strange creation, unanswerable.”
What "Life on Mars?" Is About
"Life on Mars?" tells the story of a “girl with mousy hair” who escapes her mundane life by going to the movies, only to find the film just as disillusioning as real life. At its core, the song explores escapism, boredom, media saturation, and cultural disillusionment, as well as the feeling that both real life and entertainment can be repetitive and unfulfilling.
Widely lauded for its grand arrangement and Bowie’s ability to move from introspection to explosive, theatrical choruses, "Life on Mars?" has become one of David Bowie’s signature songs. It is frequently included in “greatest songs of all time” lists and is often used in film and television soundtracks, continuing to reinforce Bowie’s reputation as a boundary-pushing artist whose work transcends genres and generations.
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This story was originally published by Parade on Mar 26, 2026, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
