Recording: Did You Ever Have A Dream, Join The Gang, There Is A Happy Land, We Are Hungry Men

David Bowie and the Buzz’s second recording session for Decca Records took place on Thursday 24 November 1966.

As with the first session for Bowie’s debut album on 14 November, it took place at Decca’s studio in West Hampstead, London.

Four songs were recorded on this day: ‘Did You Ever Have A Dream’, ‘Join The Gang’, ‘There Is A Happy Land’, and ‘We Are Hungry Men’. All but the first made it onto the album; ‘Did You Ever Have A Dream’ was the b-side of Bowie’s 1967 single ‘Love You Till Tuesday’.

Also performing during the session was session guitarist Big Jim Sullivan (born James George Thomkins), who played acoustic guitar and sitar on ‘Join The Gang’.

It’s the most peculiar thing. I love the sitar at the front, it’s totally manic, bloody brilliant! The drums are also great on it and it’s like the Bonzos at the end – the sound effects are great. There’s a Hoover, and there’s farts, and there’s munching. I think the farts sound pretty genuine to me. One of them’s even got a delay on it, like a repeat; it goes from the right-hand side to the left on the stereo!

Tomkins also performed on ‘Maid Of Bond Street’, and on Bowie’s later song ‘Let Me Sleep Beside You’.

After he had played the sitar section, I was supposed to lift the sitar off his lap and give him the guitar. But Jim wasn’t having this – evidently the sitar had cost him a small fortune and he was the only one who could touch it. So that plan didn’t work.