According to biographer Chris O'Leary, Diamond Dogs is a combination of numerous projects Bowie envisioned at the time. In November 1973, Bowie conducted an interview with writer William S. Burroughs for Rolling Stone. Published in February 1974, the interview gave insight into Bowie's current ambitions. An admirer of Burroughs's working methods and his 1964 novel Nova Express, Bowie revealed he had begun using Burroughs's "cut-up" technique as a way for inspiration. He spoke of a musical based on Ziggy Stardust, saying: "Forty scenes are in it and it would be nice if the characters and actors learned the scenes and we all shuffled them around in a hat the afternoon of the performance and just performed it as the scenes come out." He also casually mentioned adapting George Orwell's 1949 novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, a Bowie favourite, for television. He had wanted to create a theatrical production of the novel and began writing material after completing sessions for Pin Ups. Neither of these projects came to fruition. The Ziggy Stardust musical, considered a "retrograde step" by biographer Nicholas Pegg, fell through, but Bowie salvaged two songs for Diamond Dogs he had written for it—"Rebel Rebel" and "Rock 'n' Roll with Me". At the end of 1973, George Orwell's widow, Sonia Orwell, denied Bowie the rights to use the novel. The rejection annoyed Bowie, who lambasted her for it in Circus magazine a few years later. She refused to allow any adaptation of her late husband's work for the rest of her life. No adaptations were possible until after her death in 1980. Unable to adapt the novel, Bowie decided to create his own apocalyptic scenario inspired by the works of Burroughs. Songs from this scenario included what would become the album's title track and "Future Legend". Recording Buckley writes that the album was the first time Bowie used a recording studio as an instrument. With Scott's departure, Bowie produced the album himself. Keith Harwood, who had worked previously with the Rolling Stones on numerous sessions, and on Led Zeppelin's Houses of the Holy, handled engineering duties. Pegg writes that despite Bowie and Harwood's previous collaborations on Mott the Hoople's All the Young Dudes and the original version of "John, I'm Only Dancing" (both 1972), Diamond Dogs was Harwood's first credit on a Bowie album. Bowie described being "in awe" of Harwood because of his work with the Stones. With the departure