the Marc appearance, Bowie appeared on Bing Crosby's Christmas television special Bing Crosby's Merrie Olde Christmas, performing Heroes and a new duet with Crosby titled "Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy". Crosby died on 14 October before the special's broadcast on Christmas Eve 1977. Bowie later quipped: "I was getting seriously worried about whether I should appear on TV because everyone I was going on with was kicking it the following week." On 19 October, Bowie appeared on BBC's Top of the Pops for the first time since 1973, performing Heroes using a new backing track by the artist, Visconti on bass and Sean Mayes on keyboards. Bowie mimed to the new recording during the official broadcast with none of the band present. He sang the song again on the Dutch programme TopPop and the Italian programmes Odeon and L'altra domenica later the same month. RCA issued Heroes in edited form as the lead single from the album on 23 September 1977, with the catalogue PB 11121 and backed by album track "V-2 Schneider". Its shortened 3:32 edit was made in the hopes of more airplay. Another 12" single, containing both the single and album versions, was released in the US by RCA (as RCA / JD-11151) the same year. On the "Heroes" album, issued on 14 October, it was sequenced as the third track, between "Joe the Lion" and "Sons of the Silent Age". The song's promotional music video was directed by Nick Ferguson. Shot in Paris, it features numerous shots of Bowie against a backdrop of white light and wearing the same bomber-jacket he wore on the "Heroes" cover artwork. Pegg believes the final result is similar to Liza Minnelli's performance of "Maybe This Time" in the Berlin-based 1972 film Cabaret. In a stunt Pegg describes as confirming the artist's "newfound European allegiances", Bowie recorded special vocals for the track in both German and French, with lyrics translated by Maass for the German release. These versions, titled Helden and Héros, respectively, were issued in their respective countries in September. The single's release in a variety of languages and lengths achieved what NME editors Roy Carr and Charles Shaar Murray called "a collector's wet dream". Despite a large promotional push, Heroes only reached number 24 on the UK Singles Chart, but remained on the chart for eight weeks. However, it failed to chart at all on the US Billboard Hot