Once the soundtrack for a musical version of 1984 until the Orwell Estate disapproved, then an apocalyptic concept album with actually kind of a similar theme. The end of the world as we know it. This was Bowie's last stab at glam and first without Mick Ronson. The songs are sort of run together and it sounds like background music in lots of ways. Not as bad as it might sound in fact the title song and Rebel Rebel seem to get lots of radio airplay as well as cover bands versions, but still it was generally considered to be inferior to his earlier releases.