Of all David Bowie songs, it's "Suffragette City" I wish I could walk into some beat-up New York City club in the '70s and happen to see Bowie in all regalia, up on a swarmed, sweaty stage performing with all his heart.

There is so much life in this wacked-out rock number. The verses turn around the best little laconic line, "hey man," and then elaborate with such uncommon phrasing. In the choruses, there is this primal guitar unleashed, with again a supremely weird vocal phrase.

In a live setting (not some arena or other modern atrocity of a venue, but in a primary environment for music), I can sense the electricity of the crowd as the song hits its gear around the two-chord snarl, Bowie leading the congregation with the mantra "suffragette city." If the frenzy wasn't pervasive, then wait for build and the break, the gutsy "wham, bam, thank you, ma'am," and it would be there. That scraping re-entry of sawtooth guitar is all the promise of music in a fully earned moment, there in a time, created by one of time's masters.