Nightclubbing

Nightclubbing was the last track recorded for The Idiot. Bowie played the melody on piano over a Roland drum machine. When Pop said he was happy with the result, Bowie argued that real drums were needed to finish it, but Pop insisted on keeping the machine, saying it kicked ass and was better than a drummer. Pop wrote most of the lyrics on the spot in ten minutes, and Bowie suggested he write about walking through the night like ghosts. Pop later described the lyrics as his comment on what it was like hanging out with Bowie every night. The musicians were Pop on vocals, Bowie on keyboards, synthesizer, piano and drum machine, George Murray on bass and Phil Palmer on guitar.

Pitchfork's Sasha Geffen called it less an ode to Berlin nightlife than a monument to alienation. The Human League covered it on their Holiday '80 EP in 1980, and Grace Jones recorded it for an album of the same name. Nine Inch Nails' Closer, from 1994, contains a modified sample of the Roland bass drum, and Oasis used the drum loop in Force of Nature, on their 2002 album Heathen Chemistry. It was also on the soundtrack of Trainspotting and on the 1998 single that put The Passenger on the A-side.