David Bowie: "The Laughing Gnome" 7"

$1,327.89 SOLD | Released in 1967, "The Laughing Gnome" was David Bowie's first-ever picture sleeve, and his second Deram single (following "Rubber Band"). This auction is for DM-12, the original, failed 45—not DM-123, a 1973 reissue of the single that broke the UK Top 10 and went gold with over 250,000 copies sold, testament to just how big Ziggy Stardust had become. The last copy of an original "Laughing Gnome" to trade online went for a princely £1123.

Forty years on, this song is still considered the most embarrassing recording in Bowie's career by many critics—over and above "God Only Knows" and Never Let Me Down. In a moment of devilish genius, the Pete Doherty Times—I mean, NME—tried to flood a fans-pick-the-set contest for the 1990 Sound + Vision tour with "Laughing Gnome" ballots. Wherefore art such levity amidst my peers...

I can't glower with the grumps over "Laughing Gnome," because it's not exactly news that David Bowie was a raging fame junkie, and as one of the most important figures in pop music history, this tape-speed gimmick hasn't exactly gone unnoticed. For the uninitiated, I wish you luck reconciling it with "Space Oddity," which was written less than a year later.

Listen | David Bowie: "The Laughing Gnome"