"Lou came down [to the All The Young Dudes sessions]. I've got Lou singing ["Sweet Jane"] at the moment. I've got to put Ian on, but he doesn't know the lyrics yet...Lou phrased it so Ian can pick up how it was...It's really good...The album is fabulous. They've never written better stuff. They were so down when I first met them...everything was wrong. Everything was terrible, and because they were so down I thought I was gonna have to contribute a lot of material. Now, they in a wave of optimism and they've written everything on the album bar one Lou Reed number and the "Dudes" single I did for them. They were being led into so many directions, because of general apathy with their management and recording company. Everybody was very excited about them when they first came out and then, because they didn't click immediately, it fell away. When I first saw them and that wasn't very long ago, I couldn't believe that a band so full of integrity and a really naïve exuberance could command such enormous following and not be talked about. The reactions at their concerts were superb, and it's sad that nothing was done about them. They were breaking up, I mean, they broke up for three days and I caught them just in time and put them together again 'cause in fact all the kids love them."

David Bowie, NME, 22 July 1972