The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars was released by RCA Records in June 1972 and received its R.I.A.A. gold certification on 12th June, 1974.

Bowie's groundbreaking album has been variously described as ...the turning point between the worlds of hippie and punk.. [Charles Shaar Murray]. Also The grand slam, and arguably...the definitive Rock and Roll concept album, and by far the most cogent comment any rock artist has ever made on his own art form. Rock and Roll's greatest analysis of itself, an object lesson in how to record and layer vocals and the blueprint for rock stardom all in one package... [Roy Carr]. Bowie himself recognised that this album came about as a reaction to the music of the 1960s and became the blueprint for his future work ...Ziggy really set the pattern... [he] was my Martian messiah who twanged a guitar... [he] was a simplistic character. I saw him as very simple...fairly like the character Newton I was to do in the film [The Man Who Fell To Earth] later on. Someone who was dropped down here, got brought down to our way of thinking and ended up destroying himself...