Blackstar was released on Bowie's sixty-ninth birthday, two days before he died, and it was made with full knowledge of what was coming. He built it with Donny McCaslin's jazz quartet rather than a rock band, and the record moves accordingly: the ten-minute title track shifts shape three times, "Lazarus" opens with a line that reads differently now, and Ben Monder's guitar circles rather than resolves. Tony Visconti produced. A deliberate closing statement, newly remastered for 2025. Street date: July 24.