David Bowie – Five Years (Rare Rehearsal Take, Pacific Coliseum, Vancouver, 2 February 1976)

February 2nd, 2026 | by Nick

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A rarely seen take of Five Years, from the 1976 David Bowie Isolar I Tour rehearsals.

It is fifty years ago today that Bowie and his ’76 tour band, “Raw Moon”, played the first show of the Isolar I Tour, AKA the Station To Station Tour, on the 2nd of February 1976, at the Pacific Coliseum in Vancouver.

Earlier that day, there was a full dress rehearsal at the Pacific Coliseum, which was filmed by a local film crew. 15 tracks, about 90 minutes of footage from that shoot – almost the entire live set, up to Rebel Rebel – are commonly in circulation and easily found on YouTube.

In that rehearsal reel, Bowie and the band make several attempts at Five Years. The first one lasts about a minute or so, with Bowie making several vocal flubs until the song is paused at, “…soldier with a broken arm”. Bowie and the band pick up again where they left off, but again stop after only about 30 seconds. After quite a long pause, with Bowie asking for a cigarette, there is another take and they complete the song.

This take of Five Years is absent from every version of the Pacific Coliseum rehearsal reel that I have seem online. In this take Bowie gets most of the lyrics right, except, “I heard telephones, opera house, SOMETHING OR OTHER on TV. Saw toys, boys, electric irons on ME”. I suspect that this take was actually the penultimate one, since the last take in the rehearsal footage reel has almost no vocal flubs plus it has the addition of backing vocals at the beginning, that are absent in this and all the other preceding takes.

The quality is quite good compared to existing sources of the rehearsal footage online, but as Bowie becomes animated sharp horizontal movement lines mar the picture. These probably originate from an interlaced source that wasn’t transferred correctly. Wherever the cause, I was not able to remove them.

Credits

Source:
David Bowie | Five Years | Rehearsal | Pacific Coliseum, Vancouver | 2 February 1976

Big thanks to Tyler.

Nacho, 2nd February, 2026.