Pop icon David Bowie’s handwritten lyrics for hit single Starman have been snapped up by a Tasmanian museum for $339,000.
The song was released in 1972 as the lead single from the late artist’s fifth studio album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.
The A4 page of lyrics, which includes crossed-out spelling errors and amendments, was likely penned in January 1972, according to auction house Omega Auctions.
The lyrics, originally estimated to fetch up to 40,000 pounds sterling ($A66,634), sold for 203,500 pounds sterling ($A339,000) this week.
“We got carried away and paid too much,” owner and founder of Tasmania’s Museum of Old and New Art, David Walsh, said.
“It’ll make an appearance in the expanded library we are currently constructing, along with many other items we got carried away with and paid too much for.”
The lyrics, sold as part of a David Bowie and glam rock sale, were written down so the music publisher and management could prepare the lyric sheet printed on the album’s inner record bag.
They were previously on display as part of V&A Museum’s David Bowie collection that toured globally, and had been owned by the same person since the 1980s.
Omega Auctions’ Paul Fairweather said there was “almost unprecedented” interest in the item, described as being in very good condition.
“We had five telephone lines in operation for the sale, as well as bidders online and in the room,” he said.
“We’re very pleased with the incredible price achieved and are sure the lyrics will be rightly prized and treasured by the winning bidder.”
The Ziggy Stardust concept album catapulted Bowie to international rock and pop stardom.
In 2019, the first demo of Bowie singing Starman sold for 51,000 pounds sterling after gathering dust in a loft for nearly five decades.
Bowie, born David Jones in post-war Brixton, died aged 69 in January 2016.
– AAP
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