The tour opened at the Colisée de Québec in Quebec City, Canada on 4 March 1990 before reaching its conclusion at the River Plate Stadium in Buenos Aires, Argentina on 29 September 1990, spanning five continents in seven months.

[1] To this end, Bowie wanted to avoid having to play his old hits live forever, and used the release of the Sound + Vision box set as the impetus for a tour, despite having no new material recorded.

[3][6][10][12][13] Bowie spent the early few months of 1990 preparing for the tour in a rehearsal hall on Manhattan's west side.

[9] Bowie did in fact build the tour's setlist from calls to the phone number from all over the world, saying "What I ended up doing was taking about seven or eight [songs] from [the calls in] England, another seven or eight from the rest of Europe and the rest I made up from America so it's a good sampling of what everybody wanted in all the continents.

"[2] The first shows of the tour held in March 1990 in Canada were performed before any telephone polls were completed, leading Bowie to guess at the list of songs the audience wanted to hear.

[2][16] Bowie had considered playing "The Laughing Gnome" in the style of The Velvet Underground until he found out the voting had been perpetrated by the music magazine.

[17] He added that this tour is "nowhere near as ambitious as Glass Spider in size, but qualitatively, in essence, I think it's as theatrical.

"[9] In addition to the stark lighting and the backing 4-piece rock band, Bowie employed a new tool for this tour: a giant sixty-by-forty foot transparent gauze scrim.

"[2] Two large, round screens at each side of the stage also displayed the videos projected on the scrim.

He had wanted to remix one of his successful US singles, and "Let's Dance" was considered, but was rejected as Bowie thought it too recent.

[8] Bowie wanted to record the concert, something he hadn't always done before, saying "We're intending to film it for posterity; I should hope so.

Otherwise, there are no pyrotechnics, no laser beams and, best of all, no glass spiders,"[7] the last a reference to Bowie's previous world tour.

A review of an early show by Rolling Stone was positive, saying "Bowie proved able to reclaim virtually his entire diverse oeuvre – even those songs that now seem furthest from him – through sheer vocal power and charisma" and complaining only that "the band wasn't always equal to the challenge, demonstrating too much respect for the songs' recorded arrangements.

It sold out, often over multiple nights, in cities such as San Francisco, Sacramento, Philadelphia and Detroit.

[22] The UK show at Milton Keynes Bowl was reviewed negatively by Melody Maker magazine, who called parts of the performance "flat" and dismissed the song "Pretty Pink Rose" as "a tall heap of shite.

[24] A month later in Philadelphia, Bowie stopped his performance in the middle of the song "Young Americans" to speak out against music censorship, specifically due to the controversy over 2 Live Crew's album As Nasty As They Wanna Be, saying "I've been listening to the album by 2 Live Crew.

The tour opened at the Colisée de Québec – Quebec City[3] on 4 March 1990 before reaching its conclusion in Buenos Aires, Argentina on 29 September 1990, spanning five continents in seven months.

[30] Bowie felt that a burden had been lifted by retiring the old hits he felt he was forced to perform, and said "[Retiring my old hits on tour] was a very selfish thing to do, but it gave me an immense sense of freedom, to feel that I couldn't rely on any of those things.

The plus of that is that there is a certain kind of drive and tightness that you get with that embryonic line-up, where everybody is totally reliant on the other two or three guys, so everybody gives a lot more.

From David Bowie From Hunky Dory From The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars From Aladdin Sane From Live Santa Monica '72 From Ziggy Stardust: The Motion Picture From Diamond Dogs From Young Americans From Station to Station From Low From "Heroes" From Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) From Let's Dance From Tonight Other songs: