This was written and produced by David Bowie. Mott The Hoople had a cult following in England and Bowie was a big fan. The problem was, they weren't selling many albums and were about to break up. Bowie heard about their impending breakup when Mott bass player Pete Overend Watts called looking for work, and in an effort to keep the band together, he offered to produce their next album and provide them with a song he was working on. The challenge was getting Mott in the studio to record the song, since they had alienated their record label, Island. Bowie got them some time at Olympic Studios in London in the middle of the night, and that's where they recorded the song. Besides producing the track, Bowie played guitar, sang backup, and clapped.
Mott The Hoople didn't know this when they recorded it, but Bowie intended this song for his The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars concept album. The, "All the young dudes carry the news" line refers to part of Bowie's story where there is no electricity, and Ziggy Stardust uses songs to spread the news. Said Bowie: "'All the Young Dudes' is a song about this news. It's not a hymn to the youth, as people thought. It is completely the opposite."
When Bowie first offered this song to Mott The Hoople, they recognized its potential straight away. The band's drummer Dale Griffin is quoted in Rolling Stone magazines Top 500 Songs: "I'm thinking, 'He wants to give us that?' He must be crazy!"
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