This month marks the twentieth anniversary of David Bowie’s Earthling album, a record that saw him experimenting with new forms of electronic dance music. It came in the midst of his creative resurgence, a reaction of sorts to the albums he made in the mid-’80s that seemed to do little more than unsuccessfully chasing the success of 1983’s Let’s Dance.

A big part of that resurgence was guitarist Reeves Gabrels, who was a member of Bowie’s late-’80s/early-’90s band, Tin Machine. After that band broke up, he stuck with Bowie, playing on his ’90s solo albums. A trusted collaborator to Bowie, he co-wrote and co-produced much of Bowie’s material during that time, and was also his musical director. And although he left the band in 1999, you could argue that the work he did with Bowie put him on the path to his final album, 2016’s classic Blackstar, which won five GRAMMY Awards earlier this month.

Gabrels hasn’t spoken publically very much about his former bandmate since his passing last year, but he agreed to discuss his entire era with Bowie with Radio.com.