Elton John: Goodbye Yellow Brick Road - 1973
"Bernie wrote the lyrics in two and a half weeks, while I composed most of the music in three days while staying at the Pink Flamingo Hotel in Kingston, Jamaica . I had wanted to go to Jamaica, in part because The Rolling Stones had just recorded 'Goats Head Soup' there" - Elton John
In 1973 Elton John could do no wrong on both sides of the Atlantic. Honky Château and Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only The Piano Player had paved the way, but this tour de force really put Elton and his magnificent lyricist Bernie Taupin into the limelight. Not forgetting the marvellous band - Davey Johnstone on lead guitar, Dee Murray on bass and Nigel Olsson on drums. They were red hot on this album.
The remastering is amazing too as it is on all the Elton John Deluxe Editions. Yes, it does attract accusations of being bloated and indulgent, but I really can't find fault with any of the tracks. It was here that Elton John the great flamboyant entertainer was truly born, the old slightly introspective bespectacled figure behind the piano was now strutting round on huge platform boots in enormous comic glasses like a gigantic camp Frankenstein's monster. Eventually that monster would have to be destroyed, but for now it strode the world like a colossus. Do not let the over-the-top preposterous image overshadow the music, however, or indeed its tremendous lyrics.
When are we gonna come down.....
The track which starts the first side of the album is wonderful, isn't it? The dark and lengthy instrumental build-up leads eventually into the typical Elton rock of Love Lies Bleeding. Jim Steinman admits Bat Out Of Hell’s long intro was influenced by this, along with Elton’s earlier Burn Down The Mission. Despite its length, it is a marvellous opener. Then it is on to this lovely and now iconic tribute to Marilyn Monroe, Candle In The Wind. I have never tired of it, even now, and the last verse, where Elton sings "goodbye Norma Jean, from the young man in the twenty-second row..." his voice and cadence rising just a bit always gives me the tingles.
In Bennie And The Jets we have another Elton classic, with its fake crowd noise intro and unforgettable clunking piano refrain. Elton's vocal on the track is simply superb. "We'll kill the fatted calf tonight....Candy and Ronnie have you seen them yet - wow - but they're so spaced out......she's got electric boots....a mohair suit" - great lines, great delivery. Who were Candy and Ronnie, by the way?
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road - well, Bernie's timeless and image-packed bucolic reverie for his rural Lincolnshire upbringing is just wonderful, isn't it? - "back to the howling old owl in the woods, hunting the horny back toad...". Great stuff. Another one I have never had enough of. Whenever I hear it I always remember a boy called Paul Rogers in my class at school giving an ad hoc hammed-up rendition of it (the first verse at least) back in 1973. Funny the things you recall that have stuck with you, isn't it?This Song Has No Title was a short upbeat acoustic strum that tells us that, indeed, it has no title. It is a bit of a throwaway in amidst such exalted company. It is jaunty enough I guess. Grey Seal is a lovely song that dated back to 1969-1970 and is given a vaguely funky musical makeover here. I love it in either of its formats. It is one of those great songs in which Bernie uses images from nature and wildlife.
Yes, the cod-reggae pastiche Jamaica Jerk-Off is a tad silly but I have to say that it is infuriatingly catchy. It beats Led Zeppelin's D'Yer Mak'er at least.
A lengthy ballad, I've Seen That Movie Too recreates much of the atmosphere of the previous album. I would wager it dated from that album's sessions too. Nearly six minutes long, it is a typical slow grind of an Elton big ballad - all big, clunky piano lines, big drums, sweeping strings, strong vocals and contrasting quiet, deeply melodic parts. It is very representative of his sound from 1972-74.
My favourite song from the album, Sweet Painted Lady is full of evocative lyrics about the sea, sailors and prostitutes. Yes, yes, I know, but it really is beautiful. Elton John doesn't get much better than this, yet the song won't make any 'best of' lists. God knows why, it's great - the sounds of the waves, the piano refrain, the yearning vocals. Superb song. One of my favourites ever of his.
The Ballad Of Danny Bailey (1909-1934) is one of Bernie's moving old West-style tales here and although it is based a little later than that, its criminal on the run and eventually gunned down theme is the same. This theme was also visited on songs such as Have Mercy On The Criminal from the previous album and, even more notably, Ticking, from the next album.
Dirty Little Girl is a chunky, mid-pace bluesy slow rocker powered by Nigel Olsson's drumming that again harks back to Don't Shoot Me I'm Only The Piano Player. It is possibly a bit too long and its sound is a bit murky but it has a solid power to it and a strong vocal. the chorus is rousing too, although it replicates the Bennie And The Jets refrain pretty closely. It is one of those Elton album tracks that grows on you with repeated listens but it has problems sticking in the memory in comparison to many of the others. That's a perennial problem with double albums, tracks like this get lost, don't they?
All The Girls Love Alice was riffy and powerful, in places, and was ground-breaking, lyrically, for the time, dealing explicitly with lesbianism in a Killing Of Sister George sort of way (an adventurous movie from 1964 starring Beryl Reid and Susannah York). It's a really good song, melodically, atmospherically and lyrically.
Elton hadn't rocked much since the opener, so now for a copper-bottomed treat of a double-header of Elton rock. This is a frantic, totally irresistible, organ-driven fairground rock 'n' roller to start with in Your Sister Can't Twist (But She Can Rock 'n' Roll). Then Nigel Olsson's rat-a-tat drum intro, Davey Johnstone's classic, stunning and timeless riff and Dee Murray's beautifully rumbling bassline launch us into one of my favourite Elton songs of all time - Saturday Night's Alright (For Fighting). It is a titanic riffy assault that is based on Bernie’s Lincolnshire upbringing and nights out in towns like Spalding and Market Rasen -
"it's seven o'clock and I wanna rock, wanna get a belly full of beer....my sister looks cute in her braces and boots, a handful of grease in her hair...".
Taupin has stated that the lyrics were observational as opposed to autobiographical. Incidentally, the excellent picture sleeve was one of the first of its kind at the time (certainly in the UK). Actually, Rocket Man had one too but it is this one I remember, from buying it at the time.
On Roy Rogers Bernie Taupin revisits his Wild West fascinations that we had experienced on Tumbleweed Connection. It is a moving, singalong ballad, remembering the fifties TV star that Bernie grew up watching, but the Tumbleweed album's Western songs are better ones.
Social Disease is a bit strange as it starts at really low volume and you think something is wrong with your sound system until it finally kicks in with its solid, bluesy, typically Elton thump. It is a relief when it finally ups the volume. I am not sure what prompted such odd production. It certainly didn't work. Tuneful melody (and indeed Harmony, as indeed it is titled) returns on the lovely ending to a wonderful album. It is a track that gets a bit overlooked, which is understandable was we are hitting the seventy-five minute mark by now.
Putting out a double album was always a risk but no such worries here. There is not a duff track on it. Even now, it is such a fulfilling listen. Amazing that something now over forty-five years old still sounds so good.
The bonus material of the 1973 Christmas Eve was what attracted me to buying this album again, however. I clearly remember watching it in my teenage bedroom on a tiny little portable TV we owned. It had a six inch screen but it was great to see Elton in concert. Now, all these years later it is wonderful to hear it.
The non-album single from this period was the now iconic Christmas song, Step Into Christmas. Elton thanks his fans for the year in the first lines of the song and I imagine it is Christmas 1973 again - I love hearing its atmospheric, singalong chorus every December.
Recorded in May 1973 and included on the Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting single were the country finger pickin' romp of Jack Rabbit and the bar-room boogie of Whenever You're Ready (We'll Go Steady Again).
The 'b' side of the Goodbye Yellow Brick Road single was Screw You (Young Man's Blues), also dating from May 1973. It is a solid, muscular bluesy rock number.
