Elton John: The Lockdown Sessions - 2021
Elton John has always championed younger, contemporary talent and he went the whole hog here, collating remotely recorded contributions from a myriad of artists (most of whom I know nothing about) and adding them to his vocals to create a series of "duets". All this was done during 2020's "lockdown" period and it is all very laudable. But, it is not really an Elton John album in the traditional sense. Not at all.
So, why is that?....
The problem for me is that it just isn't really to my taste, musically - most of the tracks are accompanied by thumping, speaker-shaking contemporary beats (give me "real" drums any time) and there are quite a few "r 'n' b" ballads together with a couple of incongruously militant rap numbers - Always Love You, with Young Thug and Nicki Minaj and One Of Me, with Lil Nas X - that feature some gutter language that even I, a veteran foul mouth, finds unnecessary.
Some of the tracks are credited to other artists, not to Elton at all, like Learn To Fly by Surfaces, Chosen Family by Rina Sawayama, The Pink Phantom by Gorillaz, Nothing Else Matters by Miley Cyrus and Beauty In The Roses by Jimmy Allen. You don't get much Elton on many of these songs - a bit of piano here and there, a few vocals and that's it.
Elton achieved an unexpected number one here too with the contemporaneously popular "mash up" of Sacrifice, Rocket Man and Kiss The Bride that is Cold Heart with Dua Lipa. Yes, it's ok, but give me the originals all day long. I feel the same about the Tiny Dancer sampler, Hold Me Closer.
The Pet Shop Boys' It's A Sin is covered, maybe a bit pointlessly, and E-Ticket has Elton rocking in an eighties synthy style. The same applies to Orbit. Finish Line, with Stevie Wonder is alright, though, as is Stolen Car with Stevie Nicks.
However, overall, it is not an album I am ever going to return to, unfortunately. Actually, two years later I have just returned to it and it's ok, for what it is, sort of, just not as an Elton John album.
