Released - May 1972
Genre - Rock
Producer - Gus Dudgeon
Selected Personnel - Elton John (Vocals/Piano/Organ/Keyboards); Davey Johnstone (Guitar/Banjo/Mandolin); Dee Murray (Bass); Nigel Olsson (Drums/Percussion); Jean-Luc Ponty (Electric Violin)
Standout Track - Mona Lisas And Mad Hatters
About a week ago, Elton John's first new album in three years, The Diving Board, was released. It's a really very accomplished work, and a continued mark of an ongoing creative renaissance that started with 2001's Songs From The West Coast. One day I'll get this blog all the way up to 2013 and I can talk about it in more detail (like Tristram Shandy, my decision to organise this blog chronologically and the nature of time means I will probably never, ever write a review for a new album unless I significantly up my output), but one thing it did prompt me to reflect on is just what it is about Elton John that makes him such a great artist. He's a genuinely phenomenal pianist, but it's not often that you find yourself consciously aware of that fact while listening to him as his piano skills are so often relegated to accompaniment rather than moments of scene-stealing. He has a great voice, capable of both soulful hurt and playful glee, but it's not really the voice you keep coming back for. But I think what makes him such a unique figure is how effortlessly brilliant he is at writing catchy, memorable tunes - after only two listens, pretty much every song on The Diving Board had etched itself into my brain like I'd known them for years and I could sing along to the whole album. His songs have always just been brilliantly simple, impossibly catchy and memorable. The other significant thing about The Diving Board is that it shows the emphasis of Elton's songwriting shifting back onto himself as a serious singer-songwriter rather than a writer of pop tunes, for perhaps the first time since 1972's Honky Chateau (though arguably 2010's collaborative album with Leon Russell, The Union, was also moving back in that direction).
Because Honky Chateau will generally be remembered as Elton John's "last" singer-songwriter album before he morphed into a stadium pop-rock act as the style and form of his songs shifted ever so slightly into the mainstream circuit and away from the introspective, folksy mould of the likes of Russell, James Taylor et al. But even listening to Honky Chateau, it's clear that that transformation was already commencing. For one thing, for the first time Elton had been allowed to record an album using a core group of musicians rather than a disparate group of session musicians. So it is that we have the first full album from the touring band of Dee Murray and Nigel Olsson on bass and drums, and new recruit Davey Johnstone on guitar, who continues to play live with Elton to this day. Perhaps this in itself was one of the major spurs that started the metamorphosis to Goodbye Yellow Brick Road - previously, while Elton and his arrangers had proved more than adept at incorporating a diverse array of musicians into his songs, he had always principally had to rely on his own talent as a singer and pianist to really bring his songs alive. But now, with his own regular line-up of musicians around him, he perhaps felt like a "real" rockstar for the first time, and it wouldn't be long before he felt the creative freedom to diversify his writing and start producing songs that relied entirely on the talents of his band rather than just on his own.
But we're not quite there yet. "Honky Cat," one of the album's two big singles, does demonstrate an increasingly pop-sounding sensibility, being an upbeat, New Orleans-inspired funk piece complete with playful horn refrains and the whirring of electric keyboards, it was still heavily built around Elton's own virtuoso, key-hopping piano skills. The album is bookended by two such playful, musically slight but undeniably fun tracks, the second being "Hercules," (Elton's self-appointed middle name), which has a certain whiff of Beach Boys scatting in the arrangement of its backing vocals, and sees Johnstone deliver his first guitar solo on an Elton John record, appropriately tasteful and modest without pulling focus from the full-band setup. The best rock track on offer is the wonderful "Amy," a brilliantly petulant song that sums up both the deliriousness and the frustration and anger of being in love with someone and being too young to understand it, with one of the best, stutteringly syncopated choruses in the Elton John canon - "Amy, I may not be James Dean and Amy I may not be nineteen, and Amy I may still be in romper boots and jeans, but Amy you're the girl who wrecks my dreams." I spent a couple of years working on a webseries about a character of mine called Matt Fisher, whose housemate and best friend Amy Sergeant got her name entirely down to this song, so it's always one I enjoy going back to.
In general, while these upbeat rock tracks would become increasingly de rigeur for Elton, the album is still principally steeped in slower numbers and ballads. "Mellow" is a great example of how evocative it can be when the right word is paired with the right song - Elton John has written a whole number of songs in a similar mould, but something about its title and its slow, drowzy melody makes it feel like the perfect musical embodiment of hazy, mellow sunny afternoon bliss, of carefree enjoyment, and Jean-Luc Ponty's electric violin solo is an inspired moment. Then there's the album's best-known song, "Rocket Man," a song I had always found it hard to really get into until I saw it played live last year, at which point the soaring triumphalism of its melody really hit home and its brilliance became clear to me. There's always been an ongoing debate as to just how conscious a rip-off of David Bowie's "Space Oddity" it was, which is an argument that certainly has credence considering that Elton's producer Gus Dudgeon also produced "Space Oddity" itself - the themes of isolation and loneliness as felt by an astronaut adrift in space are there, and while it's very different in its tone, they both use similar musical flourishes and structures, and there are certain keyboard sounds in "Rocket Man" that seem to echo the eerie stylophone effect of "Space Oddity." No matter at the end of the day - they're very different songs really, with "Rocket Man" ultimately feeling hopeful rather than desperate, and only a month after the release of Honky Chateau the world was given The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars, at which point Bowie presumably gave up on any feelings of resentment and the two let each other get on with their meteoric careers.
The last song on the album that really makes you stop and pay attention is the incredible "Mona Lisas And Mad Hatters," another song that had always gone over my head until hearing it live, and particularly hearing Elton's introduction of it in which he explained why he chose it as the song to sing at a benefit concert shortly after 9/11. Written by Bernie Taupin as a response to hearing a gun go off in Spanish Harlem, it's an uncharacteristically direct and maudlin account of the truth about the people and the lives that fuel New York City, and the spirit that keeps it alive, while also offering a more general commentary about the importance of valuing the people you meet in your life and not becoming distracted or spoiled by privilege or position. It's a touching plea for companionship, really, for all the people in the world to remember one another and the importance of having people around you. It's musically very simple, reduced to little more than Elton at his piano singing one of the most beautifully simple and characteristically memorable melodies of his career, and as a song it's definitely a career high.
Not everything reaches the highs of those few tracks, though there's nothing here that's actively difficult to sit through. Songs like "Susie (Dramas)" are fun and rumbustious but not really captivating or inspiring, but overall it has more standouts and highlights than earlier albums like Elton John and Tumbleweed Connection. It's not quite up to the standard of Madman Across The Water, but probably comes a close second in the run of his early singer-songwriter albums. It would prove to be a major success, with both "Honky Cat" and "Rocket Man" becoming successful singles, while the album itself became his first No. 1 in the USA. The following year would be the year of Elton's transformation, the year he largely consigned folk, blues and gospel music to his past for a very long time and chose to focus more on pop and rock, becoming one of the biggest musical sensations of the decade. His career post-Honky Chateau would continue to be full of amazing songs, but a particular kind of wonderful music was left by the wayside for decades before he began revisiting it comparatively recently. The next time he would be in the public eye, he would be a rather different artist.
Track Listing:
All songs written by Elton John and Bernie Taupin.
1. Honky Cat
2. Mellow
3. I Think I'm Going To Kill Myself
4. Susie (Dramas)
5. Rocket Man (I Think It's Going To Be A Long, Long Time)
6. Salvation
7. Slave
8. Amy
9. Mona Lisas And Mad Hatters
10. Hercules
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