Month: June 2019
25 Years Ago Today: Dancing Naked with John Mellencamp

25 Years Ago Today: Dancing Naked with John Mellencamp

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By Steven P. Wheeler

Back in May of 1994, I sat down with one of rock’s biggest stars of the era and a true legend today, John Mellencamp, to discuss his then-current album Dance Naked, which was released 25 years ago today, June 21. Featuring the hit single, a cover of Van Morrison’s classic “Wild Night,” Dance Naked would become the ninth consecutive platinum album by a man who literally dominated MTV and FM rock radio throughout the Eighties and Nineties.

So I dusted off my old tape of my interview with the man who we first knew as Johnny Cougar, then John Cougar, then John Cougar Mellencamp (with 1983’s brilliant Uh-Huh album), before finally leaving the “Cougar” behind for good in 1991 with the platinum hit album, Whenever We Wanted. But more on that later…

For many rock fans like myself, the Eighties were a time of transition from radio to a new visual outlet called MTV. Not to mention a sea of concerts for various causes, including Live Aid and Farm Aid (which Mellencamp started with friends Willie Nelson and Neil Young after an off-the-cuff onstage comment from Bob Dylan at the previous Live Aid). And John Mellencamp was at the forefront of this changing tide.

Throughout the Eighties and Nineties, John Mellencamp would establish himself as one of rock’s most prominent and often controversial voices. But the road to notoriety was a long one indeed for the often ornery artist, whose own pseudonym for his producer duties was tellingly Little Bastard. And there were some traces of that reputation that seeped through during our lengthy conversation.

Teenage Husband & Father

Back in the mid-Seventies, a young John Mellencamp had visions of making it as a recording artist in the music industry, which was no easy feat for a teenage husband and father working odd jobs in the wilds of Indiana. He might as well have been in India.

In those days he was no different than millions of other musicians trying to get noticed while balancing the realities of life. Or as he would later write in his 1985 hit single “R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A.”: “Pipe dreams in their heads and very little money in their hands.”

“I don’t feel like I matured any quicker or any slower than anybody else,” he said in response to my question about the impact of marriage and fatherhood at such a young age. “And as far as following any kind of rock & roll dream, initially, I just wanted to make a record. I didn’t really have any illusions of grandeur or any dream about what I should become or what I shouldn’t become. I just had a lot of determination. Hell, I never planned anything in my life.”

Whatever It Takes

Playing by the usual rules of the music business in those days, Mellencamp played the game that the booming industry had established by the Seventies: “I had been in bands for a long time, singing in bars and fraternities, but I remembered thinking at the time that being ‘discovered’ was kind of a joke,” said the longtime heartland resident. “You had to go out and seek them, they weren’t going to come and seek you out.

“So I took every cent I had, sold a bunch of stuff, sold a lot of my record collection, sold a lot of equipment that I had gathered up over the years and raised a couple of thousand bucks and made a demo tape.”

(Interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

Of course, this was real life and not some Hollywood movie. Success wasn’t sitting around waiting for this small town boy to make his mark on the music world. “I sent that tape out to different managers and record companies, and it was rejected worldwide,” he says, without a hint of exaggeration. “I mean, hundreds and hundreds of rejections came in, and I had worked that tape in all different manners for like a year.”

John Mellencamp turned Johnny Cougar in 1976.

Lowering his goals to perhaps jumpstart his dreams, Mellencamp and his wife ventured across state lines on a day that ultimately changed his life forever. “I decided to go down to small record label down in Louisville, Kentucky, with that tape. I remember physically driving down there that day. And I remember being told that they didn’t think that I was right for their label, and I thought, ‘Jesus Christ, I can’t even get fuckin’ signed to a little local label in Louisville, Kentucky’.”

Despondent over that soul-crushing trip in 1975, Mellencamp recalled: “So I was driving home with my first wife, Priscilla (their 11-year marriage would end in 1981), and I thought I had better start re-thinking what I was gonna do. But when I got home, the phone rang and it was [David Bowie’s manager] Tony DeFries asking me to come to New York, and I said, ‘Hell, I was just in New York and I can’t afford to come again,’ so he offered to pay for a plane ticket.

“I realized that was the whole key,” he said with a laugh. “When they start paying for you to do things, you might have something happening.”

Introducing Johnny Cougar

After meeting DeFries, things moved quickly. Not unlike Greg Brady being told that he would now be named “Johnny Bravo” in that memorable episode of The Brady Bunch, DeFries landed Mellencamp a record deal with MCA Records, although he failed to mention to the young kid from Indiana that he also now had a stage name: Johnny Cougar.

“DeFries started handing me this stuff like, ‘Well, you’re either gonna be Johnny Cougar or we’re not gonna release the record.’ Of course, I had already shot my mouth off to everybody at home, telling them that I had an album coming out and everybody’s going, ‘Sure, sure, sure.’ So I kind of had to get right with the program; I had to kind of get my mind right and get into the Tony DeFries mode of thinking.”

That mode of thinking resulted in a 1976 debut album that died without a trace. Chestnut Street Incident featured Johnny Cougar’s versions of such rock classics as Roy Orbison’s “Pretty Woman” and The Doors’ “Twentieth Century Fox.”

Johnny Cougar’s cover of The Doors’ “Twentieth Century Fox” from his ill-fated 1976 debut.

For someone who grew to become one of America’s greatest songwriters, there was no trace of that to be found on his debut album, which was only half filled with originals. Looking back, Mellencamp freely admits that he had no idea what he was doing artistically on that first recording.

“I had only written a handful of songs when I got my first record deal,” he noted. “In terms of songwriting, I definitely grew up in public. When I made that first record, I just played songs that I liked. That album really had no direction. I was completely lost about what it was that John Mellencamp was supposed to be doing on a record. My dream, or my plan, hadn’t gone that far because my initial quest was just to get a record deal, so once I got that record deal I didn’t quite know what to do with it.”

Phase Two Begins

Not surprisingly, after the failure of his first album, MCA dropped the young artist like a rock, as did DeFries. The following year in 1977, Mellencamp left Seymour, Indiana for Bloomington and quickly formed the nucleus of a band he called the Zone (featuring his longtime guitarists Mike Wanchic and Larry Crane). Songwriting also became a priority and soon afterwards he hooked up with Rod Stewart’s manager Billy Gaff, who also happened to have his own record label, Riva.

The 1978 album, A Biography, was recorded in London, but was only released in the UK and in Australia. Ironically, his song “I Need a Lover” became a Top Ten hit Down Under. With this growing confidence came his 1979 album simply titled John Cougar (no more Johnny), which would get a stateside release and also feature “I Need a Lover,” which became his first American Top 40 hit. Buoyed by much stronger material from Mellencamp’s pen, the album would go Gold.

But the best was yet to come when a young female rocker named Pat Benatar recorded “I Need a Lover” as the first single for her monster debut album, In the Heat of the Night.

Rookie rocker Pat Benatar recorded Mellencamp’s first American hit, “I Need a Lover.”

“Quite honestly, I was happy that Pat Benatar had a hit record with ‘I Need a Lover.’ I knew that it couldn’t do anything but help me, and that song was also a hit in Australia for me. So that song—regardless of what people think of it or what I may think of it today—really helped me considerably at that point in my career. I mean, Pat was one of the biggest breaking female artists at that time, so I was happy with any type of success I could get.”

(Interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

One Step Up, Two Steps Back

After extensive touring helped build a healthy core of fans for the newly christened John Cougar, the singer-songwriter returned to the studio with legendary guitarist/producer Steve Cropper to work on the all-important follow-up effort after his first taste of success. However Mellencamp says that the title of his 1980 album Nothin’ Matters and What If It Did, pretty much summed up his feelings at the time.

“I wasn’t particularly interested in having a career in the music business at that time,” he said candidly. “I had just met a girl, and I wasn’t too involved with the making of that record. I was either really pissed off or really jubilant during that time.”

Although the album contained two Top 40 hits, “Ain’t Even Done with the Night” and “This Time,” and eventually went platinum, Mellencamp’s ongoing distaste for the business of music came through loud and clear on the sarcastic “Cheap Shot,” which closed the album:

The record company’s going out of business
They’re pricing records too damn high
The boys in the band can use some assistance
Get a daytime job to get by

John Cougar’s 1980 hit, “Ain’t Even Done with the Night.”

The sentiments of “Cheap Shot” aren’t a whole lot different than how the industry veteran feels today: “I have always had a love/hate relationship with the record company; more hate than love,” he smirks. “I wrote that song basically to tell those people to kiss my ass. Young guys tend to do that, ya know.”

Superstardom Comes Knockin’

With two consecutive gold albums now on his resume, and new powerhouse drummer Kenny Aronoff joining the band, the small town rocker began work on his next album, but no one could have predicted what happened next. In fact, when Mellencamp delivered American Fool to his record company in 1982, the suits rejected it.

“The fuckin’ record company hated that album. They hated it!! They wanted ‘Nothin’ Matters’ to continue, and they wanted me to become like Neil Diamond or what that Michael Bolton guy is today. That’s how Mercury Records saw me at the time.”

(Interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

Standing firm against the powers-that-be, Mellencamp and the naysayers watched American Fool become the Number One Album in America, selling five million copies, on the strength of three hit singles—”Hurts So Good,” “Hand to Hold On To” and a little ditty about “Jack & Diane.”

“Yeah, I was surprised by the success of that record,” he told me. “We had two Top Ten singles and a Number One album at the same time. John Lennon, Michael Jackson and I are the only people that have accomplished that.

“We were just happier during the making of that record. We were a big bar band at the time, playing every club in the world. It was black leather jackets, motorcycles, tattoos, earrings, and that whole bit.”

(Interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

Tale of a Ditty

The story behind Mellencamp’s only chart-topping hit “Jack & Diane” is the tale of a song that almost never happened. It was guest guitarist Mick Ronson of David Bowie fame who actually saved the song from the dust bin of history.

“I had run into Mick Ronson in New York and he said that he wanted to come down and play on my album. So he came down to Miami, where we were recording American Fool. We had already recorded ‘Jack & Diane’ and it was ready to go in the shit can, because I just didn’t like the way it sounded and I didn’t really care for the song.

“Ronson had previously heard the tape in his apartment and he asked me if we were going to do anything with this ‘Jack & Diane’ song, and I said, ‘Well, it’s really not working for me.’ So he says, ‘Well, Johnny, you need to put some baby rattles on it.’ And I thought, ‘Baby rattles? What the fuck’s this guy talkin’ about?’

Mick Ronson pictured with David Bowie during their Ziggy Stardust period.

“So a couple of days later in the studio, Ronson kept asking to work on this ‘Jack & Diane’ song, and I kept telling him to forget it and to work on something else. So one night when we finished working on what I wanted to work on, he said, ‘Let’s work on this ‘Jack & Diane’ song [laughs].’

“I finally said, ‘Alright, but the middle section, the bridge section of the song isn’t happening at all.’ So what Ronson did was he punched out all the guitars and took them totally out of the mix. So you had this little choir singing, ‘Let it rock, let it roll, let the bible belt save your soul,’ and it sounded great. Then we just beefed up the drums.

“So, yeah, Ronson really turned ‘Jack & Diane’ around by eliminating the guitars in the middle bridge part and the ‘let it rock, let it roll’ part became this male choir, kind of a cheerleading section. And that’s the story of how Mick Ronson saved ‘Jack & Diane’.”

Flexing Some Muscle

With the blockbuster success of American Fool, Mellencamp felt in control of his artistic career for the first time in his life. And the follow-up, 1983’s Uh-Huh album, would be the first to feature his given name, although “Cougar” was still there for the time being.

“I was just tired of fuckin’ around with the ‘Johnny Cougar’ business, it had been an albatross around my neck for years,” he responded when I asked about why he kept his stage name after his initial success. “So I went to the record company and said, ‘Look, I know you guys have spent a lot of dough on this Cougar business but I want my real name on this album.’ They had no problem with it; they were pretty accommodating. It wasn’t any big independence thing, it was just something that should have been done long before that and I just didn’t do it.”

The compromise was to also keep the Cougar branding for the Uh-Huh album, but adding his given name to an album that featured much more personal songs made sense. In fact the first side of that album—”Crumblin’ Down,” “Pink Houses,” “The Authority Song” and “Warmer Place to Sleep”—remains of the greatest album sides in rock music. It was truly as if the Rolling Stones had been transplanted to America’s heartland.

Bolstered by three hit singles, including two more Top Ten hits—the angry “Crumblin’ Down” and the classic tale of small town life “Pink Houses”—Uh-Huh was the first album in which the singer-songwriter put together an entire album with no filler.

But don’t go thinking that Mellencamp has any idea what the magical formula for a hit song is. “As far as ‘hits’ go, I usually don’t start thinking about hit records until the record company gets involved,” he laughs, “because that’s always their first question: ‘How many hits do you got on it?’

“They don’t give a shit if the album’s any good or not, they only care about the two songs that they can sell to radio. It’s really quite an unnerving question to be asked after you’ve made an album because, to me, it really cheapens the whole album-making process.”

Oops!

Although Mellencamp scored nine consecutive platinum albums over the course of 15 years at the time of our interview, the sales of his last four million-sellers were down in comparison to the previous four albums, which had sold between three and five million each. In response, Mellencamp bristled at my question about record sales, with his easy-going demeanor showing signs of annoyance.

“I don’t understand these questions about sales, I don’t relate to them. I don’t understand what the fuck difference it makes. It’s nice to sell records, but, to me, the quality of music has maintained over the years.”

(Interview by Steven P. Wheeler)
Performing “What If I Came Knocking” from 1993’s Human Wheels album.

“It’s not like I went out and made a shitty record, although Whenever We Wanted probably wasn’t the greatest record. Big Daddy was a good record and I think Human Wheels is the best record I ever made. Even Paul Simon went through a period where he didn’t even sell 150,000 records, and then he makes Graceland in the late Eighties.

“Younger people want to have their own music, and I think that’s the way it should be,” he maintained. “But I don’t think my work has diminished in any fashion. I also think we sold more than three million copies with the last few records, but that’s not even the fuckin’ point. It doesn’t matter.

“The point is that I’m making the records that I want to make, I’m doing it at a pace that I want to do it, and I’ve always maintained that if people want to buy my records that’s great, and if they don’t that’s okay, too, because I do this now because I want to. Not because I have to or I need the money or because I feel like I have to prove something to somebody.”

Art vs. Commercialism

Taking a purely artistic road has its pitfalls for any recording artist. Some fans want to hear the same thing over and over, not unlike the record labels who like targeting a specific market. Artists from Dylan to U2 have all had to deal with this dichotomy throughout their career, and Mellencamp the artist is no exception.

“I don’t mean to sound jaded or mean-spirited,” he said after voicing his strong opinion, “but I’m not looking for a commercial bonanza. I need to make records that are entertaining to me, and to the guys in the band, things that are challenging to us.

“The thing is, I could probably go out and make a very commercial record if I wanted to, drawing on what’s going on today and the experience I’ve gained over the last 20 years in the music business,” he noted, without a hint of cockiness.

“As a matter of fact, I feel like you, Steve Wheeler, and I could go in the studio with you as the lead vocalist and we could probably cut a hit record, but it just depends on whether you want to be that corny or not. Where’s the line that a guy is willing to cross.”

“Radio has become a very throwaway type of situation today. I mean, Janet Jackson has had millions of hit records and I can’t name one of them to you, but I hear them all the time. The music on the radio today is more like elevator music.”

(Interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

“It’s like my song, ‘Biege to Biege’ says. Songs have to be beige, they have to fit into a very generic format so that these people can sell their advertising. I don’t feel compelled to make a beige record in order to fit into some Program Director’s format. If it happens by accident, that’s fine, but I don’t feel that I should plan it out or calculate it. Those types of things are better left for people like Bryan Adams or Jon Bon Jovi. I’m not particularly interested in that.”

Don’t Call Him a Spokesman

Beginning in 1983, with the popularity of “Pink Houses,” the media began labeling Mellencamp as a spokesman of sorts for those living in middle America’s heartland. This would become even more enhanced with 1985’s monster hit Scarecrow, which featured such hits as “Small Town” and the powerful musical statements targeting the plight of American farmers in “Rain on the Scarecrow” and “The Face of the Nation.”

This massive commercial success would continue with 1987’s The Lonesome Jubilee with classic songs like “Check It Out,” “Paper in Fire” and the fond look back at growing up in rural America on the intoxicating “Cherry Bomb.”

But Mellencamp downplays the media’s attempt to bring him into the role of Spokesman for the Heartland. “I never felt that it was my job to hang on a cross for anybody or to articulate how any particular sector of the country felt,” he explained. “I can only write about what I know about or what I aspire to be. When people did ask me about it, I just kind of laughed it off. I really didn’t pay that much attention to it.”

Wouldn’t that fly in the face of being one of the founders of the long-running benefit concert series known as Farm Aid, which continues to raise awareness and money for American farmers? The summer concert series began in 1985 and has continued for the 33 years with only two exceptions in 1988 and 1991, and has raised more than $50 million in the process.

Not so, says Mellencamp, who is still on the Farm Aid Board of Directors to this day, maintaining that the intent behind Farm Aid was not some naïve or idealistic belief that they would change the world. 

“Farm Aid was put together only to raise awareness. I always knew that we were never going to change any political or social policies, and we didn’t,” he explained. “Back in the Sixties, it took an entire generation of people fighting in the streets to end a war. That’s the kind of participation that it takes to change social policy or to change anything that’s going awry in this country.

“The idea that I could write a song or that Woody Guthrie could write a song that could change political policy is really nonsense. So the idea that writing a song or having a concert is going to do much more than entertain people and maybe raise a few dollars is really silly.”

John Cougar Mellencamp performing in 1985.

“I don’t mean to sound disgruntled or negative, it’s just the reality of the situation. If you look at anything that happened during the Eighties, whether it’s Hands Across America or Farm Aid or Live Aid or This-Aid or That-Aid, I don’t really think any of them made that much of a significant impact on the powers that be.”

(Interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

Final Thoughts

Since my interview with John a quarter of a century ago, the singer-songwriter has not slowed down in the recording studio, having released 11 more albums. Mellencamp, like Robert Plant, continues to explore new artistic territory when most of his contemporaries have either retired or tour the world resting on their laurels. And that is the essence of a true artist.

A few years ago in 2015, Bob Dylan was honored as MusiCares’ Person of the Year and the ceremony included Mellencamp and other artists performing songs from Dylan’s legendary catalog. And during his acceptance speech, Dylan said: “And like my friend John Mellencamp would sing, ‘one day you get sick and you don’t get better.’ That’s from a song of his called ‘Longest Days.’ It’s one of the better songs of the last few years, actually. I ain’t lying.”

Mellencamp said that this endorsement from The Bard himself was worth more than 10 Grammys. And after a career that now spans more than 40 years, John Mellencamp can indeed be mentioned in the same breath as the greatest American songwriters to have ever picked up a guitar and put a pen to paper. We are lucky he is still around 67 years on.
Remembering Harry Nilsson

Remembering Harry Nilsson

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By Steven P. Wheeler

On what would have been his 78th birthday today, June 15, I’m remembering the late great singer-songwriter Harry Nilsson. A few months before his untimely death in January of 1994, I was fortunate enough to interview this Grammy-winning musical enigma. Sadly, it was one of the final two interviews Nilsson ever did.

Watch the trailer for the powerful 2010 documentary, “Who Is Harry Nilsson (And Why is Everybody Talkin’ About Him?)”

At the time of my meeting with him in late 1993, Harry Nilsson was known as much for his incredibly versatile and golden voice, amazing and wide-ranging songwriting talent and often confusing choice of musical directions as he was for a legendary hedonistic streak that was now finally in the rearview mirror. He may have been going through personal and health issues when we met, but his sense of humor was still fully intact.

“Harry was a big bunny… with really sharp teeth.”

Paul Williams, songwriter/friend

During my days in corporate America, I used Harry’s brilliant lyric line from “Old Dirt Road,” recorded by his longtime pal John Lennon, as my email signature: “Shoveling smoke with a pitchfork in the wind.” While the bosses may never have liked it, those who did were instantly bonded with me (and Harry).

Speaking of Lennon, The Beatles were Nilsson’s biggest fans at a time when the Fab Four were the most colossal thing on Planet Earth. And after the Beatles’ split in 1970, Nilsson and Lennon worked together creatively (on Nilsson’s 1974 Pussy Cats album) and also gained infamy during Lennon’s “lost weekend” period at the time. A wild and crazy era that culminated with the drunken duo being literally thrown out of the Troubadour in West Hollywood, which became the stuff of legends.

Harry Nilsson and John Lennon are pictured being ejected from the Troubadour club after famously and obnoxiously heckling The Smothers Brothers who were performing. Nilsson would later tell Rolling Stone: “That incident ruined my reputation for 10 years.”

This Beatle connection continued through the years as Ringo Starr served as best man at Nilsson’s 1976 wedding to Una O’Keefe, who remained his wife until his death. The two had six children together to go along with a seventh child from one of Harry’s two previous marriages.

Bride Una and Groom Harry at their wedding in 1976. Ringo was his best man.

From Banker to Songwriter

Nilsson began his music career as a songwriter in the early Sixties, while still keeping his full-time job as a computer specialist for Security First National Bank in Van Nuys, California. His amazing singing voice was also starting to get noticed in the recording studio by other artists who were recording his early songwriting attempts; artists like Little Richard. He even worked with iconic producer Phil Spector at one point in 1964, co-writing some tunes.

The Fab Connection

By 1966, Nilsson released his debut album which went nowhere, but his sophomore effort Pandemonium Shadow Show at the end of 1967 caught the ear of the Fab Four and things would change forever. Nilsson’s album included two Beatle covers (“She’s Leaving Home” and “You Can’t Do That,” which became a modest first hit for him) and his self-penned “Cuddly Toy,” which was also recorded by The Monkees that same year.


Nilsson’s innovative cover of “You Can’t Do That” in 1967 includes more than a dozen lyrical snippets from other Beatle songs. One can consider it the harbinger of today’s “mash-up,” some 25 years before the term came into being.

During a press conference at the time, when asked about his favorite American artist, John Lennon said “Nilsson” and Paul McCartney agreed. This led to an avalanche of media phone calls to the little known American artist, and a trip to meet the Beatles soon followed.

It was in 1968, while Nilsson was scoring legendary director Otto Preminger’s soon-to-be celluloid flop, Skidoo. “I got a call from Derek Taylor [the Beatles’ publicist], who said that the boys wanted to know if I’d like to come down and see their sessions for the White Album,” he recalled during our conversation. “So I asked Otto for a week off and he agreed.” Harry does a humorous imitation of the German-born director, saying, ‘Yes, go see dem and ask dem to zing in my moo-vie’.”

Accordingly, Nilsson talked the director into paying for his flight to London, where he met Taylor at Apple headquarters. “Later that same afternoon, Paul McCartney called the office to say he was looking for songs for Mary Hopkins’ album,” he recalled. “So I wrote a song for her right then [‘The Puppy Song’] and Paul produced it.” Nilsson would record the song himself the following year, and his version would be used 30 years later in the opening credits of the Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan box-office hit, You’ve Got Mail.

“I went to John’s house and it was the same day that [John’s wife] Cynthia moved out and Yoko moved in. John and I stayed up all night and into the next day, just talking about life and philosophies and wives and divorce.”

(interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

But it was later in the evening on that same day which birthed a deep friendship with Lennon. “I went to John’s house and it was the same day that [John’s wife] Cynthia moved out and Yoko moved in,” he said, matter of factly. “John and I stayed up all night and into the next day, just talking about life and philosophies and wives and divorce.”

Fame Comes Knockin’

Mass success soon followed the Midas touch meeting with the Fabs with the release of his album, Aerial Ballet. Bolstered by the iconic hit “Everybody’s Talkin’,” which, a year later, would earn Nilsson the first of his two Grammys when the song reached dizzying heights by being featured in the classic Jon Voight/Dustin Hoffman film Midnight Cowboy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AzEY6ZqkuE
Nilsson performing the classic “Everybody’s Talkin'” in 1969.

While that song was penned by Fred Neil, another song from that same album, written by Nilsson, “One,” would became a million-selling hit for Three Dog Night. And when you’re on a roll, everything turns to gold, and anyone remembering the hit television series The Courtship of Eddie’s Father can instantly sing the theme song “Best Friend” that Nilsson wrote and sang during the making of Aerial Ballet. That famous song was strangely enough never included on a Nilsson album.

Three Dog Night sold a million copies of their version of Nilsson’s song “One” in 1969.
Harry, Ringo, Elton, Paul and Linda hanging out in 1976.

Throughout the early part of the Seventies, Nilsson’s legacy was cemented into pop music history with such iconic and varied hits as the Grammy-winning ballad “Without You,” the hilarious calypso classic “Coconut,” “Me and My Arrow,” “Jump Into the Fire,” “Spaceman” and “I Guess the Lord Must Be in New York City.”

Nilsson had an unlikely Top Ten hit with the humorous ditty, “Coconut,” released on the same album as the classic mournful ballad “Without You,” which topped the charts the same year.

And being the maverick that he was, all of this success was accomplished without Nilsson EVER performing a concert or going on tour. When we discussed this bizarre fact, Nilsson would only say, with a laugh, “I never did a concert, and I think I may be the first singer-songwriter to not do that,” before adding that he did join Ringo Starr onstage for one performance of “Without You” in September of 1992.

Harry, sandwiched between two of rock’s craziest drummers, Ringo Starr and The Who’s Keith Moon. Sadly, Ringo is the sole survivor of this talented trio.

“It’s funny because Ringo and I met in our twenties, and in our thirties we talked about performing in our forties. But we didn’t actually get around to doing it until our fifties [laughs].”

(interview by Steven P. Wheeler)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEd6Wkx_rCI
One of pop music’s greatest ballads was written by Badfinger’s Pete Ham and Tom Evans, but it was Nilsson’s vocal performance that brought the song to life, sending it to the top of the charts and securing his second Grammy Award.

Studio to the Screen

Beginning with his 1970 album The Point, which was followed by an animated film adaption written by Nilsson and airing on ABC shortly after the album’s release, the singer-songwriter dabbled with the visual arts throughout his career. He starred with Ringo in the ill-fated rock-horror-comedy Son of Dracula in 1974. In the Eighties, Nilsson formed a production company, Hawkeye, with screenwriter Terry Southern. He also wrote all the songs for the Robin Williams film Popeye, and even co-wrote the screenplay for the 1988 Whoopi Goldberg film The Telephone, which was directed by Rip Torn. However, ultimately, the success Nilsson found in music he didn’t find in film.

Final Words

At the time of our interview, Harry Nilsson was recording some demos with the help of producers Mark Hudson and Andy Cahan. In fact, it was Cahan who contacted me asking me to do an interview with Harry as a way of letting record companies know that the former star was working on new material.

The reasons for this were two-fold. Nilsson, who hadn’t released an album since 1980, would need a record deal and he also had some very bad luck in the previous two years. First, it was discovered that his longtime accountant had been embezzling from him, resulting in Nilsson having to file for bankruptcy. At the time of our interview the accountant was serving a four-year prison sentence. Then on Valentine’s Day in 1993, Nilsson suffered a major heart attack.

Despite it all, his sense of humor shone through in discussions about his flamboyant past and even when he talked about his latest material, which included a country-styled song he called, “What’s a 245-Pound Man Like Me (Doin’ On a Woman Like You).” Now that’s Harry.

His final words to me that day spoke volumes: “I need things to make me laugh these days.” Harry Nilsson passed away from heart failure on January 15, 1994.

Posthumous Releases

A year later, in 1995, the two-CD anthology Personal Best: The Harry Nilsson Anthology was released. And fifteen years after that the long-awaited and powerful documentary film Who is Harry Nilsson (And Why is Everybody Talkin’ About Him?) was finally released to theaters and DVD in 2010.

The wide-ranging cast of famous friends and associates who speak candidly about their one-of-a-kind friend in the film is staggering, from the musical world (Brian Wilson, Randy Newman, Al Kooper, Yoko Ono, Jimmy Webb and Paul Williams) to the comedy and film universe (Robin Williams, Eric Idle and Terry Gilliam). It’s a riveting warts-and-all look into the life and times of a musical genius and totally unique artist.

A must-see film which ranks with the best music docs ever made.

I’m humbled I got the chance to spend some time with Harry and I find it nice to think of Nilsson and Lennon sharing their thoughts together again. Oh to be a fly on that wall…

Since it’s the weekend, here are two of Harry’s most off-color cult favorites “You’re Breakin’ My Heart” (aka “The F#@k You Song”) and “I’d Rather Be Dead.”

Featuring an all-star band of Peter Frampton, Klaus Voormann, Nicky Hopkins, Barry Morgan, and the Rolling Stones’ horn section of Bobby Keys and Jim Price.
Harry leads a choir of British pensioners, some of whom seem quite confused by the song.
David Bowie: Man of a Thousand Phases

David Bowie: Man of a Thousand Phases

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By Steven P. Wheeler

Today, June 11, marks the 50th anniversary of the release of the late David Bowie’s 1969 hit, “Space Oddity.” To celebrate, I’ve gone back through the tapes of my 1995 interview with the rock legend. Hope you enjoy this refreshed take on this special man (see “class act, gentleman”), who is still missed three years after his untimely death.

22-year-old David Bowie performing “Space Oddity” for the first time on television.

IF ever there was a rock star who epitomized the life of a musical chameleon, it would be David Bowie—not only in his art, but in his look and attitude. I had the pleasure of sitting down and speaking with Bowie, who was at the S.I.R. Rehearsal Studios in New York rehearsing his new band in preparation for his upcoming concert tour behind his just released Outside album.

Unlike his previous rock star roles, with Outside, Bowie took on not one, but seven new characters in this strange musical drama that documents the diaries of fictional detective Nathan Adler during his investigation of ritual art murders. At the time, Bowie spoke of possibly bringing this to a full stage production, which he described as “Nicholas Nickleby on acid,” however this idea was ultimately never to come to fruition.

David Bowie, at the time of our interview, in 1995.

As questionable as Outside was as a commercial venture, you would expect nothing less from a rock legend who in the past had duetted with a bizarre blend of performers, including Mick Jagger, Freddie Mercury and… Bing Crosby?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9kfdEyV3RQ
In one of those head-scratching musical moments, the eccentric rock star David Bowie got together with pop crooner Bing Crosby for this yuletide duet on the 1977 TV special Bing Crosby’s Merrie Olde Christmas. Crosby died five weeks later. A single of the song was finally released in 1982 and became one of the biggest hits in Bowie’s career. The duet remains a classic holiday hit around the world to this day.

Throughout his 50-year career, Bowie shed his various personas like a snake abandons its skin, never content to expand on successful characters, instead choosing to move in entirely different directions at the height of his various stages of popularity—and doing it more often than lesser artists would dare.

From his early days as Davy Jones in the mid-Sixties (he would adopt the name Bowie when another “Davey” Jones gained stardom with the American TV group The Monkees) and his self-titled stage name debut in ’67 to his glitter-glam era as Ziggy Stardust in the early Seventies—Bowie mastered the value of shock-rock by playing up social taboos.

For example, in 1971, he made news during his first visit to the States after wearing dresses in public appearances, and then admitting his bisexuality a year later. Bowie actually posed in a dress for his now-landmark album The Man Who Sold the World, although his American record label nixed the dress pic and replaced it with a cartoon of a cowboy in front of an insane asylum.

Bowie donning his “man-dress” for the album cover of 1970’s The Man Who Sold the World. Mercury Records in the U.S. refused to use the cover for its stateside release, instead using a cartoon of a cowboy standing in front of an asylum.

Since that time, Bowie has been married a couple of times, including his final marriage to supermodel Iman, leading many to wonder over the years if he was merely using the earlier bisexuality angle for promotional purposes.

“It wasn’t a shock value thing,” Bowie told me. “It was just the way I was at that age. Frankly, I don’t think there was anyone else around working so provocatively at that particular time, but [bisexuality] was a taboo subject, and I felt that it was something that probably needed to be brought out.”

Bowie performing as his most famous alter-ego Ziggy Stardust in 1973.

Unlike the commercial consequences that happened to Elton John’s career following his own bisexuality admission in 1976, Bowie’s commercial fortunes continued to soar, reaching new heights with The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars (#75), Aladdin Sane (#17), the Orwellian-influenced Diamond Dogs (#5) and the R&B-flavored sound of Young Americans (#9), featuring the chart-topping ode to hedonism “Fame,” co-written with former Beatle John Lennon, which perfectly encapsulated the excesses of the Seventies rock lifestyle.

John Lennon and David Bowie pictured in 1975. They co-wrote Bowie’s classic “Fame.”

During his brief stint as the Thin White Duke—a period which included his highest charting album, Station To Station—Bowie’s life in the fast lane was fueled by cocaine. He finally left the Tinsel Town in 1976 after being quoted at the time as saying that Los Angeles should be “wiped off the face of the earth.”

When we talked about this period of time, Bowie said that it was the hedonistic lifestyle, more than his often schizophrenic role-playing that led to his exodus and a new phase in his roller-coaster career. “I think my own personal life put me in some fairly chaotic and dangerous states in the Seventies,” he said. “But I had pretty much gotten out of playing characters in ’76, which is when I moved back to Europe—to West Berlin—and started to work with [producer/Roxy Music alumnus] Brian Eno. By that time, I was trying to approach things from a very different standpoint.”

Bowie performing “Heroes” on Top of the Pops in 1977.

The change was significant. Bowie and Eno would incorporate the European techno sound in a trilogy of albums—Low, Heroes and Lodger—three of the most influential albums of his storied career, whose impact on a new generation of musicians is perhaps even stronger today than it was at the time of their release.

Role-Playing & Artistic Freedom

Bowie’s penchant for role-playing remains unparalleled in rock history, but the ever-changing rock star says this was the only way to guarantee him artistic freedom: “As an artist, I was never interested in developing and having a continuum in style. For me, style was just something to use. It didn’t matter to me if it was hard rock or punk or whatever, it was whether or not it suited what I was trying to say at a particular point in time.

“It has always been essential to me that my public perception was such that I’d be left free to kind of float from one thing to another. That’s just how I work. I’m not a guy who learns a craft and then refines that craft over 25 or 30 years. I’m not that kind of artist. Maybe it sounds pretentious, but I feel that I’m much more of a post-modernist than that.”

(interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

Of course, the other side of the music “business” is occupied by those suit-and-tie folks wanting to maintain a successful formula, something that Bowie has had to battle throughout his storied career: “It’s extremely hard to have somebody from a record company continually coming into the sessions and meddling about. I really can’t work under those circumstances,” he says, before adding with a hearty laugh, “That’s generally what leads to my breakdowns: record companies.”

Film vs. Music

In addition to his recording career, Bowie was also one of the first rock stars to dabble seriously in film. His fascination began in 1969 with a 30-minute promotional film, including the then-yet-to-be-released single, “Space Oddity,” with its lyrical tale of a man detached from society, desperately trying to get in touch with those who control his destiny. It was pure Bowie, and it set the stage for the otherworldly image that would dominate his early career.

During the late Seventies and early Eighties, Bowie took his film desires to a new level, bringing his knack for characterization to the Silver Screen and receiving positive reviews for his performances in such films as The Man Who Fell To Earth, Just A Gigolo and The Hunger, as well as taking over the lead role in the stage version of The Elephant Man, where he would gain critical acclaim while breaking box-office records. Bowie also played Andy Warhol in 1996’s Basquiat, a film starring Gary Oldman, Christopher Walken and Dennis Hopper.

Bowie, pictured with co-stars Catherine Deneuve and Susan Sarandon, on the set of 1983’s erotic horror film, The Hunger.

But the renaissance man notes that he was never in danger of actively pursuing the thespian life: “No, I never thought about giving up music for acting,” he said. “Acting is not on my list of priorities. It’s actually extremely boring. I can’t understand how actors can do it; it’s so vegetating.”

As for his role as the iconic Warhol in Basquiat, Bowie did meet the real Andy, but there wasn’t much there for him in terms of researching the character: “I met him five or six times, but I can’t say that I knew him. It was more like [imitates Warhol’s whispery voice], ‘hi…..great,’ and that was kind of the depth of our dialogue over the years [laughs]. But I kind of got a vibe of what he looked like and how he sounded and that sort of thing.”

Bowie as Andy Warhol in a scene from 1996’s Basquiat.

Still, many felt his film and stage career had been to the detriment of his recording career, although 1980’s Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) would help re-establish Bowie on the American charts.

New Highs & New Lows

In 1981, Bowie teamed up with Queen to score a hit with “Under Pressure,” but the best was yet to come. In 1983, with a new label in tow, EMI America, he released his commercial blockbuster, Let’s Dance. Its three hit singles—the #1 title track, “China Girl” and “Modern Love”—solidified the return of one of rock’s most flamboyant personalities, proving that he had not forgotten how to make great accessible music.

The subsequent Serious Moonlight Tour would be Bowie’s biggest and most successful of his career to that point. Incidentally, a remastered two-CD recording from the tour, featuring 21 tracks, was finally released just this past February.

The follow-up, Tonight (featuring the Top Ten hit “Blue Jean”), kept Bowie alive on the charts, as did his Top Ten duet with Mick Jagger on their revival of the Martha & the Vandellas classic “Dancing In The Streets,” which they recorded for the famed Live Aid concerts in 1985.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNvkOLYz9I4
Bowie joined Tina Turner on her 1985 tour for this medley performance of “Let’s Dance.”

However by the late Eighties, Bowie’s career took a commercial dip, and his 1987 release, Never Let Me Down, became his lowest charting album in a decade.

Ironically, critics and fans alike seemed surprised—strange as it may seem considering this musical Lon Chaney’s bizarre past and multi-faceted career. Such changes would seem expected from a man who discovered stardom by following his artistic instincts rather than trendy mass mentalities that drive most rock stars.

Tin Machine Project

But no one, least of all his label, EMI America, could have expected what came next. The ill-fated Tin Machine project surely had EMI executives biting their tongues and scratching their heads as Bowie approached them with tales of his new band—one in which he was merely a member and no longer the star.

EMI released the band’s self-titled debut in 1989, and it proved to be a major commercial disappointment. Bowie left EMI for the greener pastures of fledgling label Victory Music, which released the band’s equally unsuccessful sophomore effort.

Bowie having fun with Tin Machine bandmates during a television soundcheck.

With his solo career in limbo and his last two projects having bombed, Bowie—who had previously been able to hit paydirt throughout a majority of his various incarnations—had finally raised questions within the industry as to whether or not he still had what it took to capture the public imagination in America.

“The Tin Machine project more or less broke down any context about who the hell I was or what I was doing and kind of left everybody wondering, ‘What the fuck is he? Wasn’t he the bloke in a suit in 1983 [laughs]?’”

(interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

For the man himself, he noted that it was just another necessary move to find a new muse: “For me, when Reeves Gabrels and I started Tin Machine, it was a very freeing process. The Tin Machine project more or less broke down any context about who the hell I was or what I was doing and kind of left everybody wondering, ‘What the fuck is he? Wasn’t he the bloke in a suit in 1983 [laughs]?’ It was just a great way to move forward and get back the excitement that I was missing within my own writing in the mid-Eighties.”

1993’s Black Tie, White Noise didn’t change anyone’s mind either. Bowie, having left Tin Machine behind, signed a solo deal with a new label, Savage, then watched as the new album sank without a trace in the U.S. (although it reportedly sold more than a million copies internationally). Savage eventually closed its doors, almost at the time of the album’s stateside release.

Was it fate or was David Bowie’s career in the U.S. just snakebitten?

Whatever the reason for the U.S. failure of Black Tie, White Noise, one would expect this to be the time for Bowie to return to the mainstream, to recapture the glory days of the Seventies or even the commercial blockbuster era of the early Eighties.

The Eno Reunion

So what does the former Mr. Stardust decide to do?

He reunites with the most eccentric of his former collaborators, Brian Eno (their first reunion since 1979’s Lodger) and Tin Machine guitarist Reeves Gabrels, and releases Outside. And if you were expecting a return to the pop sounds of Let’s Dance, you would have had to raid the classics already housed in your CD collection, as there was no joyful pop to be found.

This musical reunion came about in the strangest of ways, as then-groom David Bowie laughingly recalls: “We had hardly been in touch throughout the Eighties, but I invited him to my wedding in 1992, and he came with his wife, and we spent most of our time at the party afterwards talking about what we were both doing musically.”

The two men soon took over the DJ booth as well, probably to the chagrin of his new bride: “We were going back and forth to the DJ putting on different tracks that we were both writing [laughs]. It almost became a listening session, with people dancing until the record was taken off, and then another one would go on.

“But from that meeting, we determined that we both still had very similar musical ideas, so it was obvious by the end of that day, that it was time for us to start working together again—although it wasn’t until February or March of ’94 that we actually entered the studio.”

Is this any way to re-capture old fans and win new ones?

The answer to that question was what Bowie had always done. Challenge old and new fans alike, even bringing in Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor to remix the album’s first single, “The Hearts Filthy Lesson,” which put him back on the American Singles Charts after a long stateside drought, while continuing his British success.

Europe vs. America

As for the different successes in his two homelands, Bowie said: “I’ve always been aware that in Europe I’ve carried a certain amount of weight and I kind of know what my contribution to European music has been over the last 25 years. But in America, I’ve never really been sure. It’s always been fairly ephemeral. I sort of come over and do a tour and go away again. You never hear people say, ‘Oh yeah, Springsteen, Pearl Jam and David Bowie’ [laughs]

“You don’t think of me and American music. It’s only since the late Eighties that a new generation of bands has seemed to hone in on a lot of what I was doing—things as varied as the Scary Monsters album to the Aladdin Sane and Diamond Dogs stuff, and the trilogy I did with Eno.”

(interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

Across the pond, he senses more artistic freedom for artists in general, pointing to some of the artists who were making noise in the Nineties. “In Europe, it has really become a stylistic free-for-all,” he says, “which I find incredibly exciting, especially with bands like Portishead and Tricky and PJ Harvey—artists who move around virtually anywhere they want. It feels like they’re my children [laughs].”

Additionally, Bowie’s continued influence over bands in the States cannot be overstated and he is quick to note how much he was not only surprised but incredibly grateful. “Starting with bands like the Pixies and moving through bands like Stone Temple Pilots and Smashing Pumpkins, I started reading a lot of interviews with these bands that were sent to me by my PR firm, and these bands were citing me and my music as being an influence on what they were doing.

“Then the Nirvana thing happened where they covered ‘The Man Who Sold The World’, and then I read a piece on Nine Inch Nails, where Trent was saying that my album, Low, was sort of his morning listening before he went into the studio when he was recording The Downward Spiral. I must admit that my ego was massaged like you wouldn’t believe.”

The Burroughs’ Effect

Probably no other literary figure in history has influenced as many rock musicians as one William Burroughs, and no artist as much as Bowie. One of the primary central figures of the Beat Generation, the influential author of the 1959 novel, Naked Lunch, had a profound impact on Bowie, especially in his bizarre lyric-writing method which he never stopped utilizing.

“As a lyricist, I chop up all my ideas in the typical William Burroughs way that I’ve been utilizing since the Seventies,” Bowie explained. “I guess I used this process for the first time on [the 1974 album] Diamond Dogs, because I was—and still am—a real fan of William Burroughs [who passed away in 1997].”

Bowie demonstrates his lyrical “cut-up” technique that he learned from William Burroughs.

“I used to do it with scissors and glue—cut and paste—but this time I had a computer program to do it, which makes it a lot faster than doing it by hand. So the computer contributed an awful lot to the lyric writing.

“I would type in three different subjects into the computer, and then the computer has a randomizing program, and it would take each sentence and divide it into three or four and then remix with one of the other sentences, so you get an extraordinarily weird juxtaposition of ideas.

“Some of the sentences that came back out were so great that I put them straight into the songs, and some of them just sparked off further ideas. There would be some weird reverberation that I’d feel from one of the sentences, and I’d just fly off on that.”

(interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

Around the time of his Ziggy Stardust days, Bowie actually did get to spend time with his literary champion. “Yeah, I got to meet [Burroughs] in 1972, and he became my mentor,” he says with a fond smile. “I just felt that he was so stylistically important to the end of the 20th Century. Frankly, that’s where my fondness for trilby hats came from [laughs]: Big Bill in his suit and tie and hat and that crazy mind inside. I always found that kind of character really appealing.”

Bowie posing with William Burroughs for Rolling Stone in 1974.

Legacy & Tributes

One thing that never happened during Bowie’s lifetime is that he never endorsed a proper tribute album of songs from his extensive catalog, recorded by other artists. Something he fought against at the time of our interview. “Not if I can help it [laughs], and believe me that many-headed Hydra has come up quite a few times.

“Funny enough, I got a report back from my publishers just last week, and in June alone I had eighteen covers, which is extraordinary to me because I thought they were kind of hidden from the world. But recently, that’s been changing. Dinosaur Jr. even did ‘Quicksand’ [laughs]. It’s really odd to suddenly see all these songs getting another life in another area.”

As for another honor, induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Bowie said he had absolutely no interest in becoming an inductee. “It doesn’t bother me at all, not even faintly. I’ve got too many other things to do to even think about that situation. I look at that place as just another institution, nothing more than that.”

Ironically, in 1996, one year after my interview with Bowie, he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. And true to his word, Bowie did not attend the ceremony nor did he even issue a statement in acknowledgement of the honor. Instead Talking Heads’ leader David Byrne handled the induction speech and Madonna accepted the award on Bowie’s behalf.

David Bowie was always true to his word and his art. And while we need more like him, there will never be another. RIP David.

For a Laugh

Last thing I’ll say is that David Bowie was truly a class act, a gentleman with a contagious laugh and a quick wit, who didn’t take himself too seriously. I am thrilled that I did get to share some laughs with him, if even for just an hour. A true honor. Here are just a few vids for some laughs…

Conan O’Brien takes a walk down memory lane at the time of Bowie’s passing in 2016.
I can’t help but believe Bowie would laugh uproariously at this silent footage of the “Dancing in the Street” video that he and Mick Jagger made to help raise money for Live Aid in 1985.
“Rocketman” – Movie vs. Reality

“Rocketman” – Movie vs. Reality

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By Steven P. Wheeler

When it comes to the life and career of legendary singer-songwriter Elton John, fantasy really is more reality than fiction and now Rocketman, a cinematic overview of his life has been brought to the Silver Screen in a glitzy over-the-top Broadway fashion as envisioned by director Dexter Fletcher, with Taron Egerton in the title role. This musical-meets-drama approach should surprise no one as Captain Fantastic himself has spent a half-a-century splashing himself across global concert stages and tattered tabloids with all the subtlety of a Fourth of July nighttime sky.

Fans of Elton and his longtime lyricist Bernie “The Brown Dirt Cowboy” Taupin (portrayed by Jamie Bell in the movie) may cringe at the historical goofs laid out in Fletcher’s film, but casual fans will pay no heed to such trivial outrage. Both factions can (and should) just sit back and enjoy this musical celebration of the former Reginald Dwight’s meteoric rise, hedonistic fall, and Phoenix-like rebirth that is at the center of this amazing life story.

Those of us who already know the real story will just have to let go of the factual inaccuracies and climb aboard for a roller coaster ride of emotions buoyed by the John/Taupin catalog of songs that is unparalleled in the annals of pop music, both in terms of quality, quantity and longevity.

As Elton recently wrote of his 52-year relationship with Taupin: “Outside of my husband and children, [Bernie is] the most important relationship in my life, we really love each other and the film captures that. There’s a scene in Rocketman where he comes to visit me in rehab, and that started me sobbing again. It happened just the same way in real life. Bernie was one of the people who tried to tell me to stop doing drugs. I wouldn’t listen until years later, but he stuck by me, he never gave up on me, and he was so relieved and happy when I finally got help.

“Bernie was apprehensive about the film. He read the script and he didn’t like the fantasy aspects of it. ‘But that didn’t happen, that’s not true’–very Bernie. Then he saw it and completely got it. I don’t think he actually burst into tears, but he was incredibly moved by it. He understood the point of it, which was to make something that was like my life: chaotic, funny, mad, horrible, brilliant and dark. It’s obviously not all true, but it’s the truth.”

For those who have seen Rocketman (and those who have yet to), here’s just some random fun to help celebrate the 50+ year career of Elton John and his lyrical partner Bernie Taupin, without whom Elton John would not exist.

Watch this historic video of the actual writing of a soon-to-be John/Taupin classic called “Tiny Dancer.” The song is about Bernie’s first wife, Maxine, a SoCal Valley girl (“L.A. Lady”), who he met during their first trip to America in 1970. Maxine did come up with some of Elton’s early stage costumes, hence the lyrical line “seamstress for the band.”

“I don’t think you can get two people who are more different than Elton and I. We’re like brothers and we love each other dearly, but we’re both just very, very different people. I think the music is the thread that binds us together, and our love for it. We give each other enough space to conduct our lives, and we come together for the pure enjoyment of writing songs.”
– Bernie Taupin on his 50-year songwriting partnership with Elton

(interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

The Legendary Troubadour Show

It was in late August of 1970 that an unknown singer-songwriter from England named Elton John made his American concert debut at the famous Troubadour club in Los Angeles for a six-night engagement. With nothing more than a piano and the brilliant rhythm section of drummer Nigel Olsson and bassist Dee Murray, the tiny, spectacled and bearded John would launch an unparalleled superstar career now entering its 50th year.

August 25, 1970 was an otherwise mundane Tuesday night in West Hollywood, but the opening night performance of Elton’s now-legendary stint at Troubadour would become the thing that dreams are made of. Promoting his self-titled debut album, which was a moody and heavily orchestrated album of ballads (“Your Song,” “Sixty Years On”), rockers (“Take Me to the Pilot,” “The Cage”) and epics (“The King Must Die”), no one could have predicted what happened next.

In truth, Elton fought against coming to America at this early juncture in his career as the album was not selling, but Russ Regan, the head of his stateside record label, Uni, would not take “no” for an answer. Reluctantly, Elton, Bernie, Nigel and Dee arrived in Los Angeles where none other than Neil Diamond introduced the fledgling talent to the packed club. Regan and publicist Norman Winter had turned up the hype machine and the celebrities were out in force, from Quincy Jones and Elton’s personal idol Leon Russell to Neil Young and members of the Beach Boys.

The word was out but no one really knew what to expect from this unknown talent and many felt this would be a subdued and introspective performance from a ballad-centric, piano-playing, singer-songwriter. Instead they were treated to a raucous performance that Rolling Stone would ultimately put in its list of “The Top 10 Most Important Concerts in Rock History.”

The bearded Elton John in action at his history-making opening night at the Troubadour. (Photo by Ed Caraeff)
(Photo by Andrew Kent)

“We just made a lot of noise [at that Troubadour show]. It was new. Elton was experimenting. Plus, [Nigel and I] had to make up for the lack of an orchestra [so prominent on the album]. We just socked it to them.”
– Dee Murray, bassist

(Rolling Stone interview, 1987)

The totally unique three-piece outfit of John, Olsson and Murray (yep, no guitarist in sight, and certainly no “Crocodile Rock” as depicted in Rocketman as that pop ditty wouldn’t be written until two years later) literally ripped the roof off the Troubadour and two days later, on August 27, Robert Hilburn of the L.A. Times literally declared Elton to be rock’s next superstar. Hilburn culminated his influential review with these words: “By the end of the evening, there was no question about John’s talent and potential. Tuesday night at the Troubadour was just the beginning. He’s going to be one of rock’s biggest and most important stars.”

By January of 1971, “Your Song” would crack the Top 10 and the rest is pop music history.

My Gift is My Song

Bernie Taupin’s orginal handwritten lyrics for the classic “Your Song.”

Released in 1970, “Your Song” was the song that turned the tide for the little-known songwriting duo of Reginald Dwight and Bernie Taupin, who had been failing at getting their songs covered by recording artists for two full years. That all changed when Reg Dwight the composer became Elton John the recording artist. Penned by the teenage poet at the breakfast table in Elton’s mother’s flat, where the two songwriters shared bunk beds, this was the first Top Ten hit for the John/Taupin team.

“‘Your Song’ has got to be one of the most naive and childish lyrics in the entire repertoire of music, but I think the reason it still stands up is because it was real at the time. I was 17 years old and it was coming from someone whose outlook on love or experience with love was totally new and naive. Now I could never write that song again or emulate it because the songs I write now that talk about love usually deal with broken marriages and where the children go [laughs]. You have to write from where you are at a particular point in time, and ‘Your Song’ is exactly where I was coming from back then.”
– Bernie Taupin

(interview by Steven P. Wheeler)

Someone Saved My Life Tonight

While Rocketman points out Elton’s 1975 suicide attempt two days before the two biggest concerts of his career at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, the film doesn’t reference Elton’s first suicide attempt in 1968. This first one inspired Bernie to pen the lyrics of the 1975 hit, “Someone Saved My Life Tonight,” the epic cornerstone of the John/Taupin autobiographical chart-topping album, Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy.

This brilliant album detailed, in chronological order, the lives of the Pinner pianist and the Lincolnshire lyricist from their first meeting up until their little-known British debut album, Empty Sky, covering the years 1967-69. (Empty Sky wouldn’t be released in America until 1975 capitalizing on Elton’s fame at the time.) In 2006, Bernie and Elton released their phenomenal autobiographical follow-up, The Captain and the Kid, which covered their story from their arrival in the States in 1970 to the present day. Both albums are must-haves for John/Taupin fans and you can read a detailed song-by-song account of The Captain and the Kid here, which truly serves as the true musical bio of John and Taupin’s incredible life together. But I digress…

Made with only a passing reference in the film, which shows Bernie imploring the then-Reginald Dwight to break off his marriage engagement at a time when his musical career had yet to begin. Here’s the real story…

In 1968, struggling composer Reginald Dwight (the name Elton John or even the notion of becoming a performer were not even a thought at this point) and his lyrical partner Bernie Taupin were living together in the East End of London, along with not-yet-out-of-the-closet Reg’s fiance Linda Woodrow.

Linda Hannon (formerly Linda Woodrow, pictured in 2010) was the fiance of Reginald Dwight (aka Elton John) in 1968, before he reluctantly broke off the engagement shortly before the wedding on the advice of friends Bernie Taupin and Long John Baldry. A distraught Reginald attempted suicide right afterwards, which was chronicled in the 1975 hit, “Someone Saved My Life Tonight.”

Reg and Linda were almost two years into their relationship and only a few weeks from their marriage ceremony when Taupin and Reg’s mentor Long John Baldry (who is ridiculously excised from the entire film) went out drinking one fateful night. Taupin and Baldry were adamant in telling Dwight that he had to call off the marriage.

Baldry going so far as saying, “You’re more in love with Bernie than you are with this woman.” In Taupin’s lyrical recollection, Baldry is the life saving “Sugar Bear” made famous in the song. Elsewhere, Taupin is scathing in his lyrics towards Woodrow on behalf of his musical brother: “You almost had your hooks in me, didn’t you dear / You nearly had me roped and tied / Altar-bound, hypnotized / Sweet freedom whispered in my ear”

Watch Elton’s phenomenal vocal performance of “Someone Saved My Life Tonight” in this stunning 1976 solo performance.

In terms of Elton’s first suicide attempt that followed this breakup, according to Taupin, it was more comical than anything else. Awakened by the smell of gas coming from the kitchen, Taupin assumed that someone had left the stove on. Upon examination, Taupin found his roommate with his head near the gas oven. Instead of panicking, Taupin laughed at the sight before him as Elton had not only carefully placed a fluffy pillow under his head for comfort, but he also left the windows open.

John & Taupin Split Up

While it’s true that Bernie Taupin and Elton John put their songwriting collaboration on hold following 1976’s Blue Moves album, the split only lasted one album, Elton’s uneventful A Single Man in 1978, in which Elton paired up with lyricist Gary Osborne. Taupin took that time to collaborate with his longtime friend Alice Cooper on 1978’s From the Inside, an excellent concept album dealing with drug abuse and rehab, which included the hit single “How You Gonna See Me Now.”

By the time of their hiatus, Elton and Bernie had released 14 albums(!) in only six years in order fulfill a backbreaking contract that called for two albums each and every year (not three as stated in the film). Between 1972-75, they would release seven consecutive #1 albums, and Elton and his band–guitarist Davey Johnstone, drummer Nigel Olsson and bassist Dee Murray–would embark on a non-stop touring schedule around the globe.

As Johnstone told me in discussing the height of Elton-mania back in 1995: “It was an extremely outrageous band. I have no idea how we survived. The funny thing is, Elton and the band had an image of making good music, so we never really had a reputation for being a hard-partying band. But in actual fact, it was completely nuts.”

It was amidst this madness that Taupin felt the need to pull himself out of the crazy water they were engulfed in. “That period of time is a little foggy,” he told me during one of our interviews. “We were at the high point there of abusing ourselves to the max. It was Jack Daniels and lines on the console.

“What was happening at that time, and probably the reason we were so screwed up, is that we had done everything,” the lyricist recalls. “There was no mountain to scale or to conquer anymore. We had filled the biggest stadiums. We had seven consecutive #1 albums and you know that every album you do from now on is not going to go to #1.

“At that point in time, Elton John farting would have sold,” Taupin says without a hint of a laugh, “and that’s intense pressure to be under because you suddenly realize that there’s no place to go, but down. And after the Blue Moves album in 1976, I had to get away. I moved to Mexico for six months to dry out, because I think we were all killing ourselves.”

Over the ensuing six years, Elton would include a handful of Taupin lyrics on each of his next three albums, choosing to still include words from other lyricists. But that all changed with 1983’s Too Low For Zero, the first album since 1976 to feature exclusively John/Taupin material throughout, including new classics “I’m Still Standing” and “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” which introduced Elton to the MTV generation. Since that reunion 35 years ago, Elton’s 15 official studio albums have featured only the words of Bernie Taupin.

Outside of his work with Elton, Taupin has released several solo albums, including the brilliant 1996 album, Last Stand in Open Country, with his band Farm Dogs. He also co-wrote such #1 hits as “These Dreams” (intended for Stevie Nicks, but recorded by Heart) and “We Built This City” for Starship. In 2003, Taupin’s “Mendicino County” won a Grammy for the duet by Willie Nelson and Leann Womack, and a few years later, Taupin picked up a Golden Globe for his lyrics to “A Love That Will Never Grow Old” from the film Brokeback Mountain.

The sublime “Barstool,” written and sung by Bernie Taupin with his band Farm Dogs.

“Rocketman” Nerd Patrol

As noted previously, Elton himself said of Rocketman: “It’s obviously not all true, but it’s the truth.” And here are just a handful of untruths that are littered throughout the film…

1. The Name Game

Early bandmates Elton Dean and Long John Baldry, from whom Reg Dwight created his soon-to-be-famous moniker Elton John.

Elton took his stage name from two early musical associates–saxophonist Elton Dean and renown British band leader Long John Baldry, with whom our unknown Reginald Dwight played keyboards for. He did not take the “John” from his future friend and Beatle John Lennon as insinuated in the film.

2) Songs Not Yet Written

Bernie Taupin and Reg Dwight in 1967. The two budding songwriters had been signed to a publishing deal with The Beatles’ publisher Dick James (right). Their job was to write songs for the likes of Tom Jones, Lulu and Engelbert Humperdink. There were no plans to ever be recording artists at that point in time.

When Elton auditions for a songwriting deal in 1967, he plays snippets of songs for the Beatles’ publisher Dick James, including “That’s Why They Call It the Blues,” which Bernie didn’t even write the lyrics for until 1983 for his second wife, Toni Russo (sister of actress Rene Russo). Great song, silly song placement. He also plays “Daniel” and “Sad Songs (Say So Much)” in this scene, years and even decades before they were written. These types of song placement will bother the nerd patrol, but not the casual fans.

3. Reg & Sheila

Elton posted this Happy Mother’s Day message to his mom, only months before her passing.

Elton’s mother Sheila is portrayed as uncaring and non-supportive of her son throughout the movie. In truth, the two were very close up until 2008 when Elton refused to speak to her any longer after she continued to have a friendship with Elton’s former manager/lover John Reid and Elton’s longtime personal assistant Bob Halley whom the star had severed ties with. Mother and son did not speak again for nearly a decade, reconciling at the time of her 90th birthday. Sheila passed away in 2017 at the age of 92.

4) Lovers, Associates & Truth

Elton’s fiery manager John Reid (pictured moments after run-in with a journalist in 1976). Reid and Elton were a couple between 1970-75. Following their personal split, their business relationship continued until 1998. A legal battle over money ended their association.

4) Elton’s firing of his hot-headed manager John Reid didn’t happen until 1998, a decade after he got sober in 1990. Reid, who was known–and arrested on occasion–for physical altercations and assaults with members of the press, is not known to have slapped Elton in the face as depicted in the movie. The real reason for the dissolution was over what Elton felt were financial improprieties, approximately 20 million pounds unaccounted for. In truth, Elton lost his virginity to Reid at the age of 23 and they would remain lovers until 1975, but their business relationship would last another 20 years. The ultimate court case was settled out of court between Elton and Reid, who have not spoken since. Despite the settlement, the judge admonished Elton for his insane spending habits; something that the film humorously notes is the one addiction Elton has yet to conquer.

Final Thoughts…

Despite the previously mentioned historical quibbles (and many others), Rocketman is a compelling cinematic hybrid of a colorful musical celebration and a dark and often bleak glimpse into one man’s soul. An uncensored and relentless portrait of one’s need for love, this engaging film is ultimately a tale of redemption and survival.

Fortunately for his fans, as the 72-year-old legend bids the concert stage goodbye on his current Farewell Tour, Elton John ultimately decided 29 years ago to change the trajectory of a tragic destiny and indeed found himself wishing to be living Sixty Years On.
The Captain and the Kid: The Real “Rocketman”

The Captain and the Kid: The Real “Rocketman”

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By Steven P. Wheeler

In 2005, on the 30th anniversary of their first autobiographical album, Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, Elton John and Bernie Taupin decided to finish their story with the writing of The Captain And The Kid, which was released in 2006. This brilliant album is without a doubt a musical love letter from the self-described Tin Pan Alley Twins to their longtime fans. It was the third in their “draw-a-line-in-the-sand” trilogy following the solid, but over-hyped Songs From The West Coast and the equally strong but over-criticized Peachtree Road.

It’s funny that Elton would ever be upset over the commercial reaction—or lack thereof—to this highly personal album. Then again, it’s no more silly and ridiculous as Elton’s many bitchy rants over the years; especially in the wake of Bernie’s suggestion and Elton’s then-commitment to not worry about commercial success anymore, but to make albums that they, themselves, were proud of. 

It’s obvious and true that this is simply not an album for the masses or even for many of the newer generation of Elton fans, who weren’t there in the beginning of the John/Taupin saga, as they would have little or no reference points to Taupin’s excellent lyrics contained here (which are FILLED with winks and nods that only longtime fans would recognize). And also because this particular segment of their fan base had grown up with the musical duo and can directly relate to the then-current events that are littered throughout (Nixon-era America, the hedonistic openness of cocaine, drink and sex during the Seventies and Eighties, the initial AIDS scare, and so much more).

Even more important is how a new younger audience who may have jumped on the EJ train in the Eighties or after The Lion King success could ever truly relate to the experiences and sentiments that only those with 40+ years of life can truly understand so deeply and feel so impactfully. 

A day in the life of Bernie Taupin, the Brown Dirt Cowboy, at the time of the release of the album, The Captain and the Kid.

At its heart, The Captain And The Kid is a mature reflection of a time that will never come again. It’s a musical mirror of life for those whose own lives have been filled with touchdowns, failures, rejections and redemptions; and whose personal paths were spent speeding down open highways in their youth before realizing that these same roads are littered with detours, dead-ends, accidents, and the aftermath of personal tragedy. 

Eventually, you can pine for past days in hopes of regaining something you think you’ve lost, or, as Bernie so brilliantly notes in the epic title track: “You can’t go back, and if you try, you fail.” Truer words have never been written for those of a certain age.

What follows is an overload of trivial information, but for the few who haven’t heard this album (and hopefully some of you who have), you’ll find some of this information interesting enough to listen to it all with fresh ears and a fresh perspective……..

Like the songs from its predecessor, Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, these story-songs are indeed in chronological order and there are some beautiful moments, subtle tributes and references for longtime John/Taupin fans to find.

As most fans know, the original autobiographical album in 1975, Captain Fantastic, covered only a brief two-year period in the lives of Elton John and Bernie Taupin; from their initial meeting in 1967 through their staff songwriting failures right up to their recording of Empty Sky in 1969. What many don’t remember or never understood is that the entire Captain Fantastic album only touched on their lives BEFORE they achieved any success at all.

So, for the sequel—The Captain And The Kid—Bernie’s mission was to now cover 35 years (1970-2005) in a dozen or so songs. No easy feat, but he pulled it off masterfully; dropping in some wonderful imagery that takes those of us who were there right back to the beginning of the duo’s unparalleled journey. Here’s a track-by-track analysis for the nerds:

Postcards From Richard Nixon

Things kick right off with their first visit of the States in August of 1970 on the album’s opener. In fact, Bernie literally starts the tale with the songwriting duo (plus drummer Nigel Olsson and bassist Dee Murray) landing at Los Angeles International Airport and being greeted by a giant red London double-decker bus (with the huge banner on its side: “Elton John has arrived”), which would drive the jet-lagged English youth through the streets of Hollywood that they had always dreamed about. 

Within minutes of arriving in America, (left) a bearded Elton John, smiling Bernie Taupin, tall bassist Dee Murray and crouching drummer Nigel Olsson, outside LAX where they were put on a “big red bus,” a stunt from publicist Norman Winter. Elton was less than impressed and very embarrassed.

Literally, they didn’t even have a taste of California air before they were thrust for the very first time into the machine of big-time rock & roll!

They put us on a big red bus / Twin spirits soaking up a dream
Fuel to feed the press machine / After years that were long and lean

Incidentally, the notorious “red bus” incident was the brainchild of Elton’s early publicist/unapologetic extrovert (and a good friend and professional colleague of mine) Norman Winter. Elton hated that first American publicity stunt (as you can somewhat see by his less-than-apparent smile for the camera below….that’s Reg Dwight, the bearded chap standing on your far left, next to a 20-year-old Bernie Taupin). Elton, of course, played along and Norman never made any apologies for the stunt. And who could blame him, after all the publicity he mustered to make that week’s Troubadour stint one of the most legendary concert stands in rock history!

Within days, these unknowns played their very first concerts in America at the Troubadour. A seismic event that resulted in Elton being proclaimed “Rock’s Next Superstar” by Robert Hilburn in the Los Angeles Times after that now-legendary concert stint in West Hollywood.

Or as Bernie wrote later in “Postcards,” the naïve Brits had trouble believing the hype themselves: 
Neither of us understood the way things ticked in Hollywood…..And pretty soon we were “Where it’s at”……Or so the papers say

The Captain Fantastic album never had a chance to touch on this legendary turning point in Los Angeles, and so Bernie opens the sequel album by depicting how these shy young guys from England were literally overwhelmed by what they saw in the City Of Angels on that first visit: sunbathed beauties, a visit to Disneyland and just being in the land of one of Elton’s early heroes The Beach Boys, and quickly realized they were….. “finally on our way”

And the lyricist sums up that early period where the ideal marriage of youthful energy and sudden success are perfectly in sync, as in his metaphoric statement in this opening song’s final verse about this exploding fame and instantaneous future that was unveiled and tossed to these two musical brothers: 
And for you and me that speeding car is how it’s going to be
I see no brakes / just open road / and lots of gasoline

Just Like Noah’s Ark

The ensuing success that grew bigger and bigGER AND BIGGER STILL over the next five years is illustrated right away in the album’s second track. Taupin’s decision to put these two musical peas-in-a-pod in a whimsical rock & roll vehicle dubbed Noah’s Ark is just a brilliant touch. They were a pair; they were in this together: two of them against the world. 

We quickly see them forced to rub shoulders with sleazy record execs “chomping a big cigar” who were unknowingly insulting the still-in-the-closet piano pounder (“slapping backs and making cracks about the fags in the bar”), while cocaine-pushing radio deejays made all the usual Hollywood make-you-a-star promises (“you can put it out son, and we’ll all back it”). 

Later in this same song, we get a taste of the notorious and infamous groupies who prowled rock star haunts throughout the early-to-mid ‘70s (“the Cockettes and the ‘Casters”), and just how much temptation was being presented to these two young guys who were also being told they’re the greatest thing on earth. So even though Bernie found his first wife, Maxine—the L.A. Lady from “Tiny Dancer” fame—he is quick to note that during this time “for every Tiny Dancer, there’s a dog that’s had its day.” 

However, through that early stretch of stardom, the two did manage to keep their wits about them (at least for a while), because they had each other to keep themselves somewhat grounded amid the dizzying heights they were reaching in those lightning-fast first five years of stardom. 

“We’re not as dumb as we might look / You can’t keep us in the dark / With me and you, it’s two by two”

Wouldn’t Have It Any Other Way

By the time of the third song, the engine of stardom is firing on all cylinders, as Bernie chooses to move the proceedings to their other favorite American locale: New York City.

In this song, the decadence of their mid-70s heyday is beginning to pour through for the first time, as they seem to be slowly giving in to temptation. 
I’d wake with a stranger under the covers / Late in the day and longing for the night / Just like the snowfall there’s so many bodies, but somehow it feels so right

There’s also era-specific references about exactly where they stayed in the Big Apple, such as the 1972 murder site of mobster Joey Gallo and the mention of such then-trendy hotspots as Studio 54.

Despite their “top of the world, ma” fame, it was around the time of the famous two concerts at Dodger Stadium in 1975 that stardom was finally getting just too big to handle. Elton attempted suicide shortly before these iconic concerts and Bernie himself recalls being backstage and looking at the immense audience around the stadium and saying to himself that they had reached the pinnacle.

As Bernie told me during one of our interviews: “What was happening at that time, and probably the reason we were so screwed up, is that we had done everything. There was no mountain to scale or to conquer anymore. We had filled the biggest stadiums. We had seven consecutive #1 albums. At that point in time, Elton John farting would have sold, and that’s intense pressure to be under because you suddenly realize that there’s no place to go but down. We were all at the high-point there of abusing ourselves to the max. It was Jack Daniels and lines on the console. Luckily, we’re all still alive to tell the tale. And after the Blue Moves album in 1976, I had to get away. I moved to Mexico for six months to dry out, because I think we were all killing ourselves.”

Tinderbox

With the album’s fourth song—the excellent “Tinderbox”—we have entered the period of the post-Blue Moves period in 1976 and through the failed 1978 single, “Ego,” when the two realized the inevitable decline was not only creeping up on them, but had indeed arrived, or as Bernie writes:
We’d been running hot up until today / But a wind of change blew across our sales / We were coasting on a winning streak / We were kings until the power failed 
*note that “sales” is not a typo for “sails” but a very clever Taupin using the sailboat metaphor to note the reality of their loss of popularity and record “sales”

By the final verse, Bernie is addressing the duo’s short-lived split following Blue Moves, even mentioning his own personal move down south where he attempted to dry-out (“the sun descends down in Mexico”), while Elton was still in England living his extravagant life of indulgence (“while a fancy car back on Savile Row shows the price of fame leads to overkill”). 

It was obvious that the split between the two songwriters had to happen (“things are gonna have to change”) and finally both men realize they have to get away from each other, or as Taupin poetically says in the song:
Pressure’s gonna cook us if we don’t unlock it / Gun’s going off if we don’t uncock it / We’ve gotta climb out of the other one’s pocket / Or we’re gonna burn-out on this beautiful rocket

Across the River Thames

The proper placement for this excellent bonus track is right here. In this song—inexcusably omitted from the album proper—Bernie writes about Elton’s continued belief in himself during the duo’s separation through to their mega-successful reunion in the early Eighties, cementing their relationship up to the current day. And how these two still stood together after all this time, literally immovable like other London-based statues and images that never disappear: 
Nelson’s on his column / Ravens are in the Tower / Big Ben’s never lost his voice, chimes on every hour / And the fog rolls across the River Thames

The song addresses a slew of music trends that came and died, while these two remain alive and a musical constant in an industry bent on pushing something new as often as possible:

First comes the death of disco (“disco balls and spandex pants on questionable friends/Disco died, but the fog still rolled across the River Thames”)

Next comes Johnny Rotten and his punk ilk who very publicly decried Elton and his musical lineage (“Snarling they just came along and cut us to to the quick / Called us a bunch of dinosaurs and give us a load of stick / Told us that the times was changing and all good things must end / But I’m still standing and the fog still rolls across the River Thames”)

Then comes the MTV generation (“Hair got teased beyond belief”) while revolving bands like Spandau Ballet took turns being the top-charting one-hit wonder (“the new romantics claimed the throne and we were wondering when, but they lost their crown and the fog still rolled across the River Thames”).

Finally we hit the tabloid “rent-boy scandal” about Elton that hit at the time when their career was not exactly living up to their past (“Big bold letters screaming out a scandal in the house” and “careers going south” and how the tabloid media during the mid-80s fully believed that “the truth was meant to bend”).

And The House Fell Down

By the end of “Across The River Thames,” despite their renewed success, Elton had reached the point of no return in terms of his own personal demons, and it would all be laid out on this excellent track which takes us directly to the 1990s.

Elton takes a rollicking approach to the subject of his addictions and ultimate recovery that he has too often wrapped into a ballad. The juxtaposition of the lyrics and the music on “The House Fell Down” are as surprising—and as fulfilling—as he once did with “I Think I’m Gonna Kill Myself” back in the Honky Chateau days in 1972 and the resulting song is one of this album’s best.

This song is as straight-forward as any that Bernie has ever written and it’s powerful in its simplicity and could only have been written by someone who has danced endlessly with the Peruvian Devil himself: 
With a rolled up note I’m hovering on that line / Three days on a diet of cocaine and wind / And a little weed just to level me sometimes / So don’t knock on my door / Don’t try to call / I’m holed up in this room, talking to the wall / When you’re high as this, you think you know it all / When you’re this deep in, there’s no place else to fall

So by the end of the first-half of the album, this is what we’ve seen, heard and experienced:
– we’ve seen their arrival in the States in 1970
– we’ve seen the media call them the next big thing
– we’ve seen them achieve superstardom and battle temptation
– we’ve seen them split-up
– we’ve seen a whirlwind of musical trends (disco, punk new wave)
– we’ve seen them reunite and outlast those same musical trends
– we’ve seen them both succumb to their personal demons and address them by the early 90s

Blues Never Fade Away

And now we move on to the second leg of this unique musical journey… The second-half of the album changes narrative course for the first time, as the absolutely spell-binding “Blues Never Fade Away” is the first song on the album where we are now taking stock of the past. It’s an emotional and powerful look back at those who touched our lives but are no longer with us, and how fragile life can be. And how WE somehow survived the stupid risks we took and decisions we made, while others on the same trail are no longer with us. 

Taupin’s simple eternal question sums it all up for every one of us who has cheated death despite our often dumb choices: “And how did we get so lucky?” A haunting question that can never be answered, no matter how many times we pose it.

The chorus of this beautiful song is one of the best Taupin has ever written over the past 40-some years, and Elton’s vocal performance is stellar throughout: 
And how did we get so lucky?
Targets on the rifle range
Who makes the call and who gets to choose?
Who gets to win and who gets to lose?
It’s like a rolling dice in the belly of the blues
And blues never fade away

Incidentally, for the more curious-minded, here is the real story about those tragic figures that Bernie writes about in “Blues Never Fade Away”:
First verse is about an L.A. restaurant owner and close friend of Bernie’s who died of AIDS before there was much news about the disease.
Second verse is about a girl who was another close friend of Bernie’s who died of a brain aneurysm in a store on Hollywood Boulevard
Third verse is about Elton’s close friend Gianni Versace
And, of course, there is the small reference at the end of the song to the most famous of their late friends, in which Bernie writes, “I miss John Lennon’s laugh”

The Bridge

Next comes the solo piano ballad (and weak choice as a single) “The Bridge.” A pleasant enough song dealing with the theme of personal survival amidst the never-ending series of life choices we all have to make at one time or another. It’s about finding that spark of youthful enthusiasm during those times when you feel your age more than you should. 

Crossing that bridge rather than fading away is something we all come across in middle-age at some point; and finding yourself balanced on that often blurry line dividing personal contentment and restless acceptance. 

The song carries the powerful sentiment that a risk is worth the crossing of the bridge even if it results in momentary failure, while the retreat from the journey (the fading away) can only get easier and easier until your life itself becomes controlled by a “cruel tide” on which you ride.

Incidentally, Bernie was adamant that Elton record this song with the piano alone; no other instruments. Elton did this as a favor to his partner, adding only the haunting backing vocals. Unfortunately, this decision leaves the song much more bland than it could have with some instrumental support, especially since the playing by longtime bandmates Nigel Olsson, Davey Johnstone, and the rest of the crew is definitely the best this particular band has ever performed in the studio.

I Must Have Lost It On the Wind

Fortunately, things rebound very quickly with the album’s closing trilogy, beginning with the wistful “I Must Have Lost It On The Wind,” an honest assessment of our past loves, and the ultimate recognition of our own stubbornness and failings at the time. Bernie’s bitterness towards some of his three failed marriages can be heard in the truly moving chorus: 
From one, you learn something / Another you learn nothing / And there’s one who might teach you everything / But before I learned to listen / And if indeed someone said it / Then I guess I must have lost it on the wind

That bitterness is pointed outwards as well in this less-than-loving recollection:
One was just a trophy catch / And one was like a curse / Some would want to bleed you dry / Some might quench your thirst

And while each of his marriages resulted in some memorable songs for us, the reality was less successful, even though he says he thought each of them would last:
In warm seas I cast a line / And swore the heart I was reeling in was perfect at the time / You couldn’t tell me I was wrong / You couldn’t tell me anything / And if you did then I guess I must have lost it on the wind

The song’s title springs from Taupin’s love of an old cowboy cliché when a wrangler yells across a wide-open prairie to someone and the other person can’t hear what is being said, they’ll say, “Say it again, I lost it on the wind.” 

It’s a wonderful phrase that Taupin uses to describe those times in our lives when we refuse to listen to people who only have our best interests at heart. Incidentally, Bernie married Heather Kidd in 2004 and they have two children, so the fourth time has been the charm for the Brown Dirt Cowboy.

Old ’67

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtQWJvkNYaA

The next song, “Old ’67” (probably my personal favorites on the album), takes place in the present day and brings us up to date. It’s a wonderful melancholy story about when Bernie and Elton got together at Elton’s home in France to discuss this new album. They both admit that haven’t had such a get-together in many years: just the two of them together. The town mouse and country mouse together by themselves again. 

The result of that meeting is just a goosebump-inducing song for me, as one who loves to occasionally reminisce with longtime friends—some that have been with me through thick and thin for up to 30 years or more. It’s a fulfilling experience to share with those who knew you when you had dreams that didn’t come true while other dreams did, and still other events exceeded your early naïve dreams. That can’t be shared as intently with those who weren’t with you all those years ago.

And Bernie couldn’t have painted this get-together of two lifelong friends any better than if he had a canvas and a brush. You can almost hear the quiet laughter and the knowing nods of recognition between these two friends as they “shoot the breeze” a full 40 years after they first met. 

Back then they were kids; just two young, struggling artists in search of a dream, making sacrifices, no money for heat or food; just an unbridled love of achieving something special together. 

Now, here they are, two grown men in the late stages of life, and you can literally hear the conversation. “Can’t believe we’re sitting in this mansion in France, remember when we lived on Oxford Street, we’ve come a long way” or just listen to Elton sing Bernie’s lyrical transcript:
Don’t often do this / We never really get the chance / Nearly froze to death on Oxford Street / Now we’re sitting in the South of France / Talking through the evening / It’s good to shoot the breeze / Just you and me on a balcony / And cicadas singing in the trees

Then a clink of the glasses for the moving chorus where they rejoice in the memory of the year they met, laugh at the years gone by, and ultimately celebrate the happiness of being the age they are today:
Old ‘67 what a time it was / What a time of innocence / What a time we’ve lost / Raise a glass and have a laugh / Have a laugh or two / Here’s to old ‘67 / And an Older Me and You

Of special note on this special song is Bernie’s wink and nod of ending the song with the first line from their first hit, “Your Song.” A great idea for such a moving song that can’t help bring a smile to the face of all longtime fans. Beautiful.

The Captain and the Kid

Finally we reach the end with the title track, the perfect final chapter to how this lengthy odyssey began with the very first musical chapter, the song “Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy.” 

Here’s Bernie the “tumbleweed” and Elton living life “on a yellow brick road.” There’s Elton the “urban soul in a fine silk suit” and Bernie’s “heart out west in a Wrangler shirt.” The shy poet from Lincolnshire who turned into “the Brown Dirt Cowboy” and the pub pianist from Northwood Hills who turned “into a Rocket Man.”

Once again, Bernie comes up with a chorus that is an amazing piece of writing about two men who kept their artistic integrity intact more often than not. Two men who never tried to be more than they were, and—unlike most of their contemporaries—they also always looked to the future, steadfastly refusing to rest on their considerable laurels or live in the past:
And you can’t go back and if you try it fails / Looking up ahead I see a rusty nail / A sign hanging from it, saying ‘Truth For Sale’ / And that’s what we did / No lies at all, just one more tale about the Captain and the Kid

The only real sad omission is that Elton didn’t record music for the twelfth lyric that Bernie wrote for this masterpiece of an album. Simply titled “12” the lyrics, which are included in the album liner notes, sound to be Bernie’s final goodbye: 
That’s it, I guess / It’s been some trip / But we’ll just shrug and say, “it’s just my job, it’s all I know” / I hope we did okay

Fortunately, Elton and Bernie will return to the studio with a new batch of material to bring us all another musical gift that we have no right to expect or demand after so much they’ve given us already. But The Captain and the Kid stands as the perfect autobiographical summation of the greatest songwriting team in pop music history. And to this day, nearly 15 years later, it remains a majestic album that should always be discussed alongside such other classic John/Taupin albums as Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.