One of my favorite songs off of one of my all-time favorite albums: Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. I wouldn't say it would be the only album I'd take if deserted on an island (honestly, who would want only ONE album to listen to all the time?) but it's definitely in my Top Ten of all time. It helps that it's a double album (twice the tunes!), but there's not a song on it I don't like.
I was thinking of what music video to post and I first thought of Social Disease, but a quick search showed I had posted it not long ago. (glad the Blogger search works better than my memory!)
This song doesn't have any personal meaning to me, other than it was quite controversial for its time and I don't remember it being played on the radio...while at least a half-dozen of the other tunes off the album were. I'm fairly certain I didn't know what a lesbian was and certainly didn't know any. (which, come to find out much later, wasn't true) I like that it tells a story, even if it's a sad one.
If I had a gripe about Elton John's singing, it's that the lyrics are sometimes hard to understand, so here they are, along with interpretations of them.
"With a double barrel name in the back of her brain
And a simple case of Mummy-doesn't-love-me blues"
3 comments:
I always like that song too. The whole double album is EJ at his best. I think overall I prefer listening to his older stuff. Honky Chateau comes in a close second behind Yellow Brick Road for fav EJ albums.
I love EJ also
I agree, Barb, both about Yellow Brick Road and about his earlier stuff. While there are songs on Honky Chateau and Madman Across the Water I couldn't list, there were some of EJ's most classic and iconic songs on them. I don't think it's a coincidence that his albums - and career - suffered a little bit when he and Taupin "split" for a while and then only occasionally working together after that.
Taupin is even more accomplished than most people know. My folks were HUGE PBR fans and I was watching bull riding with them one evening when the announcer said a seldom-ridden and "mean" champion bull (Little Yellow Jacket) was owned by Bernie Taupin. My folks didn't know who he was, but I explained to them his writing lyrics f/ EJ; momma knew who he was b/c of my being a fan of him during my h.s. years.
I'm also sure I've mentioned this before, but I had a cool English teacher my sr. yr. in h.s. and he gave us a neat assignment: take a popular rock/pop song and interpret the lyrics. One girl chose "American Pie", the tune I wanted at first- she got a good grade on it, but she took the meaning straight out of an article in Teen Magazine. (cheater!) Another girl chose "My Sweet Lord", a little bit of a safe choice, seeing as how the title is pretty much the sum of the lyrics. I chose Levon which required a LOT of work and research from me, esp. in those days before computers. I didn't get everything right and couldn't find any reference to "Alvin Tostig" and no wonder, he was a totally fictional character.
Levon Lyrics
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