I Guess That's Why They Call It The Elton John Podcast

It's the 50th Frenniversary!

Elton's 4th album was a pick-and-mix, with three pastoral pop songs from the same mould as the Elton John Album, two spiky rock songs that kept the Tumbleweed rolling, and a 10 minute long Buckmaster-stroke, thrown in for good measure. While it is an uneven listen, it contains some of Elton's finest music.

The album gets some of the respect that it's due in this episode, by way of interviews, reviews,...

Here we are at last! This is the concluding part of the Tumbleweed Conversation I had with John Higgins, Elton's Legacy Consultant and Feature Writer at eltonjohn.com, and Peter Thomas, founder of pmc-speakers.com and Elton collector extraordinaire. Once again, I invite you to accompany us on our ramble along the timeline, all the way to the Troubadour. 

The image from the episode comes from this current auction, which is for ...

I am very thankful to John Higgins,  Elton's Legacy Consultant and Feature Writer at eltonjohn.com, and Peter Thomas, founder of pmc-speakers.com and Elton audio expert, who both joined me for this episode of the podcast. 

We got together for a marathon conversation (this is just part one), where we untangled the various strands of the timeline that brought the Tumbleweed Connection album into being.

You will hear some of my a...

It's all go in Eltonland! The label have marked the 50th anniversary of Tumbleweed with a reissue of the album on green vinyl, plus an entirely unexpected companion 10" single, featuring the unearthed almost 8 minute long original version of Come Down in Time, backed with a full band DJM demo of Ballad of a Well Known Gun. Everything is available, along with a range of Tumbleweed merch, over at the EltonJohn.com shop, and John Hi...

Here's the rest of my track by track breakdown with John Higgins of the 'Elton John' album. The album lit a fuse. Four and a half months later, Elton exploded at the Troubadour. John and I got to talk about some of the strides and the mis-steps that were taken along the way.

John is Feature Writer at www.eltonjohn.com as well as Elton's Legacy Consultant. Elton fans can thank him for the exceptional 50th anniversary articles he...

Enormous thanks to John Higgins - Feature Writer for the eltonjohn.com website - who came onto the podcast to share his love for the 'Black Album', and to tell me some of the stories that he'd been able to hear during interviews that he carried out with Paul Buckmaster and Gus Dudgeon about their work on the project. 

We listened through some 'mixes' that I've made of the tracks, making use of the separate channels in the 5.1 mix...

In this episode I apologise for my absence; make some excuses; review the autobiography, in a limited sense; talk about the way that the book, the film and reality interact in one case; accept that I was wrong in another; mentally stage a residency, made up of Elton's deep cuts; all before the main event, which is a follow up to episode 14 - The Songs They Gave Away. In that sense, it's a bit of a grab-bag.

Prepare for the famili...

This episode starts off with a Rocketman competition, courtesy of Paramount Home Media (here is the prize pack that's up for grabs) before the main event, an interview with Anett Murray, wife of Dee Murray, and a big part of the Elton John family during the first half of the seventies.

Anett tells us some fascinating stories of life at home and on the road with Dee. I would like to thank her for sharing her memories with the podc...

Welcome aboard the Mystery Machine, as we take a Flight of Fancy into the unknown corners of Elton's musical world. In this episode, I investigate the spookiest, dustiest corners of discogs, I search for the bootlegs that don’t even exist in our reality, and I uncover the songs that live only in the memories of people who say that they have heard them.

Several pieces of music, where the level of Elton’s involvement is disputed, a...

Empty Sky, Elton’s debut album, and also his most honest, laid-back sounding set of songs, hit the shelves 50 years ago this month. It didn’t make much impact at the time, but it is greatly loved, both by fans, and by the people that created it. 

This episode tells the story of the album through interviews with the gang of ‘lost boys’ who were credited on the sleeve – Elton, Bernie, Caleb, Steve Brown and David Larkham. In the pr...

You are invited to a very special listening session and conversation with Peter Thomas, the preeminent Elton John collector and archivist.

Peter Thomas, in his role as founder of monitor and speaker company PMC, has worked with the finest studios, mastering houses and broadcasters in the world. He has a passion for sound quality, and this extends into his hobby, which is researching and collecting Elton's earliest and most obscur...

This episode counts down the 15 biggest non-Elton singles on Rocket, and in the process, tells the story of the label, attempts to define the Rocket sound (spoiler - there isn’t one), and draws out the connections with Elton’s music, where these exist. The chart itself can be viewed here.

Thanks to Doug Sanders from The Lambrettas, who was interviewed for this episode, and gave some wonderful insight into what it was like to be t...

This episode revels in the obscure, picking up the curios in the discography, studying them, and making an attempt at explaining them. Here are the early versions, the erroneous edits that never should have been heard, the remixes, the rough mixes and the acoustic mixes.

The highlight of this episode, for me, is the mono mix of Hymn 2000, which is played in full. Empty Sky in mono is so rare, it was thought for years not to exist...

This is the story of Elton's personal redemption, through the prism of the song 'Passengers', the UK top 5 hit single with the unique songwriting credit - Elton, Bernie, Davey and South African musician Phineas Mkhize. 

This episode follows Elton from the lows of being placed on the UN's cultural blacklist in 1983, for playing at Sun City, to the highs of being recognised as Harvard's 'Man of the Year' for his charity work, parti...

In this episode, I finish going through the imaginary box-set. First, I detail all of the non-album tracks that were released between 1984 and 1990 (CD3 of the collection that I have programmed), and I then go on to discuss the rarities that might find their way onto Rare Masters Vol. 2 (annexed off onto CD4).

If you're inspired enough to get some of your singles out, to see how they compare against the transfers I've used in thi...

The Elton John Podcast with the unwieldy name goes where the record company dare not go - Rare Masters Vol. 2. We all loved the first volume when it came out, and many of us have been going grey waiting for the next instalment. It didn't look like it was going to happen, so I've just gone ahead and done it. 

All of the non-album A and B-sides recorded between 1976 and 1990 have been collected and collated, and three wonderful CDs...

Another treat - an interview with David Larkham – the man who controlled the visual element of the classic albums, liaising with Steve Brown, Bernie, Elton and others to bring their ideas to life.

David was there at Steve Brown’s house in 68/69 with Bernie and Elton, hanging out; he was there at the Troubadour, taking photos; he was out there in Jamaica, waiting for the studio to be ready like everyone else; on tour; in Caribou… ...