"Captain Fantastic" C/D?

Geir totally OTM - - - I have been really getting into Elton albums lately and this one in particular. Also it really feels like a secret treasure because it only has the one hit single, so it's basically all great album tracks I've never heard before. And they're not flabby, either - there are a lot of "parts" in the songs and little details in the production but nothing outstays its welcome. Might have the most kickass first and final tracks of any of his records too.

Can I also say, this has like the best extras of any old used record you'll ever fucking find! It's a gatefold, there's poster of the album cover, okay, and then there are TWO big thick color booklets, one with all the lyrics and the other one with like news clippings and tour photos and this long comic strip about Elton and Bernie... totally sweet. Someday I need to put this album on when I have nothing to do and spend the whole running time working through all that stuff.

And, man, never elsewhere do they pull off the slow-build to a payoff like "Someone Saved My Life Tonight" - - when that final cascading round of SOMEONE SAVED SOMEONE SAVED SOMEONE SAVED MY LIFE TONIGHT (TONIIIIIIIIIGHT) comes in it's just like the sky opening up, totally beautiful, almost matched by the wordless exultation at the end of Side B. This is one of the great classic rock records.

Very fond of "Bitter Fingers."

Totally not getting tired of this one.

It still holds up for me too. I feel the other Elton albums I like have lost it a bit (partly because those The Band-like rock/gospel songs, well, they just don't give me much), but this one is still that great collection of all great songs. I also used to love "Elton John", still like the ballad half of the songs, but not too impressed by the faster ones.

anyone who likes Ziggy/ Hunky Dory era Bowie's faster glammy rock tracks should check 'Meal Ticket'. what an amazingly under rated guitarist Davey Johnstone was.

It's "Curtains" that just slays me - - - easily the best ever of his closing epic anthem tracks, and the resonance with the larger album concept is just perfect. "And just like us...you must have had / a once upon a time." Like, the whole thing has been this saga of Reggie and Bernie getting out of their craphole towns or their go-nowhere jobs and finding these grand adventure, and by saying that the listener started from the place, there's this open-hearted implication that they could find the same road. And at the same time there is this vague sense of something misplaced, something yearned-for - - suggested by the tempo, by the wordless chorus - - that implies that the "once upon a time" is also something tragically lost. What a great record.