"I Feel Like a Bullet (In the Gun of Robert Ford)"
I always loved this song and think it would be better remembered if it had a better title. at the time I thought it was about Squeaky Fromme trying to assasinate Gerald Ford *arcane 70s reference
― m coleman, Monday, 10 December 2007 11:08 (sixteen years ago) link
Philadelphia Freedom is ALWAYS piping out of the office of the copy editor. And thus ALWAYS in my fucking head.
(Seriously, the guy had to count that he actually had 13 albums in the office, and yet I hear that song probably about twice a day).
― I eat cannibals, Monday, 10 December 2007 18:55 (sixteen years ago) link
my vote shall be "Levon," and it shall be a good song.
― Alex in Baltimore, Monday, 10 December 2007 19:04 (sixteen years ago) link
"Someone Saved My Life Tonight", Elton plays Nilsson
― Euler, Monday, 10 December 2007 19:59 (sixteen years ago) link
"Funk"!
― Jazzbo, Monday, 10 December 2007 20:06 (sixteen years ago) link
Hmm...tough one. I think Philadelphia Freedom is "the best" song on here, all things considered, but I have been kind of obsessed with Levon lately; plus the latter seems more like an archetypal Bernie/Elton creation. Nonsensical lyrics nonetheless delivered with genuine-seeming passion through a great melody...
― dell, Monday, 10 December 2007 20:16 (sixteen years ago) link
"The Bitch Is Back", because Elton is singing about himself, and that's one of the things I like about him - he's a git sometimes, but he knows he's a git. "Pinball Wizard" comes a close second.
― snoball, Monday, 10 December 2007 20:21 (sixteen years ago) link
"I Feel Like a Bullet (In the Gun of Robert Ford)" is my favorite of his ballads (was this really a hit?). There's something fervid and Technicolor about it that makes it spiritually closer to "The Bitch is Back" or "Your Sister Can't Twist (But She Can Rock 'n' Roll)" than "Daniel" or "Tiny Dancer."
I always took it as a coming out song. But I rarely know what his songs are about.
― Kevin John Bozelka, Monday, 10 December 2007 20:32 (sixteen years ago) link
But I rarely know what his songs are about.
-- Kevin John Bozelka, Monday, 10 December 2007 20:32 (Yesterday) Link
This is the essence of Bernie Taupin.
― The Reverend, Tuesday, 11 December 2007 04:02 (sixteen years ago) link
I must have picked this record up fifteen times, always expecting to see "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" -- instead we get "Lucy In the Sky With Diamonds."
― Naive Teen Idol, Tuesday, 11 December 2007 04:04 (sixteen years ago) link
I've always loved Someone Saved My Life Tonight
― Bo Jackson Overdrive, Tuesday, 11 December 2007 04:05 (sixteen years ago) link
Levon, though Philly Freedom is close.
― Mark Rich@rdson, Tuesday, 11 December 2007 04:08 (sixteen years ago) link
Man, this is tough. I could go with any of six choices...
...can't decide.
― Rock Hardy, Tuesday, 11 December 2007 05:09 (sixteen years ago) link
"sweet freedom whispered in my ear... you're a butterfly"
― nicky lo-fi, Tuesday, 11 December 2007 06:05 (sixteen years ago) link
I always vote for songs about prostitutes
― zaxxon25, Tuesday, 11 December 2007 17:53 (sixteen years ago) link
I'm Still Standing!@ yeah yeah yeah
I voted for the someone shaved my wife tonight.
― Abbott, Tuesday, 11 December 2007 19:15 (sixteen years ago) link
you nearly had me roped and tiiiiiiiiiiiied
― Bo Jackson Overdrive, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 03:18 (sixteen years ago) link
Love "Grow Some Funk of Your Own" (his best [only?] Stones rip) and "Philadelphia Freedom," but "...Robert Ford" is weird and beautiful like Bowie's "Quicksand."
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 03:21 (sixteen years ago) link
wikipedia informs us that "don't go breaking my heart" was in fact on the original version of this album, along with the amazing "sorry seems to be the hardest word," but both were pulled in the '90s because of rights issues, and replaced with future ILM fave "i feel like a bullet (in the gun of robert ford)" and future cameron crowe fave "tiny dancer." coincidentally, "breaking my heart" and "sorry seems" are also two of the clearest, most straightforward lyrics bernie taupin ever wrote.
― fact checking cuz, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 04:53 (sixteen years ago) link
wikipedia informs us that "don't go breaking my heart" was in fact on the original version of this album, along with the amazing "sorry seems to be the hardest word,"
I thought there was something fishy about that track listing! I used to have the original vinyl (lol I'm old etc) and I thought I was just having an alzheimers moment.
― Rock Hardy, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 04:57 (sixteen years ago) link
"only Stones rip"? dude, "The Bitch Is Back" and "Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting"
― Matos W.K., Wednesday, 12 December 2007 05:00 (sixteen years ago) link
Many xposts:
Taupin is pretty opaque -- "I like livin' easy without family ties/'Til the whippoorwill of freedom zapped me right between the eyes" -- but his claim that "Levon" is pretty straightforward makes sense to me.
― If Timi Yuro would be still alive, most other singers could shut up, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 05:48 (sixteen years ago) link
He is indeed. My favorite ever line of his comes from "Grey Seal": "The roots were formed by twisted roots, your roots were twisted then." What the hell? But "Solar Prestige a Gammon" just might be his quintessential lyric.
Has anyone ever made a Steely Dan-esque hoodwinking-the-masses argument for Taupin?
― Kevin John Bozelka, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 07:04 (sixteen years ago) link
SOMEONE SAVED SOMEONE SAVED SOMEONE SAVED MY LIFE TONIIIGHT
...but only because I really only discovered it a year and a half ago, whereas I've been rocking "Levon" for the past seven and have gotten a little burnt out on it.
― Doctor Casino, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 07:13 (sixteen years ago) link
I see those as glam more than Stone rips. "Saturday Night's..." always sounded like Mott the Hoople to me.
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 14:49 (sixteen years ago) link
Did "Grow some funk" ever get compiled onto any other EJ hits compilation that wasn't "every single" styled? (or "Ego"?)
heh, like I care.
― Mark G, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 14:53 (sixteen years ago) link
Taupin is pretty opaque -- "I like livin' easy without family ties/'Til the whippoorwill of freedom zapped me right between the eyes"
that one isn't opaque at all! it's kinda awful, but not opaque.
― fact checking cuz, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 15:57 (sixteen years ago) link
I'd love to see a poll of the singles from his underrepresented wilderness period (1977-1982).
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 15:58 (sixteen years ago) link
granted, most of them suck (no one mention "Little Jeannie," please).
But it's nonsensical. He liked living easy without family ties UNTIL he had a dramatic encounter with the concept freedom?
Then again, not the first illogical Taupin lyric.
― The Deacon, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 16:00 (sixteen years ago) link
i think he's saying he liked living free and easy until he was zapped between the eyes by the downsides of that lifestyle. whippoorwill = loneliness.
― fact checking cuz, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 16:04 (sixteen years ago) link
Philadelphia Freedom for the bassline alone. Also, it makes me cry (with happiness).
― 2for25, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 16:12 (sixteen years ago) link
whippoorwill = loudmouth who won't shut the fuck up at three in the morning.
(in my book, at least.)
I read in one of those Billboard #1 Hits! books that "Philadelphia Freedom" was written for Billie Jean King and that bass drum beat is supposed to be the sound of a tennis ball hitting the court.
― Pleasant Plains, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 16:16 (sixteen years ago) link
loudmouth who won't shut the fuck up at three in the morning.
yet another downside to the free-and-easy lifestyle!
― fact checking cuz, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 16:17 (sixteen years ago) link
the philadelphia freedoms were the tennis team that billie jean king coached.
― fact checking cuz, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 16:19 (sixteen years ago) link
Once again, fcc living up to his username.
― Pleasant Plains, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 16:32 (sixteen years ago) link
What's the Federal Communications Commission got to do with it?
― Myonga Vön Bontee, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 17:20 (sixteen years ago) link
Srsly, tho, that's interesting about those two missing songs - always thought they were kinda conspicuously absent. I never owned the original.
"Someone Saved My Life Tonight" for me, but another tough choice. Can't wait for Vol. 3.
― Myonga Vön Bontee, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 18:05 (sixteen years ago) link
wasn't a volume three released in the eighties and replaced with a new one in the nineties?
― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 18:43 (sixteen years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― ILX System, Sunday, 16 December 2007 00:01 (sixteen years ago) link
one more time, cos i like the photo and the likeness:
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/242/445423237_80aaadad2f.jpg
― Bob Six, Sunday, 16 December 2007 00:44 (sixteen years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.
― ILX System, Monday, 17 December 2007 00:01 (sixteen years ago) link
Tiny Dancer is not even on this album.
― billstevejim, Monday, 17 December 2007 00:03 (sixteen years ago) link
That is factually incorrect.
― The Reverend, Monday, 17 December 2007 00:16 (sixteen years ago) link
Okay, well the version I had did not include this song.. And it had "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" and "Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word."
― billstevejim, Monday, 17 December 2007 00:29 (sixteen years ago) link
Yeah, as fact checking cuz noted above, "Tiny Dancer" wasn't on the original 1977 pressing, but was added to the 1992. That song is kind of a revisionist hit -- missed the top 40 in the U.S. at the time and didn't even chart in the U.K., became popular later on largely because of Almost Famous. Now suddenly you hear it on classic rock radio as often as "Rocket Man" or anything else he did in that era.
― Alex in Baltimore, Monday, 17 December 2007 00:42 (sixteen years ago) link
Oh, my mistake. I should have continued reading the entire thread.
As a child in the late 80s, I always assumed "Tiny Dancer" was a decently well-known song since I heard it on my parents' adult contemporary stations a LOT. 10 years later, I was quite upset to see SPIN placing it in their "singles of the year," since everyone should have been appreciating it all along.
― billstevejim, Monday, 17 December 2007 00:49 (sixteen years ago) link
became popular later on largely because of WKRP in Cincinnati
― Pleasant Plains, Monday, 17 December 2007 01:02 (sixteen years ago) link
hey I said "largely" not "solely"
― Alex in Baltimore, Monday, 17 December 2007 01:04 (sixteen years ago) link
It was at least well-known-enough that Friends used the "Tony Danza" joke...
― Doctor Casino, Monday, 17 December 2007 02:51 (sixteen years ago) link
"Hold my order, terrible dresser"
― Pleasant Plains, Monday, 17 December 2007 03:02 (sixteen years ago) link
Suprising!
― piscesx, Thursday, 29 January 2009 17:23 (fifteen years ago) link
coincidentally, "breaking my heart" and "sorry seems" are also two of the clearest, most straightforward lyrics bernie taupin ever wrote.― fact checking cuz, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 04:53 (1 year ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
― fact checking cuz, Wednesday, 12 December 2007 04:53 (1 year ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
Whoa, fact checking cuz.. I just saw the 7" in a charity shop (one big crack through the vinyl), Taupin's name isn't on the a-side!
― Mark G, Thursday, 29 January 2009 17:28 (fifteen years ago) link