Bernie Taupin – PowerPop… An Eclectic Collection of Pop Culture

Elton John – Saturday Night’s Alright (For Fighting)

A fun song that has a bit more of a kick than a regular Elton John song.

The song was written by Elton, who wrote the music, and his songwriting partner Bernie Taupin who wrote the lyrics. He said it was his first attempt at writing a rock song that was totally English. Up until then, he focused on American Culture.

This song is about Taupin’s teen years going to British dance clubs, where fights were common. Many of Taupin’s songs are written to relate to Elton’s life, but not this one…it’s very unlikely that Elton would be fighting in a bar. Elton recorded this song while leaping around and standing up to get a certain feel.

The song was on the album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and parts of it were recorded in Jamaica. This could very well be Elton John’s best album. It contained the title song, Bennie and the Jets, Candle in the Wind, and more. It was during a period when John and Taupin could do no wrong…they had the Midas touch. Everything they touched turned to gold and more times platinum. Between 1969 to 1976 the pair released 11 albums. Six of those were #1 in the Billboard 100 and all of them made it to the top ten.

The album was released in 1973 and it peaked at #1 on the Billboard 100, #1 in Canada, #1 in the UK, and #5 in New Zealand in 1973.

The song peaked at #12 on the Billboard 100, #20 in Canada, #7 in the UK, and #12 in New Zealand in 1973.

As with other Elton songs…I was surprised when I saw the lyrics. He is one of the hardest singers to nail down the words I’ve ever heard…for me anyway. The line about getting drunk is brilliant…”Get about as oiled as a diesel train” but for the longest, I would just mumble… blah blah blah blah DIESEL TRAIN. This song though is clearer than some of his others.

Bernie Taupin on recording some of the album in Jamaica: “The climate was hospitable, but the natives weren’t. To use the terminology of the time, it was not a ‘good vibe.’ I remember a lot of barbed wire around the studio and armed guards. We spent a lot of time congregating around the pool area of the hotel, feeling there was safety in numbers. The Stones did manage to record there, but in retrospect, I think they had a mobile unit with them. The only thing I remember trying to record was ‘Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting.’ It was an aborted attempt, just atrocious.”

Saturday Night’s Alright (For Fighting)

It’s getting late, have you seen my mates?
Ma tell me when the boys get here
It’s seven o’clock and I want to rock
Want to get a belly full of beer

My old man’s drunker than a barrel full of monkeys
And my old lady she don’t care
My sister looks cute in her braces and boots
A handful of grease in her hair

Don’t give us none of your aggravation
We had it with your discipline
Saturday night’s alright for fighting
Get a little action in

Get about as oiled as a diesel train
Gonna set this dance alight
‘Cause Saturday night’s the night I like
Saturday night’s alright alright alright

Well they’re packed pretty tight in here tonight
I’m looking for a dolly who’ll see me right
I may use a little muscle to get what I need
I may sink a little drink and shout out “She’s with me!”

A couple of the sounds that I really like
Are the sounds of a switchblade and a motorbike
I’m a juvenile product of the working class
Whose best friend floats in the bottom of a glass

Don’t give us none of your aggravation
We had it with your discipline
Saturday night’s alright for fighting
Get a little action in

Get about as oiled as a diesel train
Gonna set this dance alight
‘Cause Saturday night’s the night I like
Saturday night’s alright alright alright

Don’t give us none of your aggravation
We had it with your discipline
Saturday night’s alright for fighting
Get a little action in

Get about as oiled as a diesel train
Gonna set this dance alight
‘Cause Saturday night’s the night I like
Saturday night’s alright alright alright

Saturday, Saturday, Saturday
Saturday, Saturday, Saturday
Saturday, Saturday,
Saturday night’s alright

Elton John – Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

One of the songs that reminds me of childhood. This was Elton in his most fertile period of the seventies. Elton and Bernie had the Midas touch with songs.

Elton and his songwriting partner Bernie Taupin went to Jamaica to record the album, but the studio wasn’t up to standard, so the project was abandoned there with only a rough version of “Saturday Night’s Alright (For Fighting)” actually being recorded. “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” and the rest of the album were recorded in France at Strawberry Studios (The Chateau d’Hierouville).

The song peaked at #2 in the Billboard 100, #1 in Canada, #6 in the UK, and #2 in New Zealand in 1973-74. This made the third Elton single to make number 1 in Canada in 1973.

The song’s B side was originally titled “Screw You”, although the US release re-titled the song “Young Man’s Blues” so that it would not offend American record buyers.

Bernie Taupin: “It’s funny, but there are songs that I recall writing as if it was yesterday. And then there are those I have absolutely no recollection of, whatsoever. In fact, I’d have to say that for the most part, if someone was to say that the entire Yellow Brick Road album was actually written by someone else, I might be inclined to believe them. I remember being there, just not physically creating.

There was a period when I was going through that whole ‘got to get back to my roots’ thing, which spawned a lot of like-minded songs in the early days, this being one of them. I don’t believe I was ever turning my back on success or saying I didn’t want it. I just don’t believe I was ever that naïve. I think I was just hoping that maybe there was a happy medium way to exist successfully in a more tranquil setting. My only naiveté, I guess, was believing I could do it so early on. I had to travel a long road and visit the school of hard knocks before I could come even close to achieving that goal. So, thank God I can say quite categorically that I am home.”

From Songfacts

The Yellow Brick Road is an image taken from the movie The Wizard of Oz. In the movie, Dorothy and her friends follow the yellow brick road in search of the magical Wizard of Oz, only to find they had what they were looking for all along. It was rumored that the song was about Judy Garland, who starred in the film.

Bernie Taupin wrote the lyrics to this and most of Elton’s other songs. He often seems to write about Elton, but this one appears to be about himself. The lyrics are about giving up a life of opulence for one of simplicity in a rural setting. Elton has enjoyed a very extravagant lifestyle, while Taupin prefers to keep it low key.

Bernie’s canine imagery, including the part about sniffing around on the ground, is a sly poke at Linda’s two little dogs. Linda was a girlfriend of Elton John’s.

In 2008, Ben & Jerry’s created a flavor of ice cream in honor of Elton John called “Goodbye Yellow Brickle Road.” Made of chocolate ice cream, peanut butter cookie dough, butter brickle and white chocolate chunks, it was made to commemorate Elton’s first concert in Vermont (home of the ice cream makers) on July 21, 2008 at the Essex Junction fairgrounds. Elton had played every other state before his Vermont show. He had some of the ice cream before the show.

Ben Folds told Rolling Stone magazine for their 100 Greatest Singers Of All Time issue: “He was mixing his falsetto and his chest voice to really fantastic effect in the ’70s. There’s that point in ‘Goodbye Yellow Brick Road,’ where he sings, ‘on the grooound’ – his voice is all over the shop. It’s like jumping off a diving board when he did that.”

American rock group Queens Of The Stone Age covered the song for the 2018 Elton John tribute album Revamp. Their version was produced by Mark Ronson and features backing vocals with Jake Shears of The Scissor Sisters.

“It’s nice to pick something that may seem off kilter at first for us to do. But ‘Goodbye Yellow Brick Road’ really has the psychedelic carousel nature to it,” said QOTSA’s Josh Homme. “I think at first we thought we will tinker with the arrangement, but there’s so many beautiful chords- the chord progression is so wonderful- once you step on that carousel, it’s just this beautiful musical swirl and it’s really intoxicating to be on that carousel. And it seemed like there’s a psychedelic element that we could bring out, that it’s touching on, and that maybe the key for us to do it would be to accentuate the wispiness that is going on in the song.”

Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

When are you gonna come down?
When are you going to land?
I should have stayed on the farm
I should have listened to my old man

You know you can’t hold me forever
I didn’t sign up with you
I’m not a present for your friends to open
This boy’s too young to be singing, the blues

So goodbye yellow brick road
Where the dogs of society howl
You can’t plant me in your penthouse
I’m going back to my plough

Back to the howling old owl in the woods
Hunting the horny back toad
Oh I’ve finally decided my future lies
Beyond the yellow brick road

What do you think you’ll do then?
I bet that’ll shoot down your plane
It’ll take you a couple of vodka and tonics
To set you on your feet again

Maybe you’ll get a replacement
There’s plenty like me to be found
Mongrels who ain’t got a penny
Sniffing for tidbits like you on the ground

So goodbye yellow brick road
Where the dogs of society howl
You can’t plant me in your penthouse
I’m going back to my plough

Back to the howling old owl in the woods
Hunting the horny back toad
Oh I’ve finally decided my future lies
Beyond the yellow brick road

Elton John – Tiny Dancer

Tiny Dancer is a nice way to start your Sunday morning. Cameron Crowe did a great job of using this song in the movie Almost Famous…which I recommend highly.

The lyrics were written by Bernie Taupin, Elton’s writing partner, and were inspired by Taupin’s first trip to America. John and Taupin are from England, and Madman Across The Water was the first album they wrote after spending time in the US. Taupin and John spent a lot of time together in the ’70s; Bernie traveled with the band and would usually stand by the soundboard during shows.

The “blue jean baby, LA Lady, seamstress for the band” could have been Maxine Feibelmann, who was Bernie Taupin’s girlfriend when he wrote the song and who became his first wife in 1971. She traveled with the band on their early tours, often sewing together the costumes and fixing their clothes. Plus, on the Madman Across The Water album, it says, “With love to Maxine” under the credits for this song. Elton John even said at one point that Bernie wrote it about his girlfriend.

The song peaked at #41 in the Billboard 100, #19 in Canada, and #70 in the UK in 1972. I’m surprised it didn’t reach higher in the charts.

From Songfact

This song ripened into one of Elton John’s classics, but it didn’t even crack the Top 40 when it was released, peaking at #41 in America in 1972. In the UK and most other territories, it wasn’t released as a single.

Its chart failure has a lot to do with its 6:12 running time, making it too long for many radio stations. Also, Elton was only on the precipice of stardom at the time, his biggest hit being “Your Song” at #8. Part of the song’s enduring popularity owes to how it was never overplayed – when it comes on the radio, it seems special.

The Madman Across The Water album was much more heavily produced than Elton’s first three. It was one of his first songs with a lush string section arranged by Paul Buckmaster, who arranged the stings on many of Elton’s albums as well as songs by The Rolling Stones, Train, and Leonard Cohen. Ron Cornelius, who played guitar on Cohen’s album Songs Of Love And Hate, told us: “Buckmaster is a wonderful string arranger, he’s just one of these guys who can make an orchestra talk. In other words, if the strings aren’t saying something, it ain’t on the record.”

This is featured in the 2000 movie Almost Famous in a scene where a rock band is on tour, at each other’s throats. When “Tiny Dancer” come on in the tour bus, they all start singing along and remember how they’re connected through their love of music.

In 2011, Budweiser used the same “Tiny Dancer changes the mood” theme in a commercial that debuted on the Super Bowl. In the spot, a gruff cowboy starts a sing-a-long to the song when he gets his beer. Peter Stormare, whose film credits include Fargo and The Big Lebowski, played the cowboy.

Elton was pleasantly surprised to learn about this song’s use in Almost Famous, as it didn’t always get a great reaction when he performed it live. Speaking to Rolling Stone in 2011, Elton recalled: “Jeffrey Katzenberg called me and said, ‘There’s a scene in this film which is going to make ‘Tiny Dancer’ a hit all over again.’ When I saw it, I said, ‘Oh my God!’ I used to play ‘Tiny Dancer’ in England and it would go down like a lead zeppelin. Cameron resurrected that song.”

After it was used in Almost Famous in 2000, Elton made this a regular part of his setlists. Over the next few years, digital downloading became possible and “Tiny Dancer” was a top seller. In 2005, it earned its first Gold certification for selling 500,000 copies; in 2018, it was certified at 3 million.

Ten different backup vocalists are credited on this track, including bass player Dee Murray and drummer Nigel Olsson, both of whom became played on many of Elton’s later recordings, but not on this one: session man David Glover played bass and Roger Pope was on drums. Other backup vocalists include songwriter Roger Cook (“Long Cool Woman (In A Black Dress)” by The Hollies) and the duo Sue & Sunny (Sue Glover and Sunny Leslie).

Additional personnel are:

Davey Johnstone – acoustic guitar
Caleb Quaye – electric guitar
B. J. Cole – steel guitar

Madman Across The Water contains another late bloomer in Elton’s catalog: “Levon,” which with a 5:08 running time, didn’t get much airplay when it was first released, but went on to become one of his standards. Released as a US single ahead of “Tiny Dancer,” it stalled at #24.

Elton performed this as a duet with Tim McGraw to open the 2002 American Music Awards. McGraw was named Favorite Male Country Artist, but left before he could accept the award.

In 2008, DJ Ironik interpolated this for his album No Point In Wasting Tears, in a version featuring the rapper Chipmunk. This reworking, which was titled “Tiny Dancer (Hold Me Closer),” hit #3 in the UK. Elton John is featured in the video. >>

On October 28, 2010, Elton played the BBC Radio show Electric Proms, where during his performance of “Tiny Dancer,” a guy in the audience asked his girlfriend to marry him. The following evening, Elton appeared on the BBC magazine program The One Show, and the now-engaged couple were in the audience. When Elton learned of this, he insisted on them coming up to meet him. >>

When Tony Danza hosted the ESPY Awards on ESPN, Chris Berman gave him the nickname Tony “Tiny” Danza. He hated it. On the show, he claimed he wanted the nickname Tony “Extrava” Danza.

Elton John performed this with Miley Cyrus at the Grammy Awards in 2018. Four days earlier, Elton announced his farewell tour.

In February 2019, this featured in a trailer for the movie Rocketman, starring Taron Egerton as Elton John. Egerton did his own singing in the film, and the trailer proved that he could pull it off. A few days after the trailer was released, Egerton sang it with the real Elton John at Elton’s annual Oscars party. The film was released on May 31, 2019.

Tiny Dancer

Blue jean baby, L.A. Lady, seamstress for the band
Pretty eyed, pirate smile, you’ll marry a music man
Ballerina, you must have seen her dancing in the sand
And now she’s in me, always with me, tiny dancer in my hand

Jesus freaks out in the street
Handing tickets out for God
Turning back she just laughs
The boulevard is not that bad
Piano man he makes his stand
In the auditorium
Looking on she sings the songs
The words she knows, the tune she hums

But oh how it feels so real
Lying here with no one near
Only you and you can hear me
When I say softly, slowly

Hold me closer, tiny dancer
Count the headlights on the highway
Lay me down in sheets of linen
You had a busy day today
Hold me closer, tiny dancer
Count the headlights on the highway
Lay me down in sheets of linen
You had a busy day today

Oh how it feels so real
Lying here with no one near
Only you and you can hear me
When I say softly, slowly

Elton John – Daniel

This is one of the first Elton John songs I remember hearing. It’s a great song that I wore out when I got his first greatest hits. The song was written by Bernie Taupin and Elton John.

The song peaked at #2 in the Billboard 100 in 1973. The song was off of the album Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only The Piano Player which peaked at #1.

When Elton wrote the music for this song, he chopped off the last verse because he thought the song was already too long. The deleted verse explained that “Daniel” was a Vietnam vet who returned home to the farm after the war, couldn’t find peace, and decided to leave America and go to Spain. With the last verse chopped off, it became a fairly vague story of two brothers who part ways, although Bernie Taupin says that losing the verse wasn’t a big deal.

Bernie Taupin: “We had that whole thing about the missing verse that everybody seems to believe explained the true meaning of the song. I think that’s just an urban legend. It didn’t really explain anything. Sure, it was cut out. But that used to happen all the time with our songs. I would often overwrite, and Elton felt it necessary to edit somewhat. But believe me, it didn’t say anything that the rest of the song didn’t say.”

From Songfacts

The lyrics were written by Bernie Taupin, Elton’s writing partner. He explained the inspiration on his web site: “I’d seen this article in Time magazine on the Tet Offensive. And there was a sidebar next to it with a story about how many of the soldiers that were coming back from ‘Nam were these simple sort of down home country guys who were generally embarrassed by both the adulation and, depending on what part of the country you came from, the animosity that they were greeted by. For the most part, they just wanted to get back to a normal life, but found it hard, what with all the looky loos and the monkeys of war that they carried on their backs.

I just took it from there and wrote it from a younger brother’s perspective; made him disabled and wanting to get away. I made it Spain, basically, because it rhymes with plane.”

This was written and recorded the same day at the the Chateau d’Herouville in France (the “Honky Chateau”), where Elton and his team retreated to make the album. Bernie Taupin wrote the lyrics one morning at the recording studio and brought them downstairs to Elton, who put music to it and recorded it with the band that day, doing just three takes.

Stowing away to France was Elton’s way of entering a creative environment free from distractions – there was no entourage and no phones. The Chateau could even keep the Black Knight at bay, as it was surrounded by a moat.

The result was part a very productive songwriting period for Taupin and John, who composed 12 songs over a four-day period, including “Daniel.”

Elton called this song “a calypso-type number with Everley Brothers-type harmonies.”

The record company didn’t want to release this as a single because they thought it was too long and somber to be a hit. Elton had other ideas, and insisted they release it as a single before the album came out. The record company did, but with very little promotion. It became a hit anyway.

According to Elton John: The Definitive Biography, here’s how the album got its title: While in Los Angeles, Elton was introduced to the legendary comedian Groucho Marx. They hit it off, but Groucho was always giving Elton a hard time about his name, insisting that he must have it backwards and really be John Elton. After Groucho refused to lay off the name thing at a party, Elton threw up his hands and said jokingly: “Don’t shoot me, I’m just the piano player.”

Bernie Taupin has told a different story, claiming that he found the phrase on a plaque at an American junk shop.

The engineer on the album, Ken Scott, played an ARP synthesizer on this track.

Bernie Taupin called this “the most misinterpreted song we’ve ever written,” saying he’s heard it called a gay anthem and a song about a family dispute.

Daniel

Daniel is traveling tonight on a plane
I can see the red tail lights heading for Spain
Oh and I can see Daniel waving goodbye
God it looks like Daniel, must be the clouds in my eyes

They say Spain is pretty, though I’ve never been
Well Daniel says it’s the best place that he’s ever seen
Oh and he should know, he’s been there enough
Lord I miss Daniel, oh I miss him so much

Oh oh, Daniel my brother you are older than me
Do you still feel the pain of the scars that won’t heal?
Your eyes have died, but you see more than I
Daniel you’re a star in the face of the sky

Daniel is traveling tonight on a plane
I can see the red tail lights heading for Spain
Oh and I can see Daniel waving goodbye
God it looks like Daniel, must be the clouds in my eyes
Oh God it looks like Daniel, must be the clouds in my eyes