The 10 songs that changed Elton John’s life
Despite no longer being a touring artist following his historic farewell at Glastonbury Festival in 2023, Elton John will remain addicted to music until he draws his final breath. In fact, one of the key benefits of having more free time at his disposal is that it allows him to spend more hours by his record player.
Despite being an internationally renowned superstar in the spotlight for over five decades, music continues to bring Elton John unfiltered joy. He doesn’t share his favourite new tracks each week on his Rocket Hour radio show on Apple Music for financial gain. Instead, his goal is to give fans a glimpse into the records that are currently making him groove, sharing the pure passion that still fuels his love for music.
While many artists become tunnel-visioned once they find fame and ignore everybody else who makes music apart from themselves, Elton couldn’t be further away from that notion. At one stage, in the pre-digital world, his record collection once consisted of 25,000 LPs and 23,000 singles before he sold it in 1993, with the proceeds going to the Terrence Higgins Trust, a charity that supports people living with AIDS.
In addition to being a fan, Elton is a singer, pianist, showman, and composer who has helped create some of the most emotionally arresting songs of all time. He has cultivated a trademark style many have tried and failed to replicate.
John possesses a booming vocal technique that defies his diminutive stature but is unmistakable and unlike anybody else. Commonly hailed as the ‘Rocket Man’ after his 1972 mega-hit of the same name, Elton has crafted over 30 studio albums and created a songbook that will continue to inspire long after he leaves this planet.
Although he’s technically a solo artist, his best work resulted from a life-changing meeting with Bernie Taupin in 1967 that changed the trajectories of their respective careers. They proved to be the perfect foil for one another. Taupin gave Elton the artistic leg up he needed, matching his music with some celestial lyrical pieces that immersed listeners in a glitter-embellished dream world. After a few years of honing his craft, John firmly hit his creative stride in the 1970s, when everything he touched turned gold.
However, his story and love of music dates back further than his meeting with Taupin. Raised in the outskirts of London, John learned the piano at a young age, and it quickly became apparent that he possessed a prodigal gift for the instrument. By 1962, he formed and played in Bluesology, a blues band in which he cut his teeth for half a decade. That same year of his departure, John met Taupin when they both answered an advert for songwriters. Things moved fast, and in 1969, he released his debut opus, Empty Sky, bolstered by the work of his new partner.
In 1970, John made the colossal decision to form the Elton John Band, and they released their first hit single, ‘Your Song’, that year, one of the most enduring ballads of all time, traversing different generations and cultures. He released a string of successful albums in the ’70s, which included 1972’s Honkey Châteu and 1975’s Rock of the Westies. Then, over the ’80s and ’90s, he carried on his stratospheric run and has been a regular feature in the media ever since, as well as supporting numerous charitable causes.
Although Elton has always been open about the music, for many years, this almost made it impossible to collate a list of his all-time definitive favourites because there’s such a vast number of songs he’s mentioned. Thankfully, in 2019, he appeared on the BBC Radio 2 programme Tracks Of My Years and shared his ten favourite songs.
Unsurprisingly, his first choice was ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ by Elvis Presley. When speaking about Elvis’ 1956 classic, he discussed how his life was never the same after that crucial moment, noting: “This record changed my life, and it changed the face of music. Up till then, we’ve had Guy Mitchell, Rosemary Clooney, Frank Sinatra, Kay Starr and all those lovely American acts.”
On the discovery of Elvis, John elaborated: “And this record my mum brought home, she bought a record every week, and she said, ‘I heard this record in the record store, and I’ve never heard anything like it, so I had to buy it’. She put it on; it was a 7″, of course, it was on HMV, and it changed my life and propelled me into my love of rock ‘n’ roll… it changed the world socially and musically”.
Another timeless classic John picked out was The Beatles’ effort ‘We Can Work It Out’. Discussing his selection, the singer recalled: “I remember being at school, at Pinner County Grammar School, and my friend Michael Johnson came with a 45″ and said, ‘I’ve just heard this band; they’re going to be the biggest band in the world’, and it was ‘Love Me Do’. I listened to it, and I thought, ‘It’s not bad, it’s not bad’, but I couldn’t see that they were going to be the biggest band in the world… he turned out to be right. I think he was number four in that fan club, so he spotted them a mile off.”
He detailed further: “And, of course, what the ’50s did with rock ‘n’ roll… The Beatles were extraordinary. They revolutionised the way things were recorded. Even though it was on quite simple equipment, they experimented, and they wrote fantastic songs. ‘We Can Work It Out’ is such a wonderful song.”
One of the other standout tracks that John named was ‘The Weight’ by Bob Dylan’s former accomplices The Band. When discussing the track, he said: “John Peel played the Music from Big Pink on his show, and I was a religious follower of John Peel in those days. He played all the great new music, and Bernie and I freaked out when we heard it. We’d never heard anything like this before. It was Americana done in a very soulful, funky, kind of laid-back way.”
Additionally, John remembered the transformative effect ‘The Weight’ had on him, explaining: “(The) next day we went up to Music Land in London and bought the import, and it changed my life again like Elvis Presley changed my life originally. This music changed my life because of the way the songs were written, the lyrics, the musicianship, was a huge influence on things like Tumbleweed Connection and Madman.”
Although John is the master of the ballad, his taste is eclectic and expansive, offering a true reflection of an individual who has dedicated his life to music.
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