The genre Elton John said had the best singing: “My favourite type of music”
Playing rock and roll doesn’t always equate to having the greatest singing voice. As much as people like the idea of someone like Freddie Mercury strutting across the stage looking like an absolute rock and roll god, there were always going to be people like Lemmy who could get by after sounding like he swallowed a mouthful of razor blades. While Elton John was more than happy to test himself whenever he stepped into the studio, he knew where to go if he wanted to hear the greatest singing he had ever heard.
Then again, John was no slouch regarding his vocal prowess. While he never considered himself a proper singer, he was more than happy to interpret the song as he felt it should be played, whether that was going into falsetto for the last verses of ‘Bennie and the Jets’ or going full-on rock and roll when performing ‘Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting.’
And that kind of singing can only come from someone who listened to everything. As much as people like to put their genres into little subsections today, John benefited from listening to everything that came on the radio, whether that was easy-listening music, The Beatles, or Jimi Hendrix. Since he also came from music school, it’s not hard to find a handful of classical leanings in his music, either.
But singing pop music is a much different animal than singing opera, for instance. Those singers have put their time in day in and day out to make the perfect tone out of their voice, but John knew that the best way to sing was about harnessing your emotion and getting it out whenever stepping in front of a microphone. You can get that from a handful of rock and rollers, but there’s no better way of channelling that emotion than through soul music.
From the glory days when Ray Charles and James Brown were first starting the movement, the world of soul was always about the feeling rather than the music. There were still top-tier musicians on every Stevie Wonder album, but listening to the way that a song like ‘Sir Duke’ or ‘Isn’t She Lovely’ is played, everyone is focusing on the kind of vocal performance that hits them rather than whether or not someone is playing the right scale for the song.
Despite his reputation as one of the biggest names in pop-rock, it’s not like John thought he could compete with the genre, either, saying, “I never consciously tried to imitate soul singers – you have to be authentic in what you do. But it’s my favourite type of music, I’ve always loved it. It has the best singers – Marvin Gaye, Bobby Womack, Levi Stubbs from The Four Tops, the Detroit Spinners, the Stylistics – and obviously, I’ve listened to so much of it, a little bit rubbed off.”
There are even a few moments where John could stand alongside soul legends in his work. ‘Bennie and the Jets’ is far from the funkiest joint he has ever made, but it takes a special kind of groove to get someone known for tracks like ‘Tiny Dancer’ and ‘Your Song’ to get one of his tunes featured on Soul Train.
Still, there was never any debate on who was better in John’s mind. He could sing his heart out trying to make the same kind of soul that Marvin Gaye did in his prime, but anyone even attempting to make their own version of ‘What’s Going On’ will be competing for second place.
