Elton John – Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy (1975)

When I was young, I only knew Elton John as this cheesy pianist who wrote the music for Lion King and for Princess Diana when she died. I found his music a bit boring and thought it was all just some grey easy listening stuff. Many years later I was introduced to his 70's albums and my view of his music changed completely. Elton John's 70's music is closer to glam rock which I've always really liked. He's also a fantastic songwriter. The songs have amazing melodies and they have been recorded with style. There's nice groove on most of his early albums and even the love ballads from around that time don't sound too cheesy. I bought this album on a great fold-sleeve vinyl with only £5 from a market square in Stratford-Upon-Avon. It's one of my first proper Elton John albums, but I feel like I would want to own more of them now that I've found what his music is really all about. The album cover is amazingly detailed and fund to look at.



Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy is an autobiographical album written about Elton John's and Bernie Taupin's early musical careers before the breakthrough. Elton John is Captain Fantastic and Bernie Taupin is the Brown Dirt Cowboy. The biggest hit on the album Someone Saved My Life Tonight tells about Elton John's engagement to Linda Woodrow and how a friend convinced John to break the engagement so he wouldn't destroy his musical career due to an unhappy marriage.

Captain Fantastic became a massive commercial success, which is strange considering it only had one single and many of the songs are quite long. I really love that these kinds of concept albums with no obvious singles could really be so successful in the 70's. It really was the golden age of the vinyl and albums.

There are various different musical styles on this album, but it all still sounds very together. Maybe it's because of the sounds. The sounds are absolutely brilliant on this album. Songs from slow ballads such as Someone Saved My Life Tonight to uptempo rock songs like (Gotta Get A) Meal Ticket all sound great. There are similarities in style to artists like David Bowie, Elvis Costello and Steely Dan. I feel like there are certainly some more recent artists, who have gotten a great deal of influences from Elton John. The first person that comes to mind is Ben Folds. It's difficult to mention any individual songs that would stand out from the rest of the album. It's all pretty great. But also, more than anything else, it sounds like a great album as a whole, so I would suggest to really listen to it from start to finish.

While writing this blog, I've often been amazed by the greatness of some of the 60's and 70's albums. That kind of complex songwriting is very rare today when artists are more and more focused on visual aspects of their act and on sounds. I truly appreciate great musicians and the musicians on these old albums are just amazing. You really have to struggle to find as good musicians these days.

Listen to the album on Spotify.