Video will appear as you scroll through the story
Elton John · S4 E2
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
A double album, 17 tracks, not a wasted note. The album that crowns Elton John as the biggest pop star on Earth
Seventeen songs recorded in roughly two weeks. When the tapes from Chateau d'Herouville arrive in London for mixing, Gus Dudgeon realizes he is holding the biggest record of the decade.
Elton John -- Grey Seal (1973). Originally recorded in 1970 as a quiet B-side, then completely re-recorded for Goodbye Yellow Brick Road with the full band. The transformation tells you everything about how far Elton has come in three years.
The Double Album
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road is a double album that plays like a single statement. It opens with an eleven-minute orchestral rock suite and closes with a fragile piano ballad. In between: glam rock, Broadway pastiche, reggae, hard rock, and a ballad about Marilyn Monroe that will outlive every other song Elton writes.
Grey Seal (1973)
The 1970 version is a quiet acoustic piece. The GBYBR version is a full-band explosion with layered guitars, thundering drums, and Elton's voice pushed to its upper range. Listen for how the arrangement builds in waves, each chorus bigger than the last, with Davey Johnstone's guitar adding new textures every time it returns.
TAP TO REVEAL: Who painted the Goodbye Yellow Brick Road album cover?
Harmony -- Elton John
The final track on Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. After seventeen songs of rock, glam, balladry, and everything in between, the album closes with this: a simple, aching piano piece barely three minutes long. The quietest ending to the loudest album of the year.
How long did it take to record the seventeen tracks on Goodbye Yellow Brick Road?
One song on this album will take on a life of its own. Next: a fake live recording, a synth riff, and the track that crosses Elton over to Black radio.
0 XP earned this session