Favorite Elton John song?

[DCRacer]

"Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" - but I really like the reworked version of 'Your Song' in the movie 'Moulin Rouge!'

 

[Jason401]

My Favorite Elton John Songs:

(1) Sacrifice
(2) Crocodile Rock



​

 

[Cormac135]

I Want Love and This Train Don't Stop There Anymore.







Or indeed twenty others.

 

[GanymedeATL]

First Episode At Hienton. Loved it since I was a kid.

 

[JarodA]

How does one even answer this question?

Not a definitive answer by any means, but just 'cause I can I'll post this one, that never gets heard and deserves to. This song's about a high-school homosexual crush .



Seriously Elton is the King. Even his weaker albums are never without some bright spots. Even some songs that didn't even make it onto albums except as bonus tracks later on are better than most artists. Examples:

Bonus track of his debut:



My favourite solo artist bar none .

 

[JarodA]

If "Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word" was in the poll I might've picked that, though my favourite version isn't studio, but Melbourne Symphony Orchestra in 1986.

 

[geep2b]

he's an artist for the ages. who can pick a favorite.

 

[jjonn3]

If "Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word" was in the poll I might've picked that, though my favourite version isn't studio, but Melbourne Symphony Orchestra in 1986.

That "Live In Australia" album is amazing - beautiful versions of Elton's music...

 

[trinket]

That "Live In Australia" album is amazing - beautiful versions of Elton's music...

I have some quibbles with that album but not really anything particular to Elton or the arrangements or performance. And arrangements are by James Newton Howard who later went big into the film scoring world. There is a nice Wikipedia entry on this album, by the way. And I have not heard the remastered version - but as I understand it, it's only remastered from the original source final mix, so same mix heard on the earlier release, and not remixed.

My issue is more a sound quality thing and live recordings in general, made worse if it's with an orchestra. It's mostly because, especially with a symphony orchestra, to paraphrase one professional recording engineer on classical recordings I heard interviewed once about the trend of just a single overhead microphone hanging roughly in position over the conductor's podium, "To think that you can shove an entire symphony orchestra down into one microphone - and only two left-and-right channels in the resulting recording - is just ridiculous".

With live recordings I don't really always feel like I'm right "there" listening with that crowd (a "fly on the wall") the night it was performed/recorded, which should be the goal of a good live recording - often all sense of the venue and hall are lost in the merge down to left-and-right channels no matter how much mic'ing they do of the room, overhead, direct-inputs to the board for the backing band's instruments, etc. These recordings are better in 5.1 or 7.1 and if done well can put you in a wonderful sense of perspective in sitting in the venue, you hear applause from all around you - but DVD-A and SACD formats never caught on majorly for anything, let alone surround sound recordings. Although, the latest trend with high-definition and surround-sound music are using Blu-Ray discs to carry predominantly audio (and no or minimal picture/slideshow content) and this has improved a little over the years especially for niche/audiophile labels.

Sorry for the mini-rant, potentially of interest here to nobody, rofl. Great performances on the disc though, no question - but it's always a problem in really feeling like a live recording is transporting you there.

 

[JarodA]

^ For me, the sound quality is good, above-average for an orchestra recording. Listen through good speakers or headphones, and you can really hear many individual instruments coming through . In my car, my speakers are good but most of the sound seems to be in the back-seats. Well, it doesn't quite sound like there's a full orchestra behind me but it still sounds pretty wonderful .

The thing about the Live in Australia recordings is not the recording or orchestra, but Elton's vocals were going through real trouble during the late-stages of '86 when it was recorded. But then again, his vocal roughness to me really added a lot to some of the songs. For instance, for me there was no better version of "Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word", "I Need You To Turn To" and maybe even some other songs too.

Great news, he's coming to my country late in the year, and I'll be able to see him .

 

[scrapple]

Had to bump this great thread!

 

[TickTockMan]

The entire Billy Elliot: The Musical soundtrack really, but if i had to pick one it would be Electricity. The show version, not Elton John's.

 

[vacancy3]

Tiny Dancer

 

[bigbj69]

definitely the best CD I own is Elton John Live with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. Truly amazing!

 

[blowing2beclever]

I've always loved "Cold" and "Pain" from his severely underrated Made In England album.