Now to start a new monthly series! In an attempt to diversify the intellectual offerings at this site I am going to start review some of what I consider great music albums. The genres are varied but in general I am going to try to stick with what i know, so that probably means mostly rock albums with a few jazz and country albums thrown in. I don't make any claims on being original or revolutionary in the albums I pick, but I feel all of them are of high artistic quality.
The first in my series is a lesser known gem from Elton John (I suppose that is a relative term considering how popular he was back in the '70s). Madman Across the Water was Elton John's fourth album and his third one that was somewhat successful. It continues his and lyricist Bernie Taupin's fascination with Americana that they had first explored in Tumbleweed Connection, but instead of the warm and rich frontier themes they explored on that impressive album Madman musically and lyrically deals with the less storied and less often considered "dark" times in America past. The Post-Reconstruction South, The Indian Wars, World War II all get lyrical treatments although never directly, only as settings in which the characters are living and reacting to. Aside from the sunny and bright opener "Tiny Dancer" this is an album of weighty epics anchored by an amazing string score from Paul Buckmaster which gives the whole album a very cinematic (albeit very artsy not so much grand western style) quality especially when combined with the lyrical material. The album's mood is in fact very summarily encapsulated by the album cover, A stark and barren denim blue with only the title and artist in front and a track listing on the back. No pictures, no eye candy, just a solemn weightiness and dignity.
Side 1
Tiny Dancer: Unlike the rest of the album, the first and most famous song revels in a sunny southern California rock style, laid back upbeat, a not so subtle hint of country (those wonderful steel guitars!) filled in with a rousing orchestration that while not being too heavy, helps to keep the song from sounding to out of sync with the rest of the album.
Levon: A somber tail of a hardened man in a cold world that devoid of all kindness and on the brink of despair, Levon starts what could be considered the "proper" tone for the album. It is a majestic song that seems to capture the sullen and proud nobility of life in the world brought on by the industrial revolution. This is a song that could easily be applied to Victorian London as much as post WWII America (which is what I always pictured). Musically it is one of Elton's masterpieces. The song starts with piano, but then it hits you with a powerful low string section and then, as the chorus sets in, with the drums to give it a powerful ballad without ever being over the top or bombastic. Elton's vocals really pull this song together, especially in the second verse when he changes the melody just a little bit in order to sending it soaring into the space like heights that the lyrics are describing.
Razor Face: Another song of a man trudging on in a cold cruel world, Razor Face differs from Levon in the comfort and joy that Razor Face gets from the people around him. In a sense Razor Face is the opposite of Levon, he has nothing it seems and has been a wanderer all his life, no steady job and no family. Yet he seems to have more, he has joy in the company around him and love from the friends he has made. Plus the accordion workout at the end of the song, is absolutely amazing, seductively sliding into the song without being obtrusive (this is probably the first time the word "seductive" has been used to describe the accordion.)
Madman Across the Water: The title track of the album, some of the lyrics mention a nightmare and this song is a perfect musical representation of a nightmare. The strings and melody combine to provide a very claustrophobic tension that is never resolved in the song, it just fades to black. The lyrics are dark and cryptic, although keeping in with the Americana theme, I would imagine that Taupin is the madman (from Britain, so its "across the water.")
Side 2
Indian Sunset: Perhaps the most movie-like song on the album, this is the story of an Indian warrior fighting and dying for the survival of his people (unfortunately, all the various Indian tribes are kind of meshed into one (Iroquois with teepees? This man got around the entire country, but perhaps I am being to literal.) and the lyrics almost sound stereotypical to the point of lameness at times. But the song's very long and gradual crescendo (starting with a lone solo voice and building into the musical climax at the end coinciding with his death at the end) fits the power of the story. Adding to the cinematic quality of the song is the middle interlude that jumps into an odd monologue describing why the man is going to war. He wants to secure a small place in the world to raise his family and live free (if that is not the American dream, I don't know what is). Finally the story ends on a dark note; The brave warrior, tired and disillusioned, now homeless and hopeless in the land that once carried everything for him accepts defeat and welcomes death for the peace it will bring him.
Holiday Inn: Coming like a breath of fresh air, musically, from the heavy dread of "Indian Sunset". "Holiday Inn" feels as sunny and breezy as Tiny Dance does at the beginning. A mandolin busily flits in and out of the lyrics as the narrator describes a weariness of traveling (in this case touring with a band) that seems to be perfectly described by the similarity and boring sterileness (I believe I have created a word here..) that is the Holiday Inn. The song captures that odd anxious desire one has after a vacation to get back home, to be done with traveling by combining the weary lyrics with the light and bouncy music.
Rotten Peaches: Southern soul greets the listener with the first guitar in this song. The lyrical imagery of the song is also heavily indebted to the gospel sound. I have always imagined this to be a song about slaves struggling to adjust and settle into the United States after Civil War and the failure of Reconstruction although the second verse doesn't fit with that interpretation very well, but if the last verse is taken literally a home in Africa is many thousands of miles a way! Plus rotten peaches then seem to represent white men, since the narrator is trying to escape from rotten peaches, but no mater where he goes he sees them, they are inevitably a part of his life.
All the Nasties: This is probably the most cryptic song in the bunch, and that is saying a lot. At any rate, this is the one song that I have not quite figured out what it exactly means. It obviously is about oppression of some sort, but who the individual being oppressed is or who the oppressors are I have no Idea. The Church choir in the background of this song helps to lend it a weighty quality that the unclear lyrics don't and gives it just a hint of drama which goes a long way to making this song feel more coherent lyrically then it actually is.
Goodbye: A short, sparse and very despondent song that closes out the full album, it seems to imply a man (well narrator) who has been used up by someone else completely, perhaps sacrificed for the pleasure of others (he is a songwriter). The second verse is full of Christ-like illusions, but these images which in Christianity have a very powerfully joyful context are despondent because the sacrifice is not the choice of the individual who is doing the sacrificing, but rather decreed upon him by others.
Madman Across the Water could have been a very difficult album to sit through, but Elton John's keen musical sense keeps it from becoming an unbearably awful train wreck of human misery. Its arrangements give the songs, and the album as a whole, a feeling of the sadness and despondency in the human world, but in the back there is always a faint glimmer of hope and of that enduring human quality of being able to grasp tightly upon the small rays of happiness that find their way into our lives. It's mood, and the fact that most of the songs are around 5 minutes long make it a very tough album to "get into." It is a sleeper album that has to grow on you. It's grand and epic, but never bombastic which means the rich dividends that the songs supply are only achieved by a careful, deliberate and repeated listenings.
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