5

6

The

B itch

at

Peace

Elton John got rejected

by his record label, is

feuding with his mother

and has a couple of

regrets about the 1980s.

So why is he so happy?

By Stephen Rodrick

PHOTOGRAPH BY

SAM TAYLOR-JOHNSON

E

lton john sits at a

giant red piano left over

from his Vegas days, wear-

ing the same brownish Ad-

idas tracksuit I saw him in

two days earlier. Today is a Sunday re-

hearsal at the Wiltern Theatre in Los An-

geles for the debut show behind his 32nd

album, Wonderful Crazy Night, and he

is jawing with his crew about his vocals.

They don’t seem to be getting the sound

to his liking, so he sings to them in an un-

rhymed couplet: “You’ll know when my

tits/Goes up your ass.”

Everyone laughs, and then Elton

breaks into a few bars from Oklahoma!

before dropping down to his bass range

and crooning lines not from the Rodgers

and Hammerstein original: “Why do all

the queers come from Tulsa?/Why do all

the fairies live in Oklahoma?/I think I’ll

move there next to you!”

The crew and the band are now gig-

gling, including guitarist Davey John-

stone and drummer Nigel Olsson, who

have been playing with Elton for more

than 40 years. They work through the

playful title track from Night. There’s

some talk with Johnstone as to wheth-

er they can get away with six new songs,

versus fi ve. Someone tells Elton that the

show is going to be 90 minutes long. He

shakes his head.

“Let’s do two hours,” he says. Elton rea-

sons that if he’s going to make the crowd

sit through half a dozen new ones, he

must give a hearty dollop of the hits. The

band gets back to work, but before long

Elton stops. It’s NFL playof season.

“Does anyone know the Packers-Red-

skins score?”

Someone reports the score, but Elton

barely listens. He’s more of a Patriots fan,