Bernie Taupin digs Elvis
Elton John's co-writer talks about songwriting -
Extract -
What’s the best lyric you’ve ever heard?
Elvis Costello’s Watching The Detectives has one of the most viciously satisfying lyrics that comes to mind. It’s cryptic but at the same time has enough of a visible storyline to make you relate to it. It has this hypnotic pulse that’s so venomous that the words literally jump out the groove and bite you in the ass -
‘You snatch a tune, you match a cigarette / She pulls the eyes out with a face like a magnet/ I don't know how much more of this I can take / She's filing her nails while they’re dragging the lake’.
Followed by the coup de grace: ‘Though it took a miracle to get you to stay / It only took my little finger to blow you away’. Elvis is constantly magnificent as a lyricist. There is nothing remotely pedestrian about what he has to say .There are so many examples of his work that to cite just a few is doing him a disservice but I’d have to throw in Pump It Up and Indoor Fireworks as prime examples of his genius. He’s interesting, he’s articulate and the melodies he writes wrap around the words perfectly.