Outrageous... rollicking... honest

Aradhika Sharma

Sir Elton Hercules John CBE (born Reginald Kenneth Dwight), has written a book that’s going to be as enduring and as appealing as his music. Me... is a rollicking, honest autobiography about and by an iconic musician, pianist and composer, who has influenced the course of music history in a career spanning over four decades. His pop and rock styles, as varied as his apparel, turned him into one of the 20th century’s biggest music icons. The famous Englishman who was chosen to sing at Lady Diana’s funeral and whose song “Candle in the Wind” became an anthem, stands out for his contribution to England as well as music, worldwide.

Writing and making music at a time when Rock and Roll had just revolutionised the country with the music, clothes, ideology and lifestyle it represented, and names like Elvis Presley, the Who, Beatles, Elton John lived in an exciting time. Elton John, the chart-topping superstar, joined the group of music makers, becoming the pop icon who changed the path of music forever.

In his autobiography, he is completely honest to his audience and he truthfully (sparing no lurid details) takes the readers through the progression of his extraordinary life. He was born in the London suburb of Pinner and named Reginald Dwight by his bad-tempered parents, who “should have never got married in the first place” and whose mother’s idea of instilling discipline was to thump the ‘living daylights’ out of Elton, petrifying and humiliating him by not holding back even in public. His father’s uncontrolled rage added to the misery. The bespectacled young boy dreamed of becoming a musician and at age 23, he was on a tour in America, facing a stunned audience, wearing the first of his extraordinary costumes that forever pushed the envelope.

His musical career started early with a band called, The Corvettes, and then with a ‘more serious’ band named Bluesology, followed by the partnership with songwriter- lyricist, Bernie Taupin. Once the two of them had their first big hits, the tour to America materialised and that’s when Elton appeared to bedazzle the world in his bizarre costume ( bright yellow dungrees, and a T-shirt with the sequined logo ‘Rock and Roll’ splashed across it). His costumes became more and more outrageous as Elton straddled the world of music (Ronald McDonald when he played the piano at Wham’s farewell concert in 1986, Donald Duck while playing at Central Park).

His journey is a star spangled one since he became a full-fledged music sensation at age 23 with his hits, “Your Song” and the No. 1 smash hits such as “Crocodile Rock,” “Bennie and the Jets” and “Island Girl”. His trajectory led him to fraternise with the likes of Princess Diana, Giovani Versace, George Michael, Freddy Mercury, Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Tina Turner — people who were blazing their own trails in the firmament. 

Elton writes with humorous candour and Me is rollicking with wry anecdotes and one-liners: “There are Benedictine monks wilder than I was when I was a teenager” or “I was wearing a kaftan and some bells on a chain around my neck. They didn’t really suit me. I looked like a finalist in a competition to find Britain’s least convincing flower child”. 

Of great significance to the author is his struggle with coming to terms with his addictions and his hard path leading to the final redemption from the drug addiction that had him in its grip for 16 years. “The first line I snorted made me retch,” he reveals. “I went out to the toilet and threw up. And then I immediately went back and asked for another line.” For this period until 1991, when he was finally cleaned up by a no-frills rehab center in Chicago, he continually fought a losing battle with cocaine, alcoholism, suicide attempts, balding, bulimia and recently, a Prostate cancer scare. 

Elton John has been disarmingly unguarded and honest in his autobiography: “I’m perfectly aware how ridiculous my life is, and perfectly aware of what an a******e I look like when I lose my temper over nothing,” he writes. He documents his love life as a gay person and his shabby treatment of his lovers until he finds love with David Furnish and becomes a father. 

More than a documentation of his music-making processes, Me is a cautionary saga about the ills that fame can bring in its wake in modern times, but at the same time it is an honest reflection of these transgressions and offers pointers to the path to salvation from those very pitfalls by changing life and getting clean.