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Fitter Stoke wrote:
Elton John ‘Deep Cuts’ (from the 4LP selection of the same name that Elton’s putting out this November as part of his ’Jewel Box’. I streamed this from the man’s extensive back catalogue and found it to be a most satisfying evening’s listening. Fans will dig, but like me are likely to have most of these tracks anyway)
I thought I was dreaming when I saw the tracklisting for Discs 3, 4 and 5: Rarities 1965-1971. 'Rarities' is a bit of an understatement. This is a vaultful of the pre-fame demos and full band tracks he recorded on the sly when Caleb Quaye let him into Dick James Studios after hours. Didn't think we'd ever hear these in decent fidelity, partly because I assumed Elton wasn't interested in putting them out, but mainly because I expected the masters to have been long lost. While it's disappointing that some much-bootlegged favourites such as 'When I Was Tealby Abbey' and 'A Dandelion Dies In The Wind' are only appearing in even earlier piano demo form, meaning we're not quite getting the full lost 1968 Sgt Zippo album as compiled for the ultra rare acetate that showed up on eBay a couple of years ago, at least we are finally getting to properly hear the two previously unheard-of tracks 'Nina' and 'Watching The Planes Go By' which were teased in the form of very poor quality extracts as part of the listing. 'Nina' in particular sounded like a monster of a track - the heaviest thing I'd heard from Elton during that particular era. Also plenty of other previously unbootlegged tracks to add to these. Amazing. I think I can (almost) now forgive the non-appearance of a deluxe 50th anniversary edition of Empty Sky last year.
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