Tumbleweed Connection was Elton John's most thematically strong, beautifully written and produced album, but it didn't have any hits. With Honky Château, he got pretty damn close to that level of quality while also serving up two sizable smashes, one of which was probably his best song and possibly the best song about being a rocket man ever written (one must also give Bowie his due credit). Not every one of the album tracks was a genuine stand out, but the jauntily sexy "Hercules", the mellowly sexy "Mellow", the dreamy "Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters", and the outrageous "I Think I'm Gonna Kill Myself" (not quite as hilarious as Queen's "Don't Try Suicide", but much quicker on the draw to find the humor in one of the most tragic things imaginable) are some of the best album cuts of John's career.
Slipping in a year past this watershed album's fiftieth anniversary is the 50th Anniversary edition of Honky Château. The album sounds true to its 1972 release but with somewhat less muddy and more detailed sound. The vinyl I received has a very slight wave, but it's completely quiet and free of any groove distortion--a lovely sounding release.
A bonus LP features demos of eight of the album's ten tracks, with "Slave" appearing twice: once in an arrangement similar to its released form and once at a hepped-up tempo that barely leaves enough time for the singer to enunciation the monosyllabic title. Otherwise, most of these demos hew closely to the familiar versions, which means they're pretty elaborately arranged for demos. One significant difference: "Kill Myself" gains a hoedown fiddle solo but loses "Legs" Larry Smith's tap dancing.
The sleeve loses the odd little wraparound feature of the original release on Uni, which isn't a big deal because the old version does tend to get jammed when sliding an LP next to it on the shelf. The package gains an 8-page booklet and printed inners with extensive liner notes, photos, a timeline, and a sort of Elton John-band family tree.
