" The Big Picture " interview

 

 

1) 1997 is an important year for you. It marks the 30th anniversary of your meeting with Bernie Taupin and also your 50th birthday, but do you feel it's a pivotal year?

It's an exciting year! 30 years writing with one person without any hiccups is pretty amazing, I mean, I'm very proud of that. I mean, Bernie and me are like brothers, you know. We've never really had a major argument. Both have done different things outside of the relationship we've had professionally, and I think that's probably what's kept us together. We've never been jealous of each others other achievements - he's gone off and written things for other people and I've written stuff with Tim Rice. We're still close, in fact closer than we ever were. It always saddens me when you see a partnership that was a great partnership break up - like Bacharach and David, Goffin and King (and I think that was marital probably).
But, you know, I'm very happy about that. 50 ... you know, I don't feel 50. What is 50? You're as old as you feel I suppose. And I've just got so much to do; I've been writing a lot in the last two years before I made this album. I took two years off from touring and making records to do writing. And in that time Tim Rice and myself has written some extra songs for The Lion King which opens on Broadway in November, and a full length 25 song musical of Aida - not the Guiseppi Verdi Aida - but based on the same story. And also a full length animated project for Steven Spielberg's Dreamworks company called Eldorado - City of Gold. So I haven't been sitting on my backside. But when you write things like that you stay in one place so I haven't travelled so I spent more time at home.

2) You are involved with Watford Football Club, charity work and recording a new album. Do you think you're a workaholic?

I like to work. I mean, I've reformed the record company in America, we've now got a film company in this country which is through Disney. It's a development company, so we want to produce and make movies. So, yeah, I don't like sitting still. I think if you have the energy and you've got the ability I just can't... I don't know what other artists do, actually, if they don't make albums for like five or six years some artists, maybe even ten. I mean, Lionel Richie is a perfect example: I said to Lionel "WHAT do you do all day? You don't play golf..." I mean, it fascinates me. I have to be busy. I love being in the thick of things.

3) The new Government have for the first time appointed a Minister for Film, Tom Clarke, do you think they are in touch with popular culture?

It's such a great thing when they got in. And I can't see them getting out, thank God, because I think this country desperately needs the change. I think John Major was a very honorable man - and I had a lot of time for him - but the conservative party as a whole it sort of self destructed and people had no respect for them at all. I think the Labour party did their homework and I think now that they got into power they've done a lot of preparation for that. And everything they're doing at the moment makes a lot of sense. And it's given this country a lot of hope and made everybody feel good. Its no good having a feel-good factor if it only affects one part of the community. It's gotta affect everybody. I think unde this government it will affect everybody and I think that's what democracy is all about.

4) How did you and Bernie meet?

- Through an advert in a paper; in the New Musical Express many years ago. And it was... I knew that when I left Bluesology the only thing I could do was to write songs. I said "You don't sing and I don't want to play the organ or the piano in a band again - I've been travelling on the road for five or six years - what can I do? Songwriting".
So I got the New Musical Express as I did every week saw this advertisement from Liberty Records saying "Songwriters, artists needed". I said "I can't write lyrics" so he said "Well, that's interesting". On my desk was a pile of lyrics sent in from Bernie. He said "This guy from Lincolnshire's sent me some lyrics, take them home and have a look". So I did and I wrote a lot of songs to them without ever meeting Bernie for a long time. And that's really... you know, it's just a complete accident.

5) How do you work, do you write the music first, or does he write the
lyrics?

It's all words first. And it's always been like that. I think now, maybe because he's made albums on his own and he's got a new band together called Farm Dogs, that in the last two or three albums I've consulted him more on the musical side of things, because I think it would be insulting if I didn't. But, you know, he's never really objected to anything that I've written or said anything. I think he would nowadays. I think he would say "well, that's not quite how I saw it", but in the pat if he didn't like anything he obviously just grinned and bared it, cause we've never really disagreed about anything. That's the way it works. We don't really consult each other. He's not in the room when I write. And as soon as I've written he's the first person I call in if he's there. Because he came over when we made the new album for the first two or three weeks and then came back in the end of it. And it's the same way I write with Tim Rice as well. He gives me the lyrics first. And I would find it extraordinary to write a melody first and then do the lyrics after. I HAVE done in the past with Gary Osborne when we did the Single Man album. I enjoyed the process, but it was a much more difficult process for me than having the lyrics first.

6) How many times have you had to say "I can't construct a melody round
these words"?

Actually there was a rewrite on the new album; a song called Long Way From Happiness. I had the verse written and I couldn't get a melody around the chorus. It was too long and kind of uneven, so I rang Bernie up and said "Listen, I've got a great verse. I need you to rewrite the chorus more simply" Which he did. And as soon as he did the song fell into place. Maybe years ago I wouldn't have done that. Maybe I'd have just thrown the song away. With Tim I don't think it's ever happened because we've written for musicals. We've never written anything I've had to record myself. Again, Bernie ... there have been periods in our life when one of us has been happy or sad or both have been sad. And I think on the Blue Moves album - around that time - several things that I... it was kind of a heavy album anyway. There was a couple of things I couldn't write to 'cause I couldn't really relate to it and it was so heavy so I didn't do it. But I always get more lyrics than I need anyway, so I am able to drop a few that I don't think I'm able to write to.

7) Why don't you just write the songs yourself?

I've wondered that myself sometimes. So I've sat down and tried to write lyrics and I'm just not very good at it. I mean, I'm a very verbose person. I can have a very great conversation with someone but as far as writing things down and things coming to mind I just have to accept that I'm not very good. So there's no point in doing things that you're not very good at
I think.

8) How did your early image evolve?

I rebelled in my 20's instead of my teenage years, so by the time I got to perform as Elton John and got a band together and went to America I'd had a year of playing with my band in Britain and evolving a stage act. And I used to wear Mr. Freedom hotpants and flying boots. And when I went to America it wasn't "Let's dress up and go to America". This was what I had been wearing anyway. And, of course, the Americans, with the Elton John cover, thought that they'd get a Randy Newman or David Accles-like figure who was gonna come out and be very moody and mysterious ... and I wasn't at all. Some of the songs on that album are very melodic and there are a few uptempo songs on it. But basically I was an uptempo piano player who loved playing that kind of piano. I wanted to use my piano like a guitar. They said "You can't. If you try to kick a piano you break your foot". So I jumped on it. You do everything to it that you could possibly do to make it more interesting. Otherwise you're stuck behind a nine foot plank. People said that "You know, I don't think he should do that when the music's so good" and I thought "Well if the music's good it's gonna stand up for itself. And also; I'm going to entertain people". If I went to see Leonard Cohen and he did that I'd be horrified you know. Or Joni Mitchell. And I wouldn't expect it. But it's part of my nature so it just evolved. And I got to the part were I realised I felt like mutton dressed up as lamb and this ... I've gone too far. And I still have a lot of those costumes - every now and again we sell one or two to raise money. We still have a lot left. But I did carry on too far. I didn't know when to stop and I became a parody of myself on stage. It was beyond ridiculous.

9) When you sell some of your clothes the money goes to the Aids Foundation, how did that start?

Well we started four years ago ... or nearly five years ago now. When I got sober and clean I wanted to do something positive with my life. I'd been around a lot of people who had died, a lot of close friends who had died and I'd been around the Ryan White family in America. I'd been at Ryan's funeral and the last week of his life. It was a point in my life that I was so unhappy. Being around that family made me realise how out of whack my life was. I didn't appreciate anything, I didn't have any values whatsoever. And they could forgive the people that had been completely harmful to them. They'd been attacked ... they'd been maliciously treated and Jeannie (sp?) White, who was Ryan's mother, was able to forgive them when he died, because these people came and said "listen, we're sorry". At the beginning there was so much ignorance about AIDS; Ryan wasn't allowed to go to school ... blah, blah, blah... She had the dignity and grace to forgive those people and I thought "God, you just lost your only son and you've gone through all this crap, and still you're able to forget". And I thought "It just shows you were I'm at". So very shortly after that I got sober and I spent a year after that doing what people told me to do. I started doing concerts for other people for AIDS and things like that and thinking "I'm not sure how much money they're going to raise here, because there seem a lot of hangers-on and hotel bills" and I thought "right, you've been the chairman of a football club. You know how to run something. Run something well, and put something back". And that's the start of the foundation. And we do. And we give all the money to direct care. And I'm very proud of it. It's a very small organisation in the fact that I have one in North America and one here and it has about five employees and volunteers. 86 percent of what we earn in America and over 90 percent of what we earn here gets out. So our overheads - which we pay ourselves - offices, wages and stuff like that, are pretty low. And most charities ... if you look at the figures at what they raise and what actually gets out it will astonish you. So I'm proud of that and I it is is something I think I will be doing for the whole of my life now. Because even though in North America and Europe and in Britain AIDS is beginning to find its level because of the medicine that's available, in third world countries, some European countries and South America the situation is very grave indeed. We have to carry on...

10) Song for Guy was not, as people thought, about AIDS, but a young man who was killed in a motorbike accident. Is that a song that still lives with you?

I really don't play it often live, but ... yeah ... it's an instrumental with a bit of singing at the end, and I've always been fascinated with sad music and I love sad music. And I had written this piece actually before he died... and I had never known what to call it - it's very hard naming instrumental pieces. When he was killed I just consulted with his family and I thought it would be nice to dedicate it to him. And it has the words "life isn't everything" at the end. And ... perhaps it isn't ... I don't know, but ... I just like writing that kind of music

11) Is there a definitive Elton John album?

It's difficult 'cause I don't listen to them very much. But having listened to the albums when they were remastered a couple of years ago I'm very proud of the Captain Fantastic album because it tells a story and it's about me. So when I was writing the song I felt an allegiance to the lyrics straight away because it was autobiographical. I think Blue Moves is a great musical album ... Yellow Brick Road is a pretty good double album ... But then again I like Don't Shoot Me... and I like Tumbleweed.... There are bits and pieces. I think we used to change the sound of our albums from album to album quite a lot -Caribou was followed by Rock Of The Westies which was followed by Blue Moves; which were three different sounding albums, because I changed personnel as well ... and if you change personnel I think the sound of the record changes ... but Tumbleweed... was totally different from Madman... which was totally different from Don't Shoot Me..., from Honky... and then you got the double album of Yellow Brick Road. So I think it's very hard to make a double album that's interesting all the way through and I think Yellow Brick Road achieved that. I'd have to put that high on the list

12) Is there an album you'd like to do better if you could?

I think Leather Jackets which had a lot of good songs on it. But I was in such a drug induced haze at that time. I wouldn't have put that out. And probably Victim of Love. I would never had put that out if I had a second chance, 'cause I love disco music and dance music but I came ... too late, basically. And I put it out when disco died (laughs). You know, it was an attempt at something and after that I said "right, always stick to what you know best and never try and jump on anybody's bandwagon ever again". I mean, I love different sorts of music. But it doesn't necessarily mean because I'm a good musician that I can do something like Underworld. I mean, Underworld's Second Toughest In The Infants was probably one of my favourite albums of the last five years and I'd love to be able to make a record like that but I wouldn't know where. So if I said to Underworld "Oh, let's make an album together", it would be more their input than mine because that's the kind of music I do not know how to produce but can appreciate it. So after I had put the Victim of Love album out I said "never jump on a bandwagon again and just be true to yourself and do what you do best and just resist that temptation". It's very tempting to try and do because you hear a record and you go "God that's SO great!!" I mean, like a Massive Attack record or something like that... but that's them, not me, and so ... I learnt my lesson with Victim of Love.

13) Do you listen to any current bands like Oasis?

Yeah! I listen to everything that comes out. I think Noel writes brilliant songs and I think that's the key to anything. I haven't seen them live, but everybody who saw them live say they were fantastic so I'd love to see them. I think they're tremendous. I love Dodgy 'cause they remind me of The Who ... very fond of Dodgy, one of my favourite English bands. I think Blur are a fantastic live band. And I really don't go and see many live bands, but I've seen them play at The Brits and they knocked me out. What else have I listened to ... I really liked the Spiritualized album Ladies and Gentlemen We're Floating in Space, which is a fantastic album. What I really like best as far as new music ... I think ... since the late 70's there's been punk, there's been rap, and now there's this Chemical Brothers -Underworld - Prodigy type stuff, which I find is a different sort of music. It's like dance music but it's got an edge to it, and it incorporates the rock and roll kind of stuff, and it incorporates other music, but it's got its own sound. And I think that's the newest sound that we have and its a sound that will take os into the next millennium. I find that type of music extremely exciting. Apollo 440. I listen to a lot of that stuff, which will probably surprise you if you heard my latest album 'cause it's full of slow stuff! But that's what excites me. It's great to hear something new and exciting and with a raw edge like that.

14) Do you think that the British bands are making more of an impact in
America?

I get the charts every week and you see British bands like Blur, who been over there and toured a lot, their albums beginning to happen. Jamiroquai, who's album I think is fantastic, their album's beginning to happen. You've got Sneaker Pimps in the charts, the new Radiohead record will do extremely well. It's very encouraging. I think there was... when the brit pop thing happened we had all this angst in America, all those kind of ... you know ... like Soundgarden-bands and there was a lot of misery flying around. And what wasn't happening with the British scene. The British scene was much more poppy. And I think now what's happening is that people are getting rid of the angst and discovering, thank God, more the poppy side of ... which the British bands have always been about; the melody and attitude and a good album. Apart from a couple of American bands I prefer much more listening to a British album by a British band. There are exceptions of course. I like Collective Soul, I love R.E.M. Bands like Sonic Youth and stuff like that are so bloody miserable.

15) Why have you got involved with Watford Football Club again?

- I think when you're involved with a football club, it's very much a team effort - if you pardon the pun - off the field. I'm not involved on the field. When Graham and I was involved with Watford the first time and we had so much success for ten years, and Graham left and went to Villa, then to England and to Wolves, it wasn't the same for me even though we had various managers. The atmosphere wasn't the same and eventually I sold out to someone else. And I became life president. And I used to go to some matches and I just saw the lack of ambition there. Which I think really started with me when Graham left. They never gave Basset a chance in Watford so ... he was there and gone in a year. And then Graham phoned me and said "Listen," - we've always kept in contact anyway - "the owner of Watford wants me to come back". And I said "I think it's the best thing for you", and he said "Well, I don't know. I'm just about ready to walk away from soccer. I've had a gutful with the Englands-thing, with the Wolves-thing and the press and being called a turnip". And I said "Listen. I know what you mean, but you can't let other people run your life for you. You're a football man. Come back to an area that loves you and be General Manager". And that's what he did. And I said "If you come back I promise I will try and find a way to come back". And I obviously couldn't come back under the previous owner. What we've done is put a consortium of people together with much more money than ... you know, before I was a sole benefactor, but football's changed so much now; the amount of money. You can not do that, the one person ... the one chairman guy, unless Jack Walker or someone else like that or ... Sir John Hall ... And I don't want that financial strain and I want a board that's gonna be a team. So we've put together a new board and back at the club I'm the Chairman, not the majority shareholder. But I'm a very good foil for Graham. I miss the team footballers I miss the people in Watford I miss the camaraderie that I had at the club. You know, you don't spend 15 years of your life at a club ... and it wasn't just the football that I loved. It was the community spirit, the spirit after the game wether you won or lost. It was very, very good for me. And now I am delighted to be back. And Graham's the team manager chomping at the bits. He's had his break and now he wants to manage again. I said "Graham, you're a young man, relatively speaking. Gotta do what you're best at" ... so we'll se what happens. Just nice to be somewhere were
there's a bit of ambition back.

16) Do you think it's possible to get Watford back into the Premiere
Division?

It's gonna be harder, let's face it. The Premiere League is gonna change in a couple of years - I read today that there's only gonna be one team relegated. But there might be another league formed. I read in the paper about this new Phoenix League -though we've not heard about it we'd want to be part of it. You can achieve anything if you put your mind to it. If there's only gonna be one club a year admitted to the Premiere League the we'll have to accept that and go for it. Before, when Graham came to the club, people said "Oh God, Watford!" - I remember Kevin Keegan saying "Blimey, what are you doing in Watford?" and I said "We'll get there." We did. And we have a ground now. We'll be sharing with Saracens (sp?) Rugby, so we'll have rugby at the ground as well, which I think it's great. We have enormous plans to redevelop if we can. So ... we can get there ... You can do anything if you put your mind to it. And you've got the right team of people

17) Thinking of all the honours you've received, including the CBE, do they
mean much to you?

To be recognised by your country is a great honor. So I was very proud of that. The Royal Academy thing meant a lot to me, because I hadn't been back to the Academy in 35 years and I went back to receive my honorary membership, and it's changed so much. When I went there as a little boy from 11 to 15 I was so afraid of going. It was like you walked into the building and there was this smell of fear. And it was very intimidating... There are all the students there sitting in the hall. And they got their own rock band, which was exceedingly good. They have courses now for songwriting. It's been modernised. It's wonderful. So I was very proud of that. It's very hard when it comes to awards. What I like best of all - which may sound really cheesy - are the platinum records and the gold records, because it means that people has actually gone out and bought them. That means more. Because they've liked the record, they've liked what I've written and recorded. So they've gone out and bought it and ... I still value those more than any other award probably. When I get a gold record for an album it's still the same as when I got my first one, it's still, like, so exciting. This is an exciting business. it's not a boring business at all. It's a surprising one. There's always a chock around the corner. You can never tell what's gonna be a hit. Some albums you've records you think are great do worse than things you don't think are so good. And so there's that continual surprise element involved. After putting out 38, 39 albums, or 40 albums or whatever it is, and still getting a gold or platinum record and thinking "Yeah, come on,
come on!" you know, that's good. I don't really think age really comes into it. I know that certain things have changed with records. In America, for example, things are categorised. There's either urban records or there's AC records or Hot AC - what the hell "Hot AC" means I've no idea. And over here there's an age element creeping in, where I think music is music and it's a very broad element. And it can bring many pleasures on different levels. And I don't see why you can't hear something, say by ... Radiohead followed by something like ... The Spice Girls, followed by Muddy Waters followed by Aretha Franklin. Music is that broad to me and I hate seeing it categorised. Listening to records by a lot of young people - I never listen to records by older people anymore, unless I'm at home and put a Billy Holiday record on or whatever... I'd rather listen to what other people produce that I haven't heard before. I can't see the point of listening to In the Midnight Hour or I Got My Mojo Working as I played them about a thousand times when I was in a band. So ... I appreciate their value and, you know, they're great songs and performances, but I wanna hear something new too. It's hearing the younger bands and the younger singer/songwriters, artists that keep me
going.

18) Why did you make the documentary Tantrums & Tiaras?

I was approached to do the Southbank Show, which is a very good show and it's brilliantly put together. But it's very reverential and I thought I just wanted to do something a little different. So I asked David, my partner, to follow me around for a year with his partner Polly (sp?) Steel.And they took a hundred hours of film and we ended up with Tantrums and .. I wanted to be as honest as possible. To show people what it really is like touring for a year. The pressure you go on, how impossible you can be, how funny situations can be. You read interviews and it's always how wonderful they are. And you see a documentary about someone and it never really examines the darker side of someone. And it was the first thing about me that I could watch all the way through without flinching, because it was accurate. I mean, when you do a talk show and you go on you kind of put on a different persona. It's that showbiz glitzy thing and you play along with it. If we're gonna do a documentary, let's try and change the level of honesty and set a new standard of honesty. And it was accepted very well. I mean, a lot of people didn't like it. It was a very good experience for me, a very kind of cleansing experience as well. I was a monster in some of it, but I just sat there and laughed at all. I just thought "God, this is so funny".

19) Tell me about the cover to the new album - "The Big Picture"

I'm very friendly with Julian Schnabel, who is one of the most celebrated painters of our time, and I asked him if he would do a portrait for the album cover. He did two portraits - one of which is going to be on the cover one that's actually gonna be on the CD itself. Bernie wrote a song called The Big Picture and I thought "wow, that's pretty amazing ... we'll call it The Big Picture". And it's turned out very well. The actual front of the album cover he's done on porcelain plates, which he's very famous for, and the other one is a straight portrait. As straight as you can get anyway.

20) Can you describe the new album?

Basically there's 10 songs and there's two uptempoish songs - and the rest are just kind of ... either slow or middling. And they're all about relationships apart Live Like Horses. If we put another track on it will be called Wicked Dreams which will probably be the eleventh track -an uptempo track and we'll put it on last because we don't want to break the continuity
of the album up. I'm very proud of the songs that we've done. They're very melodic songs ... they're either about good relationships or how difficult it is to have relationships or relationships that's gone wrong. And I can relate to that. I've been in all three situations. But, you know, when I get the lyrics from Bernie I try and just write the very best melody I can possible. And I'm very happy with the melodies. Some of them are very simple, some of them are very complex. There's a song called I Can't Steer My Heart Clear of You which is one of the most complex melodies I've ever written. It's like a song in three parts. And another one which is in three parts called January. The quality of the songs is really, really good and that's all I can do. But the running order is important and I think we've left a lot of songs off ... We've left about three songs off that we could have put on, because I'm a great believer in "less is more". You have a CD and think "Oh, I can fill all this time up!". And so you buy a CD and you get to track 15 by someone and you think "Oh my God, I can't cope anymore!" It's too much, it's too much. I know with a CD you can switch from track to track but I still think in old album form where you listen to the first track and go all the way through to the end. So, we're trying to get 50 minutes of music on the album, and that's it.

21) What's Bernie Taupin's reaction to your music?

I think now, because he's much more musical, he will say what he feels about something. And I know he's exceedingly pleased with all the stuff we've done on this album.
I think in the past that there must've been times when he said "Oh God, blimey! That's not at all what I expected." But he's never ever said he actually doesn't like something. Because we've been together for such a long time it's nice to actually say "Do you like this?". Before I never did. I said "This is it". Now I say "Do you like this?" and I call him in before we record it and I say "Is there anything you don't like in it, I'll change it", so I think he's really happy.

22) Is the order of the songs on the album important?

It is very important, I think, because it's gotta to be cohesive, it's all gonna have to fit from one track to the next. And the reason I have a record producer - and I've always had a record producer except for a couple of albums - is that they're usually very good at that. They've got an overview of it. They've been listening to it, they can tell which ones will go next. I mean, we've tried two or three different running orders on this album, and I think we've come up with the best one, which - when I saw it this morning - I thought "Oh my God, that's revolutionary! I don't know about it." And the more I've looked at it the more it makes sense. And Chris Thomas, who produced the album ... You know, when you write a song, for example. And I play it to Chris. And you've only written it about five minutes ago, so it's very precious to you. Chris will come up and say "I really like it, but I think the chorus should be here and I think you should change the melody here." And I go "EEEEEE!" But the whole point of it ... he's looking at it from a whole different angle than I am. And, usually, when he says to me "Change something", he's usually right. That's why you have him there for. And I never go to mixes, and I never go to running order things. That's his job, and he's bloody good at it. And that's the reason why I employ him, 'cause I need that advice, I need that editor. He's a producer/editor as far as I'm concerned. And it's very necessary, because artists can get so carried away - whether they're painters, whether they're writers - they'd have everything they've done in it instead of selecting the best. I think Chris is very firm with me and he's always been in favour of having just ten tracks. There's gonna be eleven, but that's a compromise ... In the past I would've said "Let's put 15, 16" But it's not a double album, it's a single album so ... it's very important for him to actually tell me the truth, which he always does.

23) Chris Thomas has also produced INXS and The Pretenders, has he had any
influence on this album?

Yeah, the reason I love Chris is everything he does ... he seems to have such a broad taste. He's in the middle of my album and he's in the middle of Pulp's album. Mine's finished, so now he's gonna finish the Pulp album. He's got that wide range. The Pulp album will sound nothing like my album, and it will sound nothing like an old Pretenders album or an INXS album or an old McCartney album or Roxy Music album. But he brings that experience and that listening to different sounds and other musicians play things. I've known Chris for 39 years - we were at The Royal Academy of Music together - we're fellow R.A.M. people ... and, you know, I trust him implicitly. And he knows about loops, he knows about drum machines and computers - I don't. I'm not technical at all. And we use real drums on this album, but we use it as a mixture in some tracks with a bit of electronic loops and stuff like that to make it sound a little bit more modern. You have to acknowledge technology. You have to accept new technology. Because it can be very exciting. And it can be very helpful. He manages to merge the two of the actual ambience live playing with the electronic side of things.

24) Why did you put the solo version of Live Like Horses on the album?

That was written for the Made In England album and I tried recording it and it never worked out. It was such a difficult song to record. And also, it's very long, quite a long song, and we already had a couple of long songs on Made In England, so I put it in my drawer 'cause I really love the song. And I started to play it live. And it went down so well live and then I got fans with placards saying "Please play Live Like Horses". So I thought "What are we gonna do with this song?". And I suddenly thought "Let's do a duet with Luciano", 'cause it's a quite classical song in chord structure. So ... we did that with Luciano and we put the single out last year. And I wanted to put the song on the album 'cause fans had written to me saying "Please put the song on the album". But I don't think I could've put the Luciano-version on there because it would've disrupted the flow of the album. It's a duet. So I put the solo version on it. And to be perfectly honest with you I prefer the solo version.

25) Is it intimidating working with people like Pavarotti?

- I don't think it's intimidation so much as respect. You just find out how they work and how they do things and he was a joy to work with. He always has a big smile on his face and ... the thing with him is he's a live singer. He finds it a little bit more difficult in the studio. And I think that applies to a lot of classical singers. Their forte is to get out there. And when you hear him sing on stage ... it's very moving. It's just the most beautiful voice. Someone said "Yeah, he's got the voice of God", and when he sings at his best he has. And when he sings one of your songs it just "Wooo!". And we did a concert with him at Modena for the children in Sarajevo and we sang it live. And it was really an emotional experience. It was Beautiful.

26) Is there anyone you'd like to do a duet with?

Sheryl Crow springs to mind. I adore Sheryl. I think she's fantastic. There's a new singer; Jewel, I love her voice. I think she's fantastic. Michael Stipe from R.E.M., Billy Corgan from Smashing Pumpkins. There's plenty of people around. There's always people ... Mary J Blige - I don't know if I'd survive the session, but, you know, she's a great singer.

27) Have you chosen a lead single from the album yet?

- No, but my hunch is going on Something About the Way You Look Tonight, because it was the first song we wrote on the album. And I chose it because it has a really loving, up lyric. I thought "Well, let's start with this one" ... and I think people will relate to the lyric. It is very much on the lines of Wonderful Tonight - the Eric Clapton song -as far as the lyrical
content. And I would think they would choose that one. There's a few ... I mean, they might go for Recover Your Soul or they might go for Love's Got A Lot To Answer For. I am too close to the album to be able pick it, quite honestly.

28) Do you read your album reviews?

- If you pay attention to reviews ... Eric Clapton says "I don't read reviews". Because if gets to you and it's horrible it affects you and it shouldn't ... You know, I don't make records for reviewers, I make records for me and the punters out there. So I try not to read them, but obviously they filter through.

29) What about your future projects, Aida and Eldorado?

Well, Aida opens in Toronto next May or June. Off Broadway, I mean, out of town, so that we can iron out all the kinks in it. And then it should go to Broadway in September of '98. The Lion King musical - which we've written three extra songs for - is about to open soon in Minneapolis. And that will go to Broadway in November. It's gonna be sensational. It's been directed and the costumes have been designed by this woman called Julie (sp?) Teymore, who is a very, very respected young, brilliant director. Disney had the foresight to see her work and say "God, she's so incredible". She uses people as scenery and she's really revolutionary in what se does. I've seen her costumes for The Lion King, and they had a rehearsal last week which was sensational, so ... I'm very happy about that. Aida is a different kettle of fish, because The Lion King has already been in the cinema. So it's not as if you're building a musical from scratch. Aida has been written by Guiseppi Verdi - we call it "the Joe Green musical" -that Joe Green thing... And I think it's very dangerous to be given a project where something has already been written brilliantly by someone. But the story of Aida is such a great story - it's like a Romeo and Juliet situation, only it's a triangle of love - and so Tim and I wrote 25 songs. And they came out so quickly. When things come very out quickly they're usually the very best songs I always find. I mean, I don't spend a lot of time on a song, but when it just come out straight away. So I'm very excited about that, because it's a
project that started from scratch. And the Eldorado-thing, which we did last year as well, is ... when you do an animation movie you have to have the songs first because they have toplace them in the film. And they'll get moved in the next four years ... they'll get moved. Tim will do lyrical changes, they might get taken out, we might write extra songs. But so far thereare seven songs for that for Dreamworks, and that's gonna be fantastic, I think. And then this October I go out on the road in America with my band and play smaller venues. I wannadownsize a little before we go out on the road next year. So we're playing places we haven't played in for a long time like Mobile, Alabama, Memphis, Fargo, North Dakota which we've never played. There won't be 20,000 arenas, they'll be maybe 10-12 000 things. And then I'm coming to Britain in December and then in January I start with Billy Joel on ourworld sojourn, around the world. We did it in America once. And it was so much fun I said "Billy, we should really take this around the world before we both are too old." So we're going to do that. We start in America in January. Then we go to Australia, Japan, New Zealand, the far east and then come to Europe in the summer next year and take it all around the world.