Elton John – Leather Jackets

elton john's worst album. He says so himself in his autobiography.

This album made me appreciate Victim Of Love
(two words)

My disc has a matrix variant as follows: 9 - 24114 - 2 - U 1 C 19

Image for this vinyl issue is wrong! Present image is the CD cover (see cat. number)

Leather Jackets is usually notable in lists as the all time low of Eltons career. His poorest album ever, maybe apart from 1979s disasterously disco-driven Victim of Love, but that's another story, time and place. By 1986 Elton was hounded by the filthy, scummy tabloid, The Sun, which published lies about his personal life. Also his voice began to show wear and tear after nearly two decades on the road, very evident on this album. He later went on to have career threatening surgery in 1987 but came out all the better, thankfully. Why is this album poor then, it's even got Gus Dudgeon in the producers chair, the man who gave us all the classic albums including 1976's Blue Moves. Well the material is not very strong, half of the tracks are from the Ice On Fire sessions, the production is synth heavy and the vocals worn and strained. But, there is a duet with Sir Cliff Richard on Slow Rivers a good ballad with nice strings by James Newton Howard, Eltons one time collaborator in the 70s. Leather Jackets never stood a chance after 1983s blockbusting 2 Low 4 Zero, 1984s not too bad Breaking Hearts and 1985s more coherent Ice On Fire. Upon listening the songs remain unengaging, unimaginative and basically tread water. The only song that breaks away artistically is the final track, I Fall Apart which has an almost strange arrangement with soulful, heartfelt vocal. I picked this LP up ten years ago for £1, to fill my Elton John collection and played it maybe once or twice. Recently I bought the original 1986 CD with the beautiful Rocket logo printed on the CD in orange and lilac ink, it was in pristine condition for a CD almost 30 years old, which may indicate it was bought, listened to maybe once or twice and then forgotten! No, it's not a great album by any means but he did churn out more than a few classics over his whole career, did he not?

Beautiful