Leather Jackets (album)
| Leather Jackets | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
||||
| Studio album by Elton John | ||||
| Released | 3 November 1986 | |||
| Recorded | January 1985, January, June, July, September 1986 | |||
| Genre | Soft rock, pop rock | |||
| Length | 46:02 | |||
| Label |
Geffen (US) Rocket (UK) |
|||
| Producer | Gus Dudgeon | |||
| Elton John chronology | ||||
|
||||
| Singles from Leather Jackets | ||||
|
||||
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |    |
| Los Angeles Times | (negative) |
Leather Jackets, released in 1986, is the twentieth official album release for Elton John. Recorded at Sol Studios in England and Wisseloord Studios in the Netherlands, it was his first album to not create any top 40 singles in either the US or the UK since 1970's Tumbleweed Connection, which had no singles released from it. It is also the poorest-charting album of his career.
In 2001 Elton regarded Heartache All Over the World as the worst song he'd ever recorded, calling it "pretty insubstantial"; in 2006, he would declare Jackets his least favourite of all his albums, saying "Gus Dudgeon did his best but you can't work with a loony." He would also call its biker-inspired cover "very butch but a total disaster. I was not a well budgie, I was married and it was just one bag of coke after another." (In spite of this, lyricist Bernie Taupin believes The Big Picture deserves the honour of worst album, and Elton has since come to agree with him).
In 2000, Gus Dudgeon said: "There was a chance he could polish himself off. He'd go out and do some coke and it'd be all over his mouth, his nose would be running and I'd go: 'Oh God, this is just awful'."
"Heartache All Over the World" was the only single to achieve chart success in the US, though it failed to crack the top 50. "Slow Rivers" is a collaboration with Cliff Richard that was released as a single in the UK. Cher collaborated with "Lady Choc Ice" (actually John himself) to write "Don't Trust That Woman". Roger Taylor and John Deacon of Queen play drums and bass guitar respectively on the track "Angeline".
John played "Paris" during his 1986 US tour. He included "Heartache All Over the World" and "Slow Rivers" on his 1986 Australian tour with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, which would eventually yield John's live album Live in Australia with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. "Heartache" was included in the band portion of the show (John opted not to play piano for that number) while "Slow Rivers" was played during the second half of the show with the orchestra. Due to contractual constraints, "Slow Rivers" was not included on Live in Australia, despite the fact that it was from the orchestral portion of the show, which was the basis for the album. Though not released as a single, "Paris" would also, ironically, become a minor FM hit for some jazz stations that programmed the track.
...
Wikipedia