Elton John and Britney Spears’ collaboration “Hold Me Closer” is doing pretty well, as it just went No. 1 on the Australian chart and it could emerge on top in the UK ranks, too. (How it fared on the US charts will be revealed next week.) Given that this was Spears’ first recording in a while, though, John says there was one thing he was unsure about when it came to Spears.
Speaking with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe yesterday (September 1), John said (as Billboard reports):
“She did it so well and so easily, and I’m sure a lot of people thought, ‘Well, can she still sing?’ Well, I knew for a start that she could sing because if you go back and look at the old footage, she was the biggest artist in the world and she could sing, she could dance, she could do everything. So I wasn’t worried about that. What I was worried about is if she would be so nervous because she hadn’t done it for a while, but she came through it with flying colors.”
He also noted, “I’m really happy for Britney, especially because having her on this record is such a gas, for start. But this is someone who has been through hell, who needed some love in her life, a lot of love from a lot of people, and she’s getting it. And she hadn’t really made any music since 2016, so it’s all about her for me. Life unfolds on an incredible speed, and I don’t know what will happen, but I’m so thrilled this is happening because I love the record. I love the fact that it’s ‘Tiny Dancer’ because it’s one of my favorite songs. I’m a lucky man. Listen, what can I say? The record’s taken off. 75 years of age and having the time of my life, and it proves that you can still be modern and be old at the same time if you care to take an interest in what’s going on.”