In the more than half-century since “Rocket Man” first shot its way to the top of the charts, it would be safe to assume that Elton John has performed the song hundreds — if not thousands — of times. The tune has become so synonymous with the artist that it was used as the title of the 2019 John biopic. But it turns out that the singer-songwriter had no idea what he was warbling about.
As NME reports, John and his longtime songwriting partner Bernie Taupin recently sat down to discuss their famous collaboration, including “Rocket Man.”
“‘Rocket Man’ was our first-ever Number One record I think,” John explained. “It was a pretty easy song to write a melody to because it’s a song about space so it’s quite a spacious song.”
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That’s when Taupin chimed in with a story that surprised even John:
“It was actually a song inspired by Ray Bradbury from his book of science-fiction short stories called The Illustrated Man. In that book, there was a story called The Rocket Man, which was about how astronauts in the future would become sort of an everyday job… so I kinda took that idea and ran with it.”
A surprised John admitted: “Do you know, I never knew that.”
Do “Tiny Dancer” next!
(Via NME)