What are your favorite Elton John non-LP B-sides ?

Well it's about time Reg put out a complete box set all the tracks. I'm surprised that a guy who is such a music fan himself does not take more care of his catalog.


Peace and love✌

 

Not many tbh..

Sick City is great however. As is Hey Papa Legba.

 

Very jealous!

 

Very jealous!

 

Very jealous!

 

Very jealous!

 

THIS

 

My favorite Elton songs encompasses a number of B-sides, mainly from the newer era. Did Anybody Sleep with Joan of Arc, God Never Came There, So Sad the Renegade, How's Tomorrow and Peter's Song reign in my top tiers. These are available on CD singles, all of which I luckily own. Some expanded issues contains first-rate material as well (The Retreat, Suit of Wolves) and owning the Rare Masters box set it's easy to hear the favorites Bad Side of the Moon, Into the Old Man's Shoes, Skyline Pigeon (Piano Version) and Sugar on the Floor.

But a lot of good stuff (some of which as already been mentioned) has never made it outside the vinyl medium, e.g. Conquer the Sun, Fools in Fashion, Tortured and Lord of the Flies. Love So Cold is a fun track too and White Man Danger has a killer organ solo. As already mentioned, it amazes me that there hasn't been a more inclusive and extensive box set of Elton's unavailable stuff. There's also a lot of contributions to soundtracks, etc...

I'm an Elton nut and there isn't one of his released works that I have not heard. It truly baffles me that it's 2015 and still there's a wealth of inaccessible material never having been reissued. I don't know if it's a copyright issue, I just think it's either Elton feeling embarrassed about that 1979-1986 period (though he still belts out the hits) or the obscurity and meaninglessness (in a commercial sense) of re-releasing this.

Download-only material (I remember The Captain & the Kid had a faulty download site with Captain Fantastic live tracks from 2005 and otherwise completely unavailable (and only available as a shoddy MP3 Across the River Thames) applies as well.

 

"Screw You", B-side of "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road", is a good song that, IMO, should have been on the GYBR album instead of the wretched "Dirty Little Girl."

 

Just Like Strange Rain
All Across The Havens
It's Me That You Need
Into the Old Man's Shoes

 

Two B-sides on this one

 

Thank You for All Your Loving kicks ass. Sadly these two tracks were only officially released in Portugal and never appeared anywhere else. Super rare stuff, that one.

 

"The Angel Tree has grown so high and its roots are planted deep.."
If you want that single anytime, well the price is awful steep..
and the price is awful steeeeeeep..

http://www.popsike.com/Elton-John-Ive-Been-Loving-You-1968-Philips-7-RARE/330566915410.html

£125 smackers.. ouch

 

No love for Take Me Down To The Ocean...!?

Any song that rhymes "take me down to the ocean" with "set the feeling in motion" is alright in my book.. haha..

Hey Papa Legba, Conquer The Sun, White Man Danger, Fools In Fashion and Love So Cold are very cool too... I love all those tracks... in fact I went through a (long) phase of listening to those late 70's/early 80's B-sides more than just about anything when I first got the Flip It Over CD, around mid-to-late 90's I think, though that may have been as much a reflection on the rubbish he was putting out at the time (Love Songs, Big Picture, Aida all-star abomination, The Muse, etc..)

 

Take Me Down to the Ocean's all right. It also appears on a V/A soundtrack to a movie called Summer Lovers which isn't that hard to find... http://www.discogs.com/Various-Summer-Lovers-OST/master/99887

A cassette copy also exists, but alas no CD... Remember researching for a probable obscure Japan-only kind of thing but to no avail.

Another thing I have only just found out is that on this VA release: http://www.discogs.com/Various-Country-Sundown/release/6497883 the 1981 B-side Can't Get Over Getting Over Losing You can be found as the first track on side B. Well how about that... A cheap K-Tel thing shouldn't be that hard to come by.

Furthermore! Almost forgot. The Yugoslavian 21 at 33 substitutes White Lady White Powder and Dear God on side B with Conquer the Sun and Love So Cold though this is not mentioned in the credits.

 

"Snow Queen" was released on CD - I have it!!! It was on a UK holiday compilation called "Merry Christmas Everybody". Not a needledrop - early '90s transfer - not brickwalled. Whoever compiled this relied solely on the song titles - pretty sure "Cold As Christmas" is on one of the five discs.

 

This the one? http://www.amazon.co.uk/READERS-DIGEST-MERRY-CHRISTMAS-EVERYBODY/dp/B004GKES2G

Thanks for the info. Had no idea Snow Queen made it outside the vinyl medium. And also, I've spotted Cold as Christmas on many a Christmas comp. Silly thing, really.

 

Mine was missing some of the artwork, but comments by others on the page indicate it is the same compilation.

"5 track CD compilation from Reader's Digest, released in 1993 containing 83 tracks in total. All the standard original Christmas hits are included i.e. Cliff Richard, Aled Jones, Jona Lewie, Band Aid, Slade etc along with some hard to find tracks including The Goons - I'm Walking Backwards For Christmas and Elton John and Kiki Dee - The Snow Queen. A great compilation that has long been deleted so quite rarely available now."

 

I Saw Her Standing There. The first time I heard this I got chills. Plus, it was performed and recorded on Thanksgiving.

 

WOW!!

How did this one sneak out the vault?!

Bernie and Elton said they would never allow it to be reissued because they thought it was cruel to Cher..

Thank you SO much, I'd given up hope there might be an actual mastertape transfer of this one day..
and there was one all along on a Reader's Digest Christmas compilation of all things..!!

Couldn't be better timing, an ideal stocking stuffer this yuletide to.. ME..!

"..Now I believe that the Snow Queen..
lives somewhere on a Reader's Digest compilation.."

 

Amazing.. just when I think "I've got it all" where Elton is concerned.. superb find guys, thanks for sharing the info!!

 

It was Elton and the Band's great privilege and our great privilege to see and hear Mister John Lennon..

Those three MSG 74 tracks with Lennon still comprise some of the most amazing live recordings I've ever heard.. yes Davey, Dee, Nigel and Ray rattle along as only they could and Lennon is nervous as hell and Elton is obviously overcome with emotion throughout.. but the sheer buzz and energy throughout is spine-tingling, there's a weird feeling of history being made, easy to say with hindsight but the crowd knew then and there it was a momentous thing, different reasons at the time of course but the love they had for John Lennon was just something else and took that gig into the stratosphere and then some!

Oh, I love it when your musical heroes get together.. and totally kick a$$

 

Honey Roll (A side: Friends)

 

I was originally hoping to keep this a secret, and use it someday to bankroll my retirement :-(

 

Sick City shouldn't have been a b-side. It's too good.
I like Flinstone Boy. Odd little song.