For those two decades, Elton John had apparently decided to become rock music's Liberace--gaudy showmanship disguising a lot of skill that he was only partly successful in hiding. Plus, like a lot of pop artists he got himself knighted. I remember seeing him on a talk show, wearing a bright tartan plaid suit that was oddly the most subdued thing I'd seem him in for years. The show's host said that he cried the first time he heard the latest release (hell if I can remember which one it was), and Elton grinned; "Why, did you pay too much for it?" In its own way, that comment was reminiscent of Liberace's classic quip; "Hope you like my new jacket--you paid for it". And the Godfather Of Glam succeeded in devaluing himself as a talent so well that many of my friends wrote revisionist histories of Elton by pointedly avoiding mention of the Classic Six Albums so they could trash him. Take the song "Tiny Dancer", a little too pretty but still well-crafted. But then he follows it up with "Levon", a blunt bitter song of a nouveau riche man who defines himself with clichs. Then "Razor Face", kind of a sequel piece to "Sixty Years On" from his self-titled album. Then he blasts the whole thing wide open with the title track, the musings of a psychiatric patient about the motives of his loved ones in visiting him regularly. I use that last song a lot as an argument to my aforementioned friends when they start to define Elton John by his disco mixes like "Philadelphia Freedom" or his ripoff of his own "Candle In the Wind" about Marilyn Monroe by turning it into a makeshift eulogy to Princess Diana. I just sit at my piano, hit an a-minor chord and start out;