Captain Fantastic: Elton John’s Stellar Trip Through the ‘70s

Captain Fantastic: Elton John’s Stellar Trip Through the ‘70s by Tom Doyle

Reading readers’ reviews on Amazon of this book, I discovered many stated that “this was a SURPRISINGLY good book….”.  I couldn’t help wondering: why were so many people ‘surprised’?  Was it because Elton is so popular that there are already a plethora of biographies about him and this was perceived as ‘yet another one’? Was it because Elton, now a septuagenarian, is on a giant farewell tour with a movie about to be released about him, and many thought this was exploitation?  Was it because the cheesiness of the front cover?  All of the above?

Regardless, I must agree. It’s a very good book, and I was pleasantly surprised.  Now, I consider myself a HUGE fan of Elton John; not only do I own all his CDs, but also host my own ‘Elton’ website, so at the risk of sounding arrogant, I feel I’m a pretty good judge.  This book pays careful attention not to just gloss over events, yet at the same time doesn’t try to immerse itself too deep in the weeds.  I felt this book devoted just the right amount of time and focus on things that a true fan wants to read about when perusing through a biography.

As the title suggests, the book focuses on the 70s, and most would argue that Elton was undoubtedly THE most popular musician of the 1970s.  So we read a lot of high profile celebrity-ism.  That’s not to say that this was a pleasant time for Elton. Sadly, Elton has always suffered from horrible mood swings and, as popular as he was (and still is), the poor chap was simply miserable most of the time. When one looks deep into his character and personality, it sadly isn’t too shocking. As a young man, Elton was a rather shy introvert; chubby, near-sighted, pre-mature baldness, and he was also forced to keep his homosexuality buried pretty deep within his closet because of the times.  In fact, the fact that he dressed so exorbitantly during the decade was his strange way of coping with his many insecurities.

The author does a great job of telling a chronological account. He doesn’t spend too much time on Elton pre Elton (his Christian name is Reginald Dwight) probably because he knows his readers really don’t care much.  As soon as the 1970s arrive, we read about his incredible climb to the top in a manner of about 5 years and about 10 albums.  We read a bit about each of the albums, and although the public quickly gobbled them up at queues in record stores, the author gives a fair assessment of each of these releases and gives the honest perspective that all of them (such as ‘Don’t Shoot Me I’m Only the Piano Player’ and ‘Caribou’) weren’t really THAT good, yet economics dictated a rushed product and keep the profits coming.

My only gripe about the book is it ended too early.  Although the decade of the 1970s is highlighted in the title, we actually read through about 1981.  Once we arrive at 1981-82, the author then briefly hits on the highlights of the last 35 years.  I wish he would have kept his same place instead of giving us a brief summary of the latter years.  Of course, this would have accounted for a much lengthier book.  Even though Elton was the most popular during the 1970s, there really was so much more story left to tell.

The good news about Elton John is that during some part of his life (most would argue when he became clean and sober – about 1992), Elton seemed to finally find peace with himself and, whereas the mood swings are still there to a point, he seems much more happy and content in his later life.  After reading about all of the turmoil that the man went through during the 1970s, it’s actually quite a miracle that he even survived.

I also want to point out, that as rabid as a fan I am, I also learned a few things that I never knew about Elton. For example, when he formed his new band in 1975, I didn’t know that there was a third guitarist, Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter, who was briefly added to the lineup.  I remember seeing a picture of the ‘new’ Elton John Band more than 40 years ago, and I always wondered who the ‘hairy’ guy in the picture was.  Now I know. 

I did, however, also find a few errors throughout the book as well, so I guess the reader needs to be somewhat cautious.  Example: The ‘Here and There’ album consists of two live performances from 1974, yet the author states that one of the concerts was from 1972.  A minor gripe.

I would love it if this author would one day release a ‘part two’ and pick up where he left off, but since the meat of Elton’s story, at least sales wise, takes place in the 1970s, I doubt we’ll ever see such an undertaking. 

The Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White House

The Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White House by John F. Harris

The title of this book is perfect. This is a book that focuses on the two-term Bill Clinton presidency from 1992-2000. Regardless of your opinion of the man, it seemed that there were always scandals, always investigations, always hints of unscrupulous behavior that occurred during his tenure.  We heard much more about these events than things that actually mattered when describing a President’s job description and accomplishments.  Much of these allegations were yellow-journalism speculation, but many were proven to be true. Yet through all of this, Bill Clinton survived. How will history remember him? Author John F. Harris tells us that we’ll just have to wait and see.

This was a very well written book.  I’ve tried to read bios of all U.S. presidents, yet the more recent the president, the more challenging it is to find such material.  As stated above, history really needs time to digest the leader’s achievements before fair assessments can be made. There are plenty of books out there about the U.S. Presidents’ tenure in office, and of the four I’ve read recently (Carter, Reagan, Bush 1, and Clinton), this one was by far the best. Harris is an esteemed journalist, so he knows how to write without losing the reader’s attention.  Although he covered the Clinton White House, he wisely keeps himself away from the action.  This is a very unbiased book. We read about what makes Clinton great, but also the things that make him lousy.  As lousy as things get, Clinton digs his heels in and keeps going. He’s truly a survivor.

When Clinton was elected, we must remember that he only received 43% of the popular vote. Had Independent Ross Perot not run, most historians conclude that George H.W. Bush would have easily been re-elected. That’s a bit scary since Bush ran an appalling re-election campaign.  So once Clinton gets elected, there’s a fair amount of the public that clearly thinks he doesn’t belong there.  It doesn’t help when you and your VP (along with the wives) look about 40 years younger than the Reagans and the Bushes.  This was definitely a new generation of new leaders, and there are many among the old guard that never handle change well.

Things get off to a very rocky start as the young president is trying to learn how to lasso Washington. It doesn’t help when the majority of his advisors are just as young, cocky, and inexperienced as he is. Plus, there’s an awful lot of squabbling going on between these folks that are supposed to be helping their boss succeed. Then you add Hillary in the mix.  I’m not saying adding Hillary to the decision-making process was a bad thing. Why shouldn’t a well-educated spouse help their mate?  It’s just that, well, there’s that word “change” again.  The country was used to First Ladies throwing tea parties on the White House lawn and speaking at Homemaker conferences.  FLOTUS’s personality and work ethic was something that many found simply too jarring.

Then the 1994 mid-term elections happen. If there was ever any doubt that the current Commander in Chief was struggling, one needs to simply remember the election results.  Pollster Dick Morris is quickly called in to make changes. Say what you want about the sleaziness of Dick Morris, the guy knows what he’s doing. He works with Clinton for the next two years around a topic known as ‘triangulation’, which simply means that Clinton (who, let’s be honest, was a VERY conservative Democrat) adopts many of the policies normally held by Republicans.  The unthinkable happens; Clinton wins re-election.  Of course, it helps when your primary adversaries on the Republican team are people like Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole.

Then, Monica Lewinsky.

She doesn’t necessarily appear out of the blue (was that a pun? If so, not intended). Author Harris lets us know throughout this retrospective that Clinton has a ‘problem’ being a womanizer.  In fact, we may have never heard of Lewinsky and it not been for Whitewater and Paula Jones.  I’m sure there are books out there that only detail Clinton’s sordid extra-marital affairs, yet Harris doesn’t overburden readers of this book with too many repugnant details.  Yet these details are very relevant to why Clinton needed to be a “survivor”, so we do read a fair amount of the clandestine Oval Office encounters, the awfully embarrassing videotaped testimony, and the eventual impeachment. Definitely a sad time for the country.

After all of that mess was over and the Senate failed to convict him, there really wasn’t much time left in the administration.  Those closest to Clinton (including his wife) seemed to forgive him and he plows through the remainder of his tenure in office.  Harris then makes the observation that Bill Clinton was one of the very few presidents that exited the Oval Office on a ‘high’ note.  That might be true, but things really couldn’t get much lower than they were during some of the years of his presidency.  Plus, the economy was doing quite well, and that always seems to be a huge factor at election time.

In fact, you can’t help but speculate “What if?”   What if the president simply learned to keep his pants zipped up?  Many believe Gore could have easily won the 2000 election had it not been for the stains (there’s another unintended pun) of his predecessor.  In fact, this book makes no secret that Al Gore was disgusted with his boss’s behavior, and preferred he stayed away from him during his presidential campaign of 2000.  Then we come to the fact that Hillary spent an awful lot of time defending her husband throughout many of his trysts. Talk about a Catch-22. What else was she to do?  Fast-forward to 2016, when SHE’S running for president, the cries of “Me too” and “Believe all Women” seemed to come back to bite her due to her complacent attitude towards her husband’s sins.  Again, what else could she do?  

Anyway, great book.  I even paid full price (something I rarely ever do) and felt it was worth every penny. This is essential if you want to understand the ins and outs, the ups and downs, and the overall atmosphere of the Bill Clinton presidency.

Reputation is a Fragile Thing: The Story of Cheap Trick

Reputation is a Fragile Thing: The Story of Cheap Trick by Mike Hayes with Ken Sharp

Reputation is a Fragile Thing is book by a serious fan of the band Cheap Trick that is really only for other serious fans of Cheap Trick.  Sadly, this simply is not a very well written book.  I don’t know much about the author, but apparently this is not the first book he’s written about a music group.  I’m a bit surprised as this thing seemed to be majorly unfocused.  Personally, I consider myself a serious fan of Cheap Trick, and whereas I did learn a few things, I basically cringed my way throughout my reading since there seemed to be no attempt by the author to write a serious work. This is definitely not a ‘bio’ and it really isn’t a ‘story’ either. It’s basically a regurgitation of everything this band has done since its inception up until around 1998 (when the book was written).

One gets the feeling that the author never even interviewed the band. I’m not saying he didn’t, I just didn’t feel as though he did based on what I read.  It seemed like what the author might have done was go through all of the rock magazines he collected as a kid, and then crafted the story here from what has already been written about the band.  There’s very little in this book about the personalities in the band and what really drives them. Instead, this book seems to rush through their musical career. Not necessarily a bad thing, but again, there’s no real imagination or creativity behind the written words.  The entire book reads like:

“The band then found themselves exhausted after another long tour.”
“….then Rick went and helped the band xxx record the songs, “abc”, “def,” and “ghi” for their new album.”
“….meanwhile, Robin appeared on stage with the band yyy and helped play the songs “bcd”, “efg”, and a rousing version of “hij”.
“….then, the band went back into the studio and recorded demos of songs they never used with the titles…..”

The entire book is like this, and it rarely lets the reader up for air to breathe.  To be fair, Cheap Trick did move at a very fast pace; especially during the early years (they released six albums from 1977 to 1980), but it’s maddeningly upsetting that there’s so little introspection here.  If the reader wants to find out why Tom was fired in 1980, there’s not a lot here that won’t tell the reader what they already know.  If they want to find out why Pete (Tom’s replacement) was fired, there’s even less.  A Google search can yield better results.  To be fair, this book was written in 1998 before the internet became as well known, so maybe such criticisms I’m making are a tad unfair.  We must also remember that the acrimonious split with drummer Bun E. Carlos didn’t occur until around 2010, so there’s nothing here that would indicate any kind of squabbling amongst the members.

The entire book feels ‘homemade’. It feels like the author wrote it, published it, and sold it all from his basement.  There’s a couple of page groupings that contain pictures, but even this feels very haphazard.  Many of the pictures are rare, so they’re fun to view, but they’re all in black and white and thrown in the book without any thought or care.

Most of the book’s chapters are broken down by album with titles like “Next Producer Please” and “Back and Busted”, so you can tell by just reading the chapter titles that the author’s imagination is somewhat limited.  The author also feels the need to list EVERY song on EVERY album with comments about each song in this book that doesn’t really serve much purpose.  On rare occasions we do read about some interesting tidbits about a particular song, but most of the commentary contains such tripe as 

“…’Baby No More’ speeds along at 100 MPH, a frenetic grunge styled number with Bun E’s Ludwig kit bearing the brunt of abuse…”  

This gets old quick.  We really don’t need this sort of commentary about every song the band ever wrote and recorded. The author even feels necessary to do this for their live albums, the live Chicagofest 81 show, Zander’s lone solo album, and Tom’s one album that he recorded with his ex-wife.  Now, I fail to see the point in the author doing this.  Casual fans couldn’t care less, and serious fans would only be impressed if the song featured some deep, unknown factoid that serious fans enjoy.  At times I felt like I was reading a fan post his review of an album on an Internet Board.

There’s also a lot of silly references to what the band did (or didn’t do) in England.  Why all the focus on England?  JAPAN was where they exploded. Right?   I then realized the author is from England.  Oy.

Perhaps my biggest frustration with all of this is the price of the book itself.  The paperback version costs $34.95 and it’s barely 200 pages of reading material.  Maybe if the book cost half that much I would have not been so seriously disappointed.

Again, the serious fan probably needs this in their collection.  These are the fans that buy every picture disc they can get their hands on, as well devote a huge chunk of their disposable income to travel all over the country to see multiple shows by the band every year.  Yes, this type of fan needs this book so they can post it in their homemade Cheap Trick museum in their basement.   Everyone else can, and should, skip this one.