Me

by Elton John | Biographies & Memoirs |
ISBN: 1250147603 Global Overview for this book
Registered by PokPok of Vista, California USA on 7/26/2020
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1 journaler for this copy...
Journal Entry 1 by PokPok from Vista, California USA on Sunday, July 26, 2020
10 stars: An Exceptionally Good book.

From the back cover: In his own words, and with his usual honesty, he shares his story - every hilarious, heartbreaking moment. He reveals the truth about his childhood growing up in Pinner and his difficult relationship with his parents... Me is full of drama, from the early rejection of Elton's work with songwriting partner Bernie Taupin to spinning out of control as a chart topping superstar; from friendships with John Lennon, Freddie Mercury, and George Michael to disco dancing with the Queen; from suicide attempts to a secret drug addiction that would grip him for nearly two decades. Elton also writes powerfully about getting clean and setting up his AIDS foundation. He describes finding his true love with David Furnish, holidaying with Versace, and singing at Princess Diana's funeral. And he pinpoints the moment he realizes he wants to be a father and his life changing once again. Joyously funny, entertaining, and at times deeply moving, Me will take you on an intimate journey with a living legend.

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This book blew my mind. The description above hints at what was most engaging about it -- Elton's "voice" is very funny, but also very authentic. He continually and regularly aims his laser sharp wit at himself, as well as observations about people and the world around him. I almost never read and enjoy autobiographies, as most of us can't be that impartial. Not Elton. Particularly on the topic of his addiction, he consistently talks of how self involved his antics were. As I read this during a time in helping a family member when they needed help, it similarly resonated.

Quotes below are lengthy, I had flags all over the place. I just loved this book, and am sure I will reread. I know at least two people have purchased because of my constant raving about it! I hope if you are reading this, you enjoy.

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[Talking about a very early job working as a cover artist] On one occasion, I was required to sound like Robin Gibb of the Bee Gees, a great singer but a man possessed of a unique vocal style: a kind of eerie, tremulous, nasal vibrato. I couldn’t do it unless I physically grabbed hold of my throat and wobbled it around while I was singing. I thought this was a real brainwave, but it caused absolute pandemonium among my fellow musicians. I stood there, wailing away, fingers clasped round my neck, desperately trying not to look across the studio where the other session singers were clinging on to each other and weeping with laughter.

[Of the first show at the Troubadour, and seeing Leon Russell in the audience]. I had to pull myself together. I had to do something to take my mind off the fact that Leon Russell was watching me. I jumped to my feet and kicked the piano stool away. I stood there, knees bent, pounding at the keys like Little Richard. I dropped to the floor, balancing on one hand and playing with the other, my head under the piano. Then I stood up, threw myself forward and did a handstand on the keyboard. Judging by the noise the audience made, they hadn’t expected that either.

"It was Katherine Hepburn. "I'm staying with [Elton's neighbor] and he said it would be OK if I used your pool.' John and I just nodded, dumbstruck. Five minutes later she reappeared in a swimsuit, complaining there was a dead frog in the pool. When I dithered about how to get it out -- I'm a bit squeamish --she just jumped in and grabbed it with her hands. I asked her how she could bear to touch it.
'Character, young man."
[I am SOOOOO stealing that.]

"The biggest songwriting partnership of the era, locked in a dispute backstage. Not about money or musical direction, but about whether it was a good idea for me to go onstage with an iluminated model of Father Christmas hanging in front of my willy. Sometimes Bernie had a point."

[About the first time he tried coke..and ultimately was an addict for 18 years]. What the hell was I doing? I tried it, I hated it, it made me puke – hello? Talk about God’s way of telling you to leave it at that. IT’s hard to see how I could have been given a clearer warning that this was a bad idea unless it had started raining brimstone and I’d been visited by a plague of boils. So why didn’t I leave it at that? Partly because the throwing up didn’t stop the coke affecting me, and I liked how it made me feel.

The story of him playing charades with Bob Dylan. "One of the best lyricists of the world,...and he can't seem to tell you whether a word's got one syllable or two syllables or what it rhymes with." [so Elton proceeded to throw oranges at him]. That's not really a phone call you want to receive. "Morning darling- do you remember throwing oranges at Bob Dylan?" Oh God.

Bernie and Elton sat down to compose to hit songs. One was called "I'm always on the bonk." : "I don't know who I'm fucking, I don't know who I'm sucking, but I'm always on the bonk." The other was :"Don't go breaking my heart." ... Bernie hated the end result [ of ...breaking} and I can't really blame him. Bernie is not a fan of anything he thinks is shallow pop music. But even he had to admit it had been substantially more commercial than "I'm always on the bonk."

Or this photo, with the caption: "George Michael wanted to leave the frivolity of pop music behind. So naturally I turned up at Wham's farewell concert in June 1986 dressed as Ronald McDonald."

There was not one single moment where he decided that he needed help, he notes a few. One was the first time he eve went on stage high. He said that while he'd run offstage to immediately do a few lines, he never went onstage high (until he did). Another was when he had a psychological intervention with a lover who was himself in rehab and calling Elton out. But the biggest factor appeared to be his relationship with Ryan White and his mother Jeanne. You may remember Ryan as a hemophiliac who contracted HIV through a blood transfusion.
][He spoke at length about the hate that Ryan received from the public, particularly from his school, both students and faculty. Elton had become friends with Ryan and his family, who he described thusly: "They were stoic, they were forgiving, they were patient and kind. Even in the most awful circumstances I loved being around them, but they made me feel ashamed of myself, in a way I'd never felt before. I spent half my life feeling angry and resentful about things that didn't matter. I was the kind of person who got on the phone and shouted at people because the weather outside my hotel didn't suit me. [ a true story].,, How the fuck did I become like this? ... [After performing at Ryan's funeral] I went back to my hotel in a strange mood. It wasn't just grief, there was something else bubbling underneath. I was angry at myself. Ryan had done so much in such a short time to help people with AIDS. A kid with nothing, and he'd changed public perceptions."

(Talking about the famous Dodger's Stadium shows, which he had tried a suicide attempt the night prior to the first one...) "I had California's most famous used car dealer, a man called Cal Worthington, come on with a lion [ his dog, Spot!] - Christ knows why!"

"Nearly 40 and more than capable of behaving like a child myself, the last thing I needed was an actual child thrown into the equation. [ what friends conjectured, when he married a woman, in the 80s]. The wedding was as straightforward as any wedding can be at which one of the groom's best men is his former lover, to whom he lost his virginity."

[He has a long section about his successful battle against tabloids]. "I had allegedly readied myself for the orgy by donning a pair of 'skimpy leather shorts'. *Leather shorts?* I've worn some ridiculous old tat in my time, but I've never, ever prepared for a night of passion by squeezing into a pair of leather shorts ...Furthermore, I was apparently 'twirling a sex ad' between my fingers and 'looking like Cleopatra'. Ah, of course, Cleopatra: last ruler of the Ptolemaic dynasty, lover of JUlius Ceasar and Mark Antony, and history's most celebrated dildo twirler and wearer of leather shorts."

[He had a long history of oneupmanship withRod Stewart in a very campy way] "That was the only time I worked that year,m unless you count unexpectedly turning up onstage in full drag at one of Rod Stewart's Wembley Arena gigs and sitting on his lap while he tried to sing "You're in my Heart". And I don't: spoiling things for Rod has never felt like work, more a thoroughly enjoyable hobby."

"I remember Robert Ebert calling [the 1971 movie Friends, which he wrote the music to] 'a sickening piece of corrupt slop" but not all the critics enjoyed it as much as that."

[talking about leaving a particular concert] "Nothing unusual in itself, save for the fact that, as I was walking across the stage, basking in the crowd's applause and punching the air, I was also, unbeknown to the audience, copiously urinating into an adult nappy concealed beneath my suit. Pissing myself in front of an audience while wearing a nappy: this was hitherto uncharted territory. There aren't a huge number of positives about contracting prostate cancer, but at least it had enabled me to have an entirely new and unprecedented experience onstage."

[Calling his new husband David, the day after they met] I asked what he was doing that evening, when I just happened to be in London. I behaved as if this was a remarkable coincidence, but if David had been in Botswana I suspect I would have happened to be there, too. 'The Kalahari Desert? What a stroke of luck! I've got a meeting there tomorrow morning!'


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