Welcome to the Deep Dive. Today, we're stepping
away from the usual focus, not the spotlight
or the piano. We're pulling back the curtain
on someone absolutely crucial, one of the greatest
and, wow, most enduring storytellers in modern
music. Right. A man whose words, I mean, they've
soundtracked multiple generations, yet his own
life, his own complexity, often gets a bit overshadowed
by his partner's, you know, huge stardom. Right.
We are talking about... Bernie Taupin. Yeah,
absolutely. When most people think of those decades
of just smash hits from Elton John, they picture
the performance, the costumes, the stage presence,
all that theater. Exactly. But Taupin, he's really
the silent engine behind it all. He's the, well,
the tireless source of all that vivid imagery,
the narrative, the characters that really define
the sound of that collaboration. He gave it.
the soul, you could say, the literary backbone.
That's a great way to put it. And our mission
today really is to look far beyond just that
iconic partnership. We want to uncover the complexity
of Tappan's entire career. As a writer, sure,
but also as this prolific, genre -hopping collaborator,
a visual artist, even an experimental performer
at times, we're giving the lyricist his moment.
And it's so important. We really need to start
by just establishing the sheer scale of his importance.
his longevity. This isn't some fleeting thing.
No. The collaboration with Elton John started
way back in 1967. Just think about that for a
second. Six decades. And the quality, the consistency
of what they produced. Yeah. It's... That longevity
is why the big awards are, well, really piling
up now, late in his career. They got into the
Songwriters Hall of Fame back in 92, sure. Right,
ancient history almost. Yeah, but their career
isn't just history, it's still going. Just this
year, 2024, they were awarded the Gershwin Prize
for Popular Song. That's one of the absolute
highest honors for American music. And Kalpin
himself, personally. got the Ivor Novello Award
for Outstanding Contribution to British Music
in 2024, too. Oh, wow. These recent awards, they
really feel like timely proof that the industry
is finally recognizing him as a singular force.
Yeah. You know, separate from just the hits.
He's fundamental to how modern popular songs
are built. And what's just wild is that this
monumental partnership, the one that basically
defined the sound of the 70s and kept going.
Yeah. It was almost completely accidental. Yeah.
It wasn't some like clever A &R plan or a mutual
friend connection. It literally sprang from a
single classified ad. In the New Musical Express.
The NME. The NME. Incredible. Answering one little
ad in 1967 changes the course of global music
history. It's amazing. And that's really where
our story has to begin, connecting this shy young
poet from rural isolation with the biggest stages
in the world. Let's unpack where that poetic
imagination came from. Okay, so the power, the
specificity in Taupin's early lyrics, all that
vivid detail, that sense of place, sometimes
melancholic, the really grounded characters.
It makes so much more sense when you look at
where he actually grew up. He wasn't, you know,
a product of swinging London or the mod scene.
He was born in 1950 in a literal, quite isolated
farmhouse in Lincolnshire. That first place was
called Flatter's House. And the sources, yeah,
they confirm it didn't even have electricity
initially. Wow. Which immediately tinks this
picture, doesn't it? Remote, almost like stepping
back in time. His family did move later to a
more established place called Roston Manor. That
was after his father, Robert, got a promotion
to farm manager. So those early years had a kind
of rustic simplicity, maybe, but definitely a
connection to the land. But that relative stability,
it wasn't his whole youth, was it? No, not at
all. Later in his childhood, they moved again.
this time to a place called Malt Kiln Farm in
Omby Byspil. And this move, well, it represented
a much tougher financial reality. Right. The
farm was pretty rough, and the family's main
income came from battery farming chickens for
eggs. So quite a step down in some ways. Yeah.
And we shouldn't gloss over the conditions there.
The house at Malt Kiln Farm, it lacked proper
heating, didn't have up -to -date plumbing. This
contrast, you know, moving from a more established
property to this kind of harsh, gritty reality
of rural working life where his surroundings
were much rougher than his ambitions. Yeah. That
feels absolutely critical to understanding his
writing voice. I can see that. It must have bred
this really keen sense of observation. And maybe
a desire for escape, too. You hear that all through
his early work, especially on albums like Tumbleweed
Connection. Yeah, that sense of romanticized
isolation, maybe, surrounded by hard work, rural
austerity. But he clearly developed this early
knack for writing, even though, by all accounts,
he wasn't exactly a star student academically.
Not at all. But this is where his family background
provided something crucial, a kind of counterpoint.
How so? Well, his mother, Daphne, she'd studied
French literature. So there was an intellectual
foundation there in the home. But the real key
influence, it seems, was his maternal grandfather,
John Leonard Patchett Court, who he called Poppy
Court. Poppy Court. And he was. He was a man
of letters, a Cambridge graduate, actually, and
a classics teacher. Now, that's a crucial detail,
isn't it? Definitely. Cambridge classic. He seems
to have instilled in young Bernie this. deep
almost classical appreciation for nature for
narrative structure and for poetry itself so
how does that classics background you know show
up in songs that became huge pop hits that seems
like a leap well i think it manifests in the
narrative complexity most pop songs especially
back then, dealt with pretty simple immediate
emotions, right? Love found, love lost. Sure.
But Taupin's early work, it often builds character
arcs, creates whole settings. Look at a song
like Levon or The King Must Die. These are like
little short stories set to music. They use classical
literary devices, allegory, metaphor. It feels
like a direct line back to the narrative poetry
he learned to appreciate from his grandfather.
He wasn't just writing for his chorus verse.
Sometimes he was crafting these miniature epics.
So he had this rich inner world developing. But
his actual life after school sounds, well, profoundly
aimless for a while. He left school at 15. Yeah,
15. And the immediate path wasn't music or poetry.
No, not directly. He worked for a short time
as a trainee in the print room of the Lincolnshire
Standard. Apparently had some aspirations towards
journalism, which, you know, makes sense for
someone with a writing bent. Sure. But when that
didn't really stick, his mid to late teenage
years were just spent drifting. Hanging out,
drinking, hitchhiking to youth club dances. Just
sort of existing on the fringes, waiting for
something. It feels like a period of just wandering
and waiting for, I don't know. inspiration direction.
Which finally culminated, like we mentioned,
in that huge moment when he was 17, he sees the
Liberty Records ad in the NME. Yeah. And that
ad, it just set this whole incredible career
in motion. It was just a general call for songwriters,
wasn't it? It's talent search. Yeah. And here's
the absolute stroke of fate. Reginald Dwight,
the guy who had become Elton John, answered the
exact same advertisement. No way. Yes. Both showed
up for an audition. Neither of them passed. Both
rejected. Both rejected. But the A &R man there,
a guy named Ray Williams, had this, I don't know,
miraculous foresight or maybe just a practical
solution. He knew Reginald Dwight was talented
musically but couldn't write lyrics. Right. And
he also had this pile of lyrics submitted by
people who presumably couldn't write music. So
Williams just handed John a sealed envelope.
And inside were Taupin's poems. Just like that.
A sealed envelope. Just like that. It was like
this perfect prepackaged solution just fell into
his lap. That's incredible. And the rest, genuinely,
it started on the London Underground ride home.
John, rejected by Liberty Records, opens the
envelope on the train, sees the poetry, and apparently
started working out melodies almost immediately.
Wow. The music partnership was born right there.
Out of shared rejection and the sheer, beautiful
serendipity of an A &R guy connecting a poet
from the sticks with a technically brilliant
pianist from London. It's an origin story that
just perfectly underscores that theme of collaboration,
doesn't it? How two people, individually kind
of incomplete for the job of songwriting, became
this absolutely unstoppable force together. So
once they connected, the genius of that partnership,
it became apparent really quickly. Not just because
the songs were great. but because they're totally
unique and fiercely protected writing process.
Right. The Two Rooms documentary from 91 really
highlighted this, comparing them to Lennon -McCartney.
Can you break down that methodology? Because
this is where their dynamic is just fascinating.
It really is. What's truly remarkable is the
structure, how it worked, especially back then.
Historically, Toppin writes the lyrics completely
on his own. Totally separate from John. Okay.
He'd finish the words, sometimes pages and pages
of this narrative poetry and just hand them over.
Then John would set them to music. And the key
phrase is, with historically no further interaction.
Wow. John is basically scoring a finished piece
of literature. That's just mind boggling. So
John receives a poem, right? A complete story,
complete emotional map laid out in words. And
then he finds the melody, the rhythm, the whole
song structure to fit its... Yes, emotional architecture
without sitting in the room debating verses,
changing lines. Exactly. It's built on this foundation
of pure, implicit trust in Toppin's narrative
instincts. John trusted the words would give
him everything he needed. And think about the
technical challenge for John. If the lyrics are
complex, maybe the meter is irregular. He has
to somehow bend the music around those words.
That must lead to some really unusual song structure
sometimes breaking away from standard pop formulas.
Absolutely. And does the melody just reinforce
the emotion in the lyrics or does it sometimes
reinterpret it? It's this really unusual, powerful
symbiosis. I always wonder if that lyrics first
approach ever led to... Like misinterpretations.
Or maybe the music fundamentally changed the
feeling of what Toppin originally intended in
the poem. That's a question people always ask.
But the general consensus, and from what they've
both said, is that it rarely happened in a negative
way. Or if it did, it resulted in a kind of happy
accident. Tupin himself has talked about the
surprise sometimes of hearing the finished song.
He'd say John often found rhythms and moves that
he didn't even consciously realize were inherent
in the words he wrote. Can you give an example?
Well, think about Rocketman. The lyrics are quite
dark, aren't they? This sci -fi poetry about
deep space loneliness. Yeah, existential. But
the music John said it to is almost, well, jaunty.
A mid -tempo folk rock kind of groove. And somehow
that contrast. actually makes the loneliness
feel even more profound, more unsettling. That's
a great point. Okay, so that foundational process,
Taupin writes words, John writes music, that's
still the gold standard for them. Pretty much.
The sources do note that today, maybe things
are a little more interactive in the studio as
the songs get developed, perhaps just because
digital communication makes it easier. Sure.
But that fundamental lyrics first rule, it seems
to remain absolutely sacrosanct. The words come
first. And the output, my God, speaks for itself,
especially that first decade, the 1970s. Their
run was just unbelievable. Incredible. Taupin
seemed to move so seamlessly from these intimate,
vulnerable moments to sprawling, almost epic
narratives, sometimes all within the same album.
It started really with your song in 1970, their
first massive hit. And it kind of established
that template, didn't it? Romantic, deeply personal
vulnerability, which was actually a huge shift
from a lot of the heavier rock dominating the
charts at the time. Yeah, it stood out. And then
came the sheer depth of the rest of that 70s
catalog. It's just... immense. It's exhaustive,
really. You look at Rocketman, like we said,
that brilliant take on loneliness through a sci
-fi lens. Then there's Levon, this bizarre multi
-generational American story about a poor man's
son named Levon, who has a son named Jesus. I
mean, it's pure storytelling. And crucially,
the albums themselves had such depth beyond just
the singles. You think about the deep cuts from
the 70s that are now considered absolute classics,
like Tiny Dancer, which just perfectly evokes
that wistful Southern California feeling or the
sheer literary richness of the Goodbye Yellow
Brick Road album. Absolute masterpiece. Gave
us the title track, obviously, but also the kind
of sci -fi soul of Benny and the Jets and that
classic New York melancholy and Mona Lisa's and
Mad Hatters. And of course, Don't Let the Sun
Go Down on Me. Just unbelievable range. That
decade was so intense, though. They were releasing,
what, an album almost every single year. Pretty
much. It was inevitably followed by a necessary
break, a hiatus. Between 77 and 79, they took
some time off from the partnership. What were
they doing? Well, Talpin collaborated with other
people, including, interestingly, Alice Cooper.
And John worked with other lyricists, like Gary
Osborne, quite successfully, too. It seemed like
a period where both of them needed to stretch
their creative muscles independently for a bit.
But the partnership wasn't totally over. No,
they did collaborate sporadically during that
time. But the full -time writing renewal really
happened in 1983 with the album Too Low for Zero.
Ah, okay. From that point forward, Taupin was
once again Elton John's primary lyricist for
his solo albums. It signaled a real long -term
recommitment. And the hits just kept coming through
the 80s and 90s, didn't they? Maybe the sound
shifted a bit towards tighter, maybe more immediately
accessible pop structures sometimes? Yeah, perhaps.
The 80s brought us that incredibly resilient
anthem, I'm Still Standing. Love that one. The
soulful storytelling of, I guess that's why they
call it the blues, and the very 80s Cold War
imagery of Nikita. And the 90s hits too, while
the music obviously evolved with the times, they
still relied so heavily on Taupin's narrative
depth. Songs like The One, Simple Life, and the
sort of religiously themed Believe. They proved
they could adapt their synergy, their process,
to totally changing musical landscapes without
losing that core identity. And then, then came
a moment where the partnership showed its ultimate
emotional maturity, its sensitivity, the rewrite
of Candle in the Wind. For Diana, Princess of
Wales. In 97, September 97. Yes. That was just
such a profoundly charged global cultural moment.
Taupin had this immense task. Yeah. Transform
a song that was a very specific homage to Marilyn
Monroe into this collective national, almost
universal eulogy. Right. That requires incredible
lyrical empathy, doesn't it? It really does.
And Taupin himself, he explained his strategy
quite deliberately. He said he wanted to make
it sound like a country singing it. Wow. He didn't
want the lyrics to feel like they came from one
person's grief. But from the collective consciousness,
the nation's grief, the task was huge, partly
because the original song was already so famous,
so ingrained. And he somehow achieved that collective
voice almost instantly. He mentioned that once
he landed on those first couple of lines, starting
with Goodbye England's Rose, the rest of the
lyrics just sort of fell into place. That single
opening line immediately redefined the subject,
didn't it? And it gave the entire nation, the
world really, a phrase to mourn with. It was
masterful. And their collaboration, it remains
vital today. It's extended into film, into musical
theater. While John worked with Tim Rice on big
Disney projects, Taupin and John created Lestat.
the musical Together in 2006. Right, based on
the Anne Rice novels. Exactly. And they've contributed
songs to animated films like Gnomeo and Juliet
and its sequel, Sherlock Gnomes. They just keep
finding new outlets for that shared talent. And
maybe the ultimate capstone recognition, in recent
years anyway, came with the 2019 biopic Rocketman.
Great film. Yeah, and it didn't just celebrate
their history. It actually produced a brand new
collaboration between them for the movie I'm
Gonna Love Me Again. Which won them the Oscar.
Exactly. They won the Academy Award for Best
Original Song in 2020, an Oscar nearly six decades
into their working relationship. That's just
an astonishing testament to their enduring friendship,
their creative energy. It's incredible. It's
just far too easy, isn't it, to reduce Bernie
Taupin's massive body of work down to simply...
Elton John's lyricist. Yeah, it's the shorthand
everyone uses. But if you really dissect his
career, you realize he's this genuine chameleon.
He's capable of adapting that unique storytelling
voice of his to virtually every corner of popular
music. This is where you see his pure versatility
shine. OK, so let's talk about that versatility,
maybe starting with mainstream pop. His collaborations
with the English composer Martin Page are really
interesting here, showing his range outside of
the typical Elton rock pop sound, specifically
in that. That big 80s anthem rock style. Right.
We're talking about two massive anthems here
that are tonally worlds apart. Yeah. Yet both
feel like quintessential 80s hits, you know.
Which ones? The first is We Built This City.
Recorded by Starship. Yeah. Huge, high energy
almost, corporate rock sound. Definitely. Divisive
now, maybe, but massive then. Massive then. And
the second is the complete opposite. The soft
focus, romantic power ballad, These Dreams, recorded
by Heart. Wow. Okay. The contrast is staggering.
To write, we built this city. He had to kind
of abandon the sprawling, specific narratives
of his 70s work, right? And distill the essence
into these punchy, radio -ready hooks, generalized
stadium chant themes. Yeah, exactly. And then
he just turns around and writes the completely
different, introspective, romantic moves required
for these dreams. Yeah. It just shows he wasn't
creatively locked into only his rural or classical
influences. He could absolutely write to market
demand when needed. It proves he understands
the mechanics, the craft of commercial songwriting,
just as much as... he understands narrative poetry.
Okay, but moving away from huge commercial success
for a moment. There's a collaboration that's
really important for critical context, even though
it was pretty much ignored commercially at the
time. That's his work producing David Ackle's
1972 album, American Gothic. Ah, yes. American
Gothic. This is an album that, yeah, it probably
deserves its own deep dive someday. It's become
this really influential cult classic for serious
music fans, partly thanks to the, well... critical
hyperbole it received back then. Hyperbole is
maybe the right word, but possibly deserved.
Didn't a major critic call it something extraordinary?
Yes, the influential British music critic Derek
Jewell, writing for the UK Sunday Times, famously
described American Gothic as the S .T. Pepper
of folk. The S .T. Pepper of folk. OK, wow. Why
that comparison? What does that even mean? Well,
that comparison suggests monumental ambition,
right? Innovation. S .T. Pepper was known for
its complex studio production, its revolutionary
orchestration, its conceptual unity. So what
was Talpin, who was still really young, remember?
What was he doing as a producer on American Gothic
that warranted that kind of high praise? Yeah,
what was it? It seems to be about the conceptual
scope and the soundscape they created. Ackles'
songwriting was already pretty complex, literate
stuff. But Taupin's production, it embraced this
really rich, dramatic orchestral framework. It
blended classical arrangements with folk instruments
and Ackles' complex, often quite dark, thematic
lyrics about American life. So it wasn't just
a singer -songwriter album. Not at all. It was
a sprawling, meticulously arranged concept piece.
And Taupin, only in his early 20s, showed this
incredible instinct for production, for thematic.
of cohesion. Yeah. And that clearly impressed
the critics enormously. And how did that collaboration
even happen, Ackles and Taupin? It happened because
David Ackles actually co -headlined Elton John's
legendary American debut shows at the Troubadour
in Los Angeles in 1970. Ah, the Troubadour connection.
Yeah. It just shows Taupin's creative antenna
were always up, right? Always seeking out interesting,
complimentary artists who were willing to push
boundaries. And his genre hopping just continued
into some really wild, uncommon pairings after
that. Totally. In 1978, he... He co -wrote an
entire album from the inside with Alice Cooper.
Alice Cooper. Okay. That is a huge stylistic
shift from producing folk or writing wistful
rock ballads. Right. Shock rock. And later, in
the late 80s, early 90s, he collaborated quite
a bit with the French -American musician Josquin
Desprez on numerous songs, stretching his vocabulary
even further. But maybe his most successful and
perhaps longest -lasting triumph outside of the
Elton John world came in a completely different
genre again. Country music. Yes. This is where
his real penchant for storytelling, for character
development, for that specific kind of Americana.
Perfect, really resonant home. It feels like
a natural fit somehow. It totally does. It was
like a validation of his specific writing voice.
The country world really welcomed that narrative
structure he'd been honing since the 70s. For
instance, Willie Nelson and Kid Rock, they recorded
a song called Last Stand in Open Country, which
was actually the title track from an album by
Taupin's own band from the 90s, Farm Dogs. We'll
talk about them in a bit. Ah, okay. So Nelson
picked up on his band's song. Yeah, and Nelson
clearly liked what he heard. because he went
on to include two other Toppin songs on his own
album, The Great Divide. One called This Face
and the really successful one, Mendocino County
Line. Right. Mendocino County Line was a big
deal in country music, wasn't it? Huge deal.
Critically and commercially within that world.
It was a duet between Willie Nelson and Leanne
Womack. And it earned Toppin a Grammy Award in
2003. A Grammy. A Grammy. For Best Vocal Collaboration
in Country Music. This is so crucial. A Grammy
win, completely independent of the whole Elton
John machine, for material that taps right into
his deep love for the American landscape and
storytelling. That's fantastic. And the high
-profile film work kept expanding his reach,
too, right? Beyond the Elton stuff. Absolutely.
In 2006, he won a Golden Globe Award. Golden
Globe for what? For the lyrics to the song A
Love That Will Never Grow Old, which featured
very powerfully in the film Brokeback Mountain.
Oh, wow. Yeah. The music for that was composed
by the great Gustavo Santolalla. Just beautiful,
haunting work from both of them. He really is
a genuine collaborator, isn't he? Willing to
work with anyone if the project is right. Seems
like it. We should also quickly mention he collaborated
with other rock legends, too. He worked with
Courtney Love on her 2004 solo album. Really?
Courtney Love. And he co -wrote the title track
for Brian Wilson's Christmas album, What I Really
Want for Christmas, back in 2005. Brian Wilson.
OK. I mean, the list goes on. Taupin has truly
proven he's fluent in the language of almost
every major musical genre you can think of. He's
not just Elton's guy. It's interesting, isn't
it? For a man who really defined himself as the
quiet, written half of this massive, flamboyant
musical duo, Taupin has actually had this surprisingly
public and sometimes quite experimental solo
career, trying to become a performer in his own
right, moving beyond just the words on the page.
Yeah, it's a fascinating side thread. His earliest
and probably most esoteric experiment came way
back in 1971. It was a spoken word album simply
titled Tappan. A spoken word album in 1971. Yeah,
it's a very unusual artifact in rock history.
He basically recited some of his early poems
over what the sources describe as impromptu sitar
-heavy music. Sitar -heavy. Who was playing?
Members of Elton's band, actually. Like guitarist
Davy Johnstone. Okay. And what were the poems
about? Well, the contents were deeply personal,
tying right back to his childhood, which we talked
about. Side one was called Child. It included
readings about his first two homes, Flatter's
House and Roston Manor. Ah, connecting back.
Exactly. And it also featured a poem called The
Greatest Discovery, which looks at his own birth
from the perspective of his older brother, Tony.
That's a poem that Elton John later did set to
music, quite famously. Oh, right. I know that
song. So it's interesting to compare the two
versions, then. His recitation versus Elton's
musical take. Definitely. The recitation puts
the emphasis purely on the verbal rhythm, the
words themselves, whereas John's interpretation
gives the poem this soaring, really emotional
melody. It's quite different. But the spoken
word experiment was pretty short -lived. Taubman
himself stated later that he was explicitly not
pleased with how that album turned out. He didn't
like it. Why not? It seems like maybe there was
a conflict between his vision as the writer and
the reality of being the performer, or maybe
how the music framed the words. He didn't elaborate
much, just that he wasn't happy with it. Okay.
But he did try the singing route again later,
didn't he? He did. In 1980, he released his first
proper album as a vocalist called He Who Rides
the Tiger. Did it do well? No, it failed the
chart. He followed it up in 1987 with another
album called Tribe. And that one. Same story,
really. Neither of those albums found much commercial
success. And regarding that first solo effort,
He Who Rides the Tiger, Taubman later kind of
suggested he felt he lacked the creative control
he really wanted over the final product. Ah,
that makes sense. A common creative conflict.
Right. The person who provides the source material
steps into the spotlight and suddenly finds their
original vision maybe diluted by producers, other
musicians. Exactly. He found himself on the receiving
end of the process he usually initiated with
Elton. He was the writer being interpreted rather
than the interpreter. But he did eventually find
a way to bridge that earthier storytelling style
with performance again, didn't he? In the mid
-90s, but this time in a collaborative band setting,
the group Farm Dogs. Yes, Farm Dogs. Formed in
1997. They released two albums, Last Stand and
Open Country and Immigrant Sons. And this project
feels fundamentally important because it was
described at the time as a conscious and actually
quite successful throwback. A throwback to what?
To the grittier, earthier sound of Tumbleweed
Connection. You know, that seminal 1970 album
he co -wrote with John, which was so heavy on
themes of the American West, rural life. Okay.
So Farm Dogs was like a deliberate return to
his deepest thematic roots. The rugged, dusty
narratives he always excelled at. Pretty much.
And notice the structure. In Farm Dogs, he went
right back to that familiar, successful division
of labor. He wrote the lyrics. But the music
was a collaborative effort among the other band
members. So he provided the soul, the stories,
and the others provided the sound. Exactly. That
seems to be the setup where he felt most comfortable
performing, when he wasn't solely carrying the
musical load. Makes sense. Okay, so beyond musical
performance, he also has a solid bibliography,
right? Yeah, he's published his collected lyrics
multiple times. There was an early collection
back in 1973 that covered all the big hits up
to Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. And then a more
complete lyrics collection came out in 1994.
And didn't he write a memoir, too? He did. In
1988, he published A Cradle of Halos, Sketches
of a Childhood. But crucially, this autobiography
was only released in the UK. Oh, really? Just
the UK? Yeah. And it meticulously covered his
rural upbringing, everything we talked about
earlier, right up until 1969. It stops just as
he's about to head off to London and meet Reginald
Dwight. So it's like the full immersive backstory
to the poems that started everything. Precisely.
It gives you the genesis of his poetry. But the
most maybe striking creative pivot of his later
career isn't musical or literary at all. It's
his visual art. Yes, which represents a completely
different kind of storytelling for him. When
did this start? Is it serious? His career as
a visual artist really took off around 2010.
And this isn't just some casual hobby. His work
consists of these large mixed media contemporary
assemblages. They've been shown pretty extensively,
collected across the U .S. and Canada. He actually
attributes his lifelong passion for art. going
way back to his mother Daphne. Interesting. Is
there a thematic link between his art and his
lyrics? Oh, absolutely. If you look at the consistency
in his artwork, it links directly back to his
life as this, well, Americanized Englishman.
A hugely recurring element in his visual art
is the incorporation of the American flag. The
flag. Yes. Which just reinforces this idea, doesn't
it? That the themes he writes about in his country
songs, his Americana rock lyrics, that whole
mythology of the United States, it's not just
lyrical fodder for him. genuine, deep, artistic
obsession that he now expresses visually on canvas
and through assemblage. So Bernie Toppin's professional
life, it seems like a model of creative consistency,
really, despite the genre hopping. But his personal
life, it reflects more of a journey, doesn't
it? Major changes, relocation, transformation.
Definitely. He's been married four times, for
instance. And we track his move from England
to the United States back in the mid 1970s. That
was obviously a huge shift personally, but also
creatively. How so creatively? Well, relocating
to the U .S., particularly California, seemed
to really solidify the thematic direction of
so much of his later work. That focus on American
landscapes, characters, myths. It became even
more central, maybe more authentic once he was
living it. And he fully committed to his adopted
home, didn't he? Became a citizen. Yeah. became
a naturalized U .S. citizen in 1990. He currently
lives down in Santa Barbara County, California.
Deep in the heart of the territory, he's so often
romanticized in his lyrics. His current marriage
is to Heather Kidd, and they have two daughters
together. But we absolutely cannot move on without
pausing for this one incredible biographical
detail. It seems almost too perfect, like something
out of one of his own songs. Too ruggedly poetic
to be true. Oh, I know where you're going with
this. The man who wrote Tiny Dancer and Goodbye
Yellow Brick Road was a part owner. of a world
-famous bucking bull. It's just the best anecdote,
isn't it? Little Yellow Jacket. Little Yellow
Jacket. It's phenomenal. It's like the physical
embodiment of his whole tumbleweed connection
aesthetic. And this wasn't just some casual investment,
right? This bull was a star. Oh, absolutely not
casual. Little Yellow Jacket was a total superstar
in the PBR, the Professional Bull Rider Circuit.
He was named PBR Bull of the Year, three years
running. 2002, 2003, 2004. Three years in a row.
Yeah. So for a man who wrote all these lyrics
romanticizing cowboys, Dusty Rhodes, the rugged
spirit of the American West, to actually co -own
a champion bucking bull, it's the ultimate. literal
convergence of his art in his life. It's perfect.
It really is. It's just a perfect little anecdote
that adds so much color and depth. It reminds
you his connection to Americana isn't just literary,
it's visceral, it's real. He literally put his
money where his poetry was. Exactly. And as we
kind of look back at this long, incredibly varied
career, the recognition, as we touched on earlier,
has really culminated in a number of huge, monumental
late career honors. And these firmly establish
his legacy. deservedly, outside of the shadow
of his partner's massive performance profile.
Right. So in 2022, he got that major recognition
from his home country. He was appointed commander
of the Order of the British Empire, the CBE,
for his services to music, which feels like a
powerful statement of recognition from the establishment
he sort of left behind decades ago. Yeah, a homecoming
honor, in a way. Then, in 2023, came the ultimate
rock and roll recognition, induction into the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Was that with Elton?
No, this was specifically for him in the Musical
Excellence Award category. Ah, okay. What's that
category for? It specifically recognizes individuals
who've made outstanding creative contributions
to music, but aren't necessarily defined primarily
by their status as performers. So it's recognition
for the craft, for the songwriting itself. Perfect
for him. Absolutely perfect. And we keep coming
back to 2024 because it really has been this
landmark year for his legacy. It really has.
The Gershwin Prize for Popular Song, shared with
Elton John, yes. But also his personal Ivor Novello
Award for Outstanding Contribution to British
Music. The sheer accumulation, it just proves
that critics, his peers, the institutions, they're
finally looking beyond the piano player and fully
acknowledging the unparalleled creative force
of the writer behind the songs. It's a recognition
that's been long, long deserved. Acknowledging
the incredible depth, the sheer volume, and the
quality of his contributions across so many genres,
so many decades. You know, what truly stands
out when you do a deep dive like this on Bernie
Taupin is just the comprehensive nature of his
journey. It's remarkable. We start with this
shy, seemingly isolated poet in rural Lincolnshire.
Right. Influenced by his Cambridge -educated
classics -teaching grandfather, absorbing narrative
structure in a farmhouse that didn't even have
electricity. Amazing beginnings. And that shy
poet then somehow transforms into the absolute
hit machine that defines the sound of 70s rock
radio. Yeah. Then he evolves again. Finding huge
success as this Grammy -winning country writer,
connecting deeply with icons like Willie Nelson,
and then later becomes this respected visual
artist obsessed with the iconography of his adopted
American home. An obsession you see reflected
right there in the recurring American flag motif
in his large -scale art pieces. Exactly. He's
a storyteller whose creative palette just kept
expanding, didn't it? From paper to canvas and
whose voice traveled so seamlessly from rock
and pop to folk and country. He just never stopped
observing and translating the world around him
into art. And it all comes back ultimately to
that foundational partnership. I mean, if you
ever doubted Taupin's singular importance to
the story of modern music, just remember what
Elton John himself said. He told the audience
at his own 60th birthday celebration. What was
it? He said that without Bernie Taupin, there
probably would not be an Elton John as the public
has come to know him. Wow. That's pretty definitive,
isn't it? It really is. The persona, the legend,
it was all built on the poetry. One man provided
the sophisticated, emotional, narrative soul.
The other provided the music and the voice that
made it global. It's truly a miracle of creative
synergy when you think about it. So as you reflect
on this long, varied, complex journey of this,
well, quiet genius, Maybe consider the profound
unpredictability where creativity comes from.
What other great culture -defining collaborations
might have been started simply by two unknown,
recently rejected people answering a random classified
ad in the back of a music paper? It's an amazing
thought, isn't it? The greatest connections sometimes
really do begin in the most mundane, unexpected
places. Absolutely. That's it for the Deep Dives.
Thank you so much for joining us.