#380) "Don't Go Breaking my Heart" by Elton John and Kiki Dee - Yep, I know, not a ton going on musically here, not much to sink your teeth into. The melody doesn't lead anywhere, the lyrics don't lead anywhere. It's just a watery (if pleasant) little poof of 1970s pop pap. Moreover, I have no particular childhood memories associated with this song, nor do I really remember much about 1970s-era Elton John, or anything about Kiki Dee, and most damning to the warrant for placing it on this list, I don't even remember this song playing in my parents' bookstore all that much, if at all. I cannot recall it burbling from that beloved and accursed AM radio that sat on the sun-soaked south-facing windowsill behind the front counter, that little black and gray plastic fountain of music with the retractable antenna that introduced me to - and indoctrinated me with - so much Seventies gold bathed in so much golden Seventies late-morning / early afternoon sunlight.
And yet, "this song" did in fact play in my dad's bookstore, I'm sure of it. "This song", in a composite sense, was always playing, burbling continuously from that musical fountain picking up whatever local station was brushing the airwaves in its best precursor-to-"Lite Hits"-and-"Adult Contemporary"-radio fashion. I have no doubt "this song" dribbled out of that radio's tiny tweeters as my dad price-marked leftover Bicentennial merchandise half-off and cleverly placed last month's unsold, cover-stripped men's mags in brown paper bags and rebranded them "Slick Packs" (a masterful marketing maneuver if ever there were one), as I snuck penny candy out of the top shelf of the candy bar, my mom counted store inventory, and my brother fought a neighbor kid who was always waiting for him on the next block when he and I walked, ironically enough, to karate lessons at the youth center.
It's the specific time in my life that "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" represents that makes me want it along on 1/48/50, evident in the song's very structure: the watery, disco-ish beat, the stringy string accompaniment, the feel-good sentiment from that cramped space in American history - post-Vietnam, pre-Reagan 80s - the time represented hilariously and brilliantly in the movie "Dazed and Confused" (which gave us Ben Affleck's most terrifying role: Fred O'Bannion).
I was a young kid then, already on the lookout for Fred O'Bannions in my daycare / pre-school / kindergarten midst, but still safe in the knowledge that nothing would ever change as I accompanied my dad to his bookstore on so many sunny Saturday mornings, spent long stretches of summer days in and out of it. While it's possible I never actually heard "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" prior to many years later when the 70s became an historic era to look back on, I have no doubt it was there.
"Honey if I get restless / Baby you're not that kind ..."
#381) "I'm Still Standing" by Elton John - "I'm Still Standing" was actually my first exposure to Elton John, as well as one of the first videos I can remember watching on MTV, back in those crazy early days when the "M" still stood for "Music". In the great annals of Reginald Dwight musical history, I think this one holds up, although it probably gets dismissed by music snobs for what they might consider its throwaway pop sensibilities.
It could be said it's not unlike "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" in this respect, but I think "I'm Still Standing" is much more durable, possesses much more gravitas, both musically and lyrically. It's just more interesting all around, and catchy as all get-out. In fact, I would venture it's a prime example of Elton John and Bernie Taupin at their pop songwriting best.
"Your blood like winter freezes just like ice / And there's a cold lonely light that shines from you ... "
