Blue Moves

Did You Know?

• Initial CD versions of Blue Moves omitted various combinations of the tracks "Cage the Songbird", "Shoulder Holster", "The Wide-Eyed and Laughing", and "Where's the Shoorah?".
• The Beach Boys turned down "Chameleon", written two years before the album's release.
• George Michael performed "Idol" in place of "It Doesn't Really Matter" on the setlist of his 2011 Symphonica Tour.

Background

John's previous album Rock of the Westies (1975) was his first without longtime band members Dee Murray and Nigel Olsson, who had been fired after Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy (1975). Both those albums debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, the first two albums to do so. In June 1976, John's duet with Kiki Dee, "Don't Go Breaking My Heart", topped the US Billboard Hot 100. After touring in 1975 and 1976, John decided to take an indefinite break from touring.

In an October 1976 Rolling Stone interview, he said it would be "silly" to keep his band under contract while unsure of future performing plans. Davey Johnstone, Ray Cooper, and James Newton Howard continued working with John after Blue Moves, but the album marked the last time he worked with Caleb Quaye and drummer Roger Pope. In the same interview, John came out publicly as bisexual, stating "There's nothing wrong with going to bed with somebody of your own sex. I think everybody's bisexual to a certain degree"; he would later come out as gay in 1992.

Overview

The song "Cage the Songbird" paid homage to the French singer Edith Piaf. Kiki Dee later recorded her own version for a Rocket Records album that was never released at the time, finally coming out in 2008. That track began life during the sessions for Rock of the Westies but was left unfinished, most likely because its gentle, acoustic style clashed with the harder rock sound of the songs that made the final cut. John had already performed "Chameleon" at Wembley Stadium in 1975, the same concert where he played the entire Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy album.

A short piece from "Out of the Blue" served as the closing theme for Top Gear until that version of the show ended in 2001. Blue Moves is one of only two Elton John albums where Davey Johnstone does not sing backing vocals; the other is The Big Picture from 1997. The core tracks were cut at Eastern Sound in Toronto, with extra overdubs added at EMI Studios in London, Brother Studios in Santa Monica, and Sunset Sound in Los Angeles. Mixing took place at Marquee Studios in London.

Over the years, John has brought several songs from the album into his live sets, including "Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word," "Bite Your Lip (Get Up and Dance!)," "One Horse Town," "Tonight," "Idol," and "Crazy Water." During his 2011 Symphonica tour, George Michael performed "Idol." At a Royal Albert Hall benefit for the Elton John AIDS Foundation, he introduced it as a song about an aging pop star, while John watched from the audience. Michael had already recorded "Tonight" for the 1991 compilation Two Rooms, and his live vocals from that 2011 show ended up on his 2014 album Symphonica.

Reception

Blue Moves has received mixed reviews since its release. A contemporary Rolling Stone review stated the album "contains nowhere near enough good songs to justify the extended length" and that interludes and instrumentals were done "to the exclusion of sense". Village Voice critic Robert Christgau described it as "impossibly weepy" and "excessive". Lindsay Planer of Allmusic later said the album showed the "inevitable fatigue" of John's "immense creativity" from his earlier career.