Victim of Love (Elton John album)
Elton John's disco album released after the genre's peak.
Victim of Love is the thirteenth studio album by British musician Elton John, released in 1979 as a disco album after the genre's peak popularity. It was neither critically nor commercially well-received, and ranks as John's third lowest charting album in the US. The title track reached No. 31 on the US Billboard Hot 100, and all tracks charted on the US Billboard Disco Top 100.
Quick Facts
- Artist
- Elton John
- Released
- 12 October 1979
- Recorded
- August 1979
- Studio
- Musicland (Munich, Germany); Rusk Sound (Hollywood, California, US)
- Genre
- Disco, pop
- Length
- 35:45
- Label
- MCA (US); Rocket (UK)
- Producer
- Pete Bellotte
Facts from the source article.
Background
Victim of Love is the shortest album Elton John ever made, clocking in at under 36 minutes, and it stands out from the rest of his work for several reasons. He only sang on the record—he did not write any of the songs, nor did he play piano or keyboards. In 1998, John admitted he chose the disco style as a way of jumping on a trend. It was also the first album he made without any of his original band members, a situation that did not happen again until his 2010 album with Leon Russell, The Union. As of 2026, it is one of just two studio albums (the other being A Single Man) that do not feature lyrics by Bernie Taupin. The B-side "Strangers" was later added as a bonus track on the 1998 Mercury reissue of A Single Man because it was recorded during those sessions. When the album first came out on CD in the 1980s, the track breaks were wrong—the first 45 seconds of "Spotlight" were attached to the previous song, with similar mistakes on other tracks. A digitally remastered reissue in 2003 fixed those errors.
Critical reception
The album was panned by critics. The New York Times noted that John still had an appealing pop-music baritone but found little individuality in the work. Matt Springer of Ultimate Classic Rock placed the album at the bottom of his ranking of all of John's studio albums, and The Rolling Stone Album Guide called it the nadir of John's recorded output. Aside from the single edit of the title track appearing on the deluxe edition of Diamonds, none of the album's songs appear on any of John's greatest hits or career retrospective releases; however, "Warm Love in a Cold World" did appear on a Pickwick compilation titled Love Songs.
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