Maps of Music

Wonderful Crazy Night (2016)

Where the lyrics of Wonderful Crazy Night take you, and where it was really made.

The album was written and recorded in just 17 days, yet it became Elton John's thirtieth studio album.

Key places

Recorded at The Village, Los Angeles (2016)

Recording site Village Recorders — The album was recorded at The Village, a studio in Los Angeles, California. The album was written and recorded in 17 days. Google Maps · Apple Maps

How to get there: See the map for directions.

Album story

Overview

• Wonderful Crazy Night: thirtieth studio album by British musician Elton John
• Released 5 February 2016
• First album since 2006's The Captain & the Kid to feature the Elton John Band
• Written and recorded in 17 days
• Produced by Elton John and T Bone Burnett
• Recording and mixing by Jason Wormer
• Mastered by Gavin Lurssen at Lurssen Mastering, Hollywood, California

Background

• Kim Bullard appears on keyboards for the first time, replacing Guy Babylon
• Matt Bissonette replaced Bob Birch on bass
• Ray Cooper, John's long-standing percussionist, appears on an album of John's for the first time since Made in England in 1995
• Band line-up includes Davey Johnstone, Matt Bissonette, Nigel Olsson and John Mahon

Recording

• Recorded at The Village in Los Angeles
• Elton John sings and plays acoustic piano
• T Bone Burnett plays a guitar solo on track 4
• Ray Cooper plays tambourine on tracks 3, 5, 6, 8 and 9
• Track 6 features a horn section with tenor, baritone and French horn players, trombone and tuba
• Gabe Witcher arranges the horns and conducts
• Ken Stacey adds harmony vocals on tracks 3 and 8
• Second engineers Gabriel Burch, Jeff Gartenbaum, Vanessa Parr and Alex Williams work on the sessions
• Mike Piersante handles additional editing

Cover

• Art direction and design by Mat Maitland
• Creative director Toby King
• Elton John photography by Juergen Teller
• Studio photography by Joseph Guay

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Tracklist

Sources: musicbrainz.org

Artist

Formation

• Born Reginald Kenneth Dwight in Pinner, Middlesex, on 25 March 1947.
• Won a junior scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music at age 11.
• Formed the blues band Bluesology in 1962; took the name Elton John in 1967.
• Joined DJM Records as a staff songwriter with lyricist Bernie Taupin in 1968.

Members

• Partnered with lyricist Bernie Taupin since 1967; Taupin writes lyrics and John composes the music.
• Backing band over the years included Davey Johnstone, Nigel Olsson, Dee Murray and Ray Cooper.

Career

• Debut album Empty Sky (1969); Honky Château (1972) became his first US number-one album.
• Seven consecutive US number-one albums between 1972 and 1975.
• Composed The Lion King and Aida with Tim Rice; won Academy Awards and a Tony Award.
• Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour (2018–2023) was the highest-grossing tour at the time.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Reception

At release

• Metacritic gives the album an average score of 70 out of 100, based on 17 reviews from mainstream critics
• Metacritic reads this score as generally favorable reviews
• The album received generally positive reviews from music critics
• Metacritic assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, so the 70 is a weighted average of those critics' ratings
• The 17 reviews counted for this score are all from mainstream critics included by Metacritic

Reappraisal

• No later reappraisal is recorded in the source

Records

• Debuted at number eight on the U.S. Billboard 200
• First-week sales of 58,000 album-equivalent units
• The chart debut is the album's main commercial record given in the source
• The album is John's thirtieth studio album, released in February 2016

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Trivia

• The album was written and recorded in 17 days.
• Ray Cooper returned to John's albums for the first time since Made in England in 1995.
• Kim Bullard took over keyboards from Guy Babylon.
• Matt Bissonette replaced Bob Birch on bass.
• The album debuted at number eight on the U.S. Billboard 200 with 58,000 album-equivalent units.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

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