Longtime collaborator Bernie Taupin recently said he’d been trying to persuade John to begin writing music and had supplied “close to 16 or 18” lyric ideas. “I would love to see him start to do some work," he said. "As I say, I continually encourage him to do so.” (Ultimateclassicrock)
But in a new interview with Record Collector, John revealed he wasn’t responding to the encouragement. “I have no idea what the fuck I’m going to do next, and that feels great,” he said. “I just don’t think this is a time for me to think about recording. I’m a dad, and I love being a dad. I will get in the mood to record again – and I’ll get in the mood to write. ... But no one needs another Elton John record out at the moment.”
“When I first started working with Bernie, it was exactly the same as it is now,” he recalled. “I would get a lyric, I would go away and write the melody and play it to him.”
John explained that he'd "just go to the studio and there’s 24 lyrics waiting for me, and I look through them and see which one I want to start with, and then I try to write a song. I never, ever know what the lyrics are gonna be upfront. … It’s strange, but it works.”
