Elton John Madman Across The Water CD

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.
Personnel: Elton John (vocals, piano); Caleb Quaye (acoustic guitar, electric guitar); Davey Johnstone (acoustic guitar, mandolin, sitar); Les Thatcher (acoustic guitar); Chris Spedding (electric guitar, slide guitar); B.J. Cole (steel guitar); Jack Emblow (accordion); Brian Dee (harmonium); Rick Wakeman (organ); Diana Lewis (ARP synthesizer); Chris Laurence (acoustic bass guitar); Dee Murray (bass guitar, background vocals); Dave Glover , Herbie Flowers, Brian Odgers (bass guitar); Nigel Olsson (drums, background vocals); Roger Pope, Terry Cox, Barry Morgan (drums); Ray Cooper (tambourine, percussion); Lesley Duncan, Liza Strike, Roger Cook, Sunny Leslie, Terry Steele, Tony Burrows, Barry St. John, Sue Glover (background vocals).
Liner Note Author: John Tobler.
Trading the cinematic aspirations of Tumbleweed Connection for a tentative stab at prog rock, Elton John and Bernie Taupin delivered another excellent collection of songs with Madman Across the Water. Like its two predecessors, Madman Across the Water is driven by the sweeping string arrangements of Paul Buckmaster, who gives the songs here a richly dark and haunting edge. And these are songs that benefit from grandiose treatments. With most songs clocking in around five minutes, the record feels like a major work, and in many ways it is. While it's not as adventurous as Tumbleweed Connection, the overall quality of the record is very high, particularly on character sketches "Levon" and "Razor Face," as well as the melodramatic "Tiny Dancer" and the paranoid title track. Madman Across the Water begins to fall apart toward the end, but the record remains an ambitious and rewarding work, and John never attained its darkly introspective atmosphere again. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine
MADMAN ACROSS THE WATER produced only a couple of minor hits, which may have something to do with the fact that its best songs are all five or six minutes long. But they're among the strongest songs in the entire Elton John catalog--especially the lovely opening track, "Tiny Dancer," which builds from a light, delicately melodic verse to a sweeping, dramatic chorus. Another highlight is the inscrutably biographic "Levon," whose title character was born "on a Christmas day when the New York Times said God is dead."
John's luxurious piano melodies, Bernie Taupin's poetic lyrics, and Paul Buckmaster's lush string arrangements all stretch out on MADMAN, giving the record a grandiose, sweeping feel when it is not riding dark, surging currents, as on the memorably edgy title track. There is a painstaking, interior quality here that goes missing from John's early pop-song oriented albums and from the later excesses of GOODBYE YELLOW BRICK ROAD. For this reason, MADMAN ON THE WATER is a crucial, unique addition to the John catalogue.