Elton John has been singing “Rocket Man” for over 50 years. Only recently did he learn what the song is about.
Sir Elton shared an interview clip to Instagram of him and lyricist Bernie Taupin talking about the hit song. He recalled that writing the song’s melody was pretty easy to do, ” … Because it’s a song about space, so it’s quite a spacious song.”
This is where Taupin chimes in and says the song was actually inspired by an anthology book titled The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury. Taupin details, ” … In that book, there was a story called ‘The Rocket Man,’ which was about how astronauts in the future would become sort of an everyday job… so I kinda took that idea and ran with it.”
Stunned, Sir Elton replies, “Do you know I never knew that?” The clip below is appropriately captioned, “You learn something new every day!”
John is currently wrapping up his “Farewell Yellow Brick Road” tour in Europe. He’s playing the U.K. and Ireland through to April 17. During that time, he has a nine-night stand at London’s O2 Arena. A full list of tour dates can be found at EltonJohn.com.
