In 1972, I met the music of Elton John.
I fell instantly in love with that music.

The Elton John albums of the Seventies marked my adolescence. When I grew older, their successors then took over. Half a century later, as I write these lines, Elton John’s music is still there. Listening to his first albums, or turning the pages of the booklets that adorned some of them... Transient actions that remain imperishable Proust’s madeleines.
Elton John's first recordings, produced by Gus Dudgeon and orchestrated by Paul Buskmaster (the sleeves of which were designed by David Larkham), are true masterpieces. Both content and container, compositions and packaging, vinyls and paper, music and colours, lyrics and design. They were splendid unique objects, and extraordinary music. And they have remained as such.
Thus, the emotion, the fascination, the admiration, my love for this music and its author endure, despite the river of time that has flown away. And in spite of the petty 2018-2019 incidents that shadowed this story of youth linked to the musician, but that failed succeeding in corrupting the essential. Namely, what I have always felt for Elton John when listening to his music, a feeling that remains and will remain preserved in my heart. Misunderstandings and indelicacy fade. Rosebud remains. I explain how and why at the end of this section dedicated to the British musician in its final chapter "The Drought Years".

But for now, let’s get back to those glorious Seventies when Johan, a boy my age in middle school in Nice, introduced me to what he called the “Black Album” in early 1972. And the crush that followed. For the music and its composer-performer -and, incidentally, for the disc’s owner. This college friend was handsome, smart, sensitive and romantic. And he had a girlfriend ; this detail at the time did not prevent my several hundred listenings to Your Song and First Episode At Hienton from remaining indissolubly linked to Johan.