Bernie Taupin - The Sea Has No Mercy

Bernie Taupin — The Sea Has No Mercy

Elton John lyricist's first-ever self-written album!

180-gram vinyl

Includes 8-page booklet of lyrics

Without Bernie Taupin‘s lyrics, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, The Tumbleweed Connection, Madman Across the Water, Captain Fantastic & the Brown Dirt Cowboy, and virtually the entire rest of the Elton John catalog would not exist. That's why John literally handed him his Rock & Roll Hall of Fame statue when he was inducted in 1994, and personally welcomed him into the institution in 2023.

But throughout much of this time, the lyricist has also maintained a solo career that's flown so far under the radar that many Elton John fans are unaware that Taupin's own work even exists, writes Rolling Stone. And it hasn't, in any meaningful way, since he disbanded his group Farm Dogs in 1998. His last solo album was 1987's Tribe. Throughout the past couple of decades, he's focused largely on his family, and his work with John.

That'll finally change Oct. 23, when he releases the stunning new album The Sea Has No Mercy, which he recorded in Nashville with producer Frank Liddell, guitarist Adam Wright, bassist Glenn Worf, and keyboardist Michael Rojas. There are also guest appearances by Brandi Carlile, Lee Ann Womack, the Jeremy Jordan Ensemble, percussionist Jay Bellerose, violinist Scarlet Rivera, and Taupin's daughter, Georgey.

"With age comes wisdom, which is a natural progression," Taupin tells Rolling Stone. "I don't regret any of the records I've made in the past. They all had a point at the time they were made. But this is the most satisfying record I've ever made. I'm talking about in my own canon, not with the Elton thing, because that's a completely different ballpark ... I wanted to be able to express my own feelings on my own level in my own writing. That's what makes it more important than anything else I've ever done."

On The Sea Has No Mercy, Taupin has his first-ever entirely self-written album and most personal work to date. Across 10 reflective, atmospheric folk songs, he distills 76 years of life experience into stories that are intimate, vivid and deeply revealing.

Inspired by his acclaimed memoir Scattershot, the album is plaintively warm, thoughtful and richly cinematic. The Sea Has No Mercy stands as a late-career masterpiece from one of music's greatest storytellers. 180-gram vinyl includes 8-page booklet of lyrics.

 

Side A

1. Fisherman

2. Old Church Road

3. The Sea Has No Mercy

4. Elephant Boy

5. Ghosts of Greater Men

Side B

1. Joker

2. Come On California

3. The Favor

4. Old Dog

5. One Hundred Ways

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