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Elton John Gets Candid About Studio ‘Outbursts’ Making New Album: ‘I Was A Nightmare’

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Sir Elton John has admitted he was a “nightmare” to deal with while putting together his latest album.

For his next release, the British music icon teamed up with fellow Grammy winner Brandi Carlile for a full-length collaborative album recorded in under three weeks.

On Thursday, a short film detailing the recording of the project was shared online, showing Sir Elton and Brandi in the studio together.

In the footage, Sir Elton was seen having a fair few of his infamous tantrums, slamming down his headphones, snapping at his collaborators, tearing up song lyrics and threatening to walk out of the session entirely.

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The following day, The Guardian published a joint interview with the musical pair, in which they spoke candidly about what went on in the studio.

“I was very grumpy, I was tired, I didn’t feel well and I was extremely nervous, and that nervousness caused quite a few sparks to fly,” the Candle In The Wind singer recalled.

Brandi later disclosed that during the recording process, Sir Elton smashed his iPad and a pair of headphones in what she described as “really amazing, classic Elton John outbursts”.

“My lyrics got torn up and thrown on the ground,” she recalled. “He goes: ‘Fuck off, Brandi.’ He would yell: ‘Predictable! Cliché!’”

Sir Elton added that while he eventually settled into the process once three songs were completed, he “was a bit of a nightmare” prior to that.

A short film about the making of Who Believes In Angels? shows Sir Elton John losing his temper on more than one occasion
A short film about the making of Who Believes In Angels? shows Sir Elton John losing his temper on more than one occasion

YouTube/Elton John

Elsewhere in the interview, Brandi said that while she never told her collaborator that he’d crossed a line, “there were definitely points that I felt that”.

In a voiceover for the short film released this week, Sir Elton could be heard saying: “The reality is, I was exhausted. I had a lot of doubt, and I was a nightmare. [I was] angry, I was tired, I was irritable. There was tension in the studio.

“And I thought, ‘I don’t want to do it’. And then I thought, ‘there’s other people involved, I can’t abandon it’. And once we got going, Jesus!”

In the archive footage, Brandi also admitted that she was “having a hard time connecting to Elton”, revealing in voiceover: “There were times I thought, ’why does he want to do this? Why is he going from Glastonbury to making an album with me?’.”

Sir Elton’s temper was previously a major theme in the 1997 documentary Tantrums And Tiaras, directed by his future husband David Furnish.

His and Brandi’s album Who Believes In Angels? is released on Friday 4 April. Watch the music video for the title song, directed by David LaChappelle, in the video below:

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