Elton John - Regimental Sgt. Zippo (1968)

Here's something very special and brand new. If you're an Elton John fan at all, you'll want to listen to this. Officially, John's first album was "Empty Sky," released in 1969. But did you know he had an album that was almost released in 1968? I didn't, until today. But this is the very first time the public has all the songs to make up the album. This is his long lost 1968 album, "Regimental Sgt. Zippo." So that's pretty cool. But what's important is that the music in it is very good.

Elton John was a struggling musician for several years before he hit it big. He sang lead vocals on a single by the band Bluesology as far back as 1965. But it wasn't until 1967 when he met his collaborator Bernie Taupin when he began to hit on something special. All the songs here are John-Taupin originals, including "Hour Glass," which has often been incorrectly deemed a cover. 

In 1967, the Beatles released one of the greatest albums of all time, "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band." The songs on this 1968 album are heavily influenced by late period Beatles. It's downright odd they would put "Sgt." in the album title, because that would have led some people to think it's a "Sgt. Pepper's" ripoff. But it's not. Yes, there's a strong Beatles influence, but John was already finding his own style, though one that was steeped in a general late 1960s slightly psychedelic rock sound. For instance, Taupin would later explain the "Regimental Sgt. Zippo" was actually influenced more by Procol Harum than the Beatles.

In any case, at the time, Elton John was signed to a tiny label that wasn't making much money. This album was developed to the point that an exact song list was created. But it was never released, probably because the record company didn't see any potential hit singles.

So how is it that one is able to put this album together, after so many years? As I write this, yesterday was the release of "Jewel Box," an eight CD Elton John box set. Three of the CDs contain demos from the years 1965 to 1968. Those include all but two of the songs from this album. Most of the other songs had been out there on bootlegs, but a couple of the songs were missing, and others only available in poor sound quality. By luck, the previously missing songs were included as part of "Jewel Box," and the two songs that failed to include have been bootlegged. So I was able to put it all together. The "Jewel Box" artwork even includes a song list for the album, so we know this was exactly how it was supposed to go.

Normally, I wouldn't want to post something from material that was officially released so very recently. But this is just a portion of the 8 CD box set, not even as long as one of those CDs, and it's inevitable that people are going to put this together. The box set practically begs for it, by including most of the songs (but scattering them around), and the song list.

This album is 37 minutes long, which was typical for that era. If you enjoy this, please go out and buy the "Jewel Box" box set. The songs here are but a small portion of all the previously unreleased demos on that, and that in turn is only a portion of the entire box set.

UPDATE: On November 17, 2021, I updated the mp3 download file. For Record Store Day 2021, an official version was released, for a limited time. This is very similar, the same songs in the same order, but some different mixes are used. (And the two unreleased songs were officially released for the first time on this special release.) So I'm updating the link to this version, which must be what the artist had in mind. But I'm leaving the other link up, since it has some different versions.

01 When I Was Tealby Abbey (Elton John)
02 And the Clock Goes Round (Elton John)
03 Sitting Doing Nothing (Elton John)
04 Turn to Me (Elton John)
05 Angel Tree (Elton John)
06 Regimental Sgt. Zippo (Elton John)
07 A Dandelion Dies in the Wind (Elton John)
08 You'll Be Sorry to See Me Go (Elton John)
09 Nina [You're My Woman] (Elton John)
10 Tartan Coloured Lady (Elton John)
11 Hour Glass (Elton John)
12 Watching the Planes Go By (Elton John)

RECORD STORE DAY 2021 VERSION:

https://www.upload.ee/files/15904981/EltonJn_1968_RegimentalSgtZippo_atse.zip.html

PREVIOUS VERSION:

https://www.upload.ee/files/15239313/EltonJn_1968_RegimentlSgtZppo_Old_Version_atse.zip.html

As mentioned above, there was an official release of this album in 2021, though for a limited time only. So I've replaced the cover I've made with the official cover. That said, I'm keeping my version for people who want to hear the alternate versions for some of the songs. The rest of the text below discusses the cover for that version. I was pleased to see that it had a lot of similarity to the official cover, using the same drawing of Elton John's head.

The album cover art needs some explanation. Even though the "Sgt. Zippo" was almost released, I don't know if cover art for it was even made. If so, it hasn't made it to the public. But about a month before the "Jewel Box" was released, the "Regimental Sgt. Zippo" song was released as a teaser, and an official animated video was done for it. I took most of the elements of the cover from the video. 

At one point in the video, the large head with smaller heads in it was shown. (That seems to be heavily based on the cover for the Beatles' "Revolver" album, by the way.) So I took a screenshot of that and used it. At another point, a vista of some hills and a sunset appeared. I used that as the background behind the head. At yet another point, the word "Zippo" appeared in large letters right over the top portion of the head. I used that exactly as it appeared in the video, complete with the black highlighting. The only thing I changed is the color (it was kind of a tan that's too similar to some of the sunset colors). I then added the "Regimental Sgt." text in a similar font, as well as the "by Elton John" text. (I felt the need to add the "by" so the hypothetical record buyer wouldn't get confused and think that "Regimental Sgt. Zippo" was the name of the artist. Also, just to add some more period flavor, I added a "stereo" logo in the bottom corner, since that was common for 1968 albums.

Had the album been released in 1968, I'm sure the cover would have looked totally different. But the 2020 video was meant to ape the artistic styles of 1968, and they did a good job. So hopefully this at least has the right spirit of a 1968 cover, and it does all come from an official source specifically meant for the title song.

Oh, by the way, one day after posting this, I found out that the drawing of the head actually dates back to 1968. Elton John used it in a press pack that went with the release of his first album in 1969.