BLAZE OF GLORY

 “He said yes so quickly and hung up the phone that I wouldn't have sworn he wasn't coming. He was like, 'I'd love to do it, man.

Have your manager call my manager. It sounds like a great idea. And, er, I gotta go'. I was like, yeah, sure, man, We've all heard the rumours about what he's like, you know.

"Well the fucker not only flew out to LA to do it, but he was in the studio in the morn­ing before I was and wouldn't leave until I physically said, 'I'm not gonna do this any more, go home!' I mean he worked his ass off' He dispelled all the rumours about him, he was a consummate professional .

“As a person, Jeffs a little boy. He loves to play. He wants to go to the movies. We went to see Total Recall together, He loves to drive around in his car. He wants to go out 10 dinner and goof off. I mean, he loves to go play around, but when it came time to work, he was right there on the money every time."

What about Elton John?

"Ah ... again there's a guy that's a con­summate songwriter and performer, and Elton is a great guy as well. Fortunately, I got a feeling meeting Elton -I think the first time was when he came to see us - I got a feeling meeting Elton that he was one of the guys. He was a real sweetheart who just loves playing piano. Then I played with him at Madison Square Garden and I felt that I had a friend in Elton. As he was in Los Angeles at that time I thought that he would be perfect. It wasn't name-value so much as the fact that he was perfect for the part. Roy Bitten was booked, but Bruce Springsteen would not let him do it."

It wasn't a bit of New Jersey-boy rivalry? "I don't think so. I think he's co-producing his album. If Bruce Springsteen is afraid of me then I'm flattered. But I doubt that this is the case. I think that it's just purely that Roy was co-producing the Springsteen album and he couldn't do it. But with Elton being there, he said he'd love to do it. So, I had him come over and one song in particular that I wrote on piano really lent itself to Elton - 'Dyin' Ain't Much Of A Livin'. To me it sounds like an Elton John song, he sings on it. To me it was like he's the only guy who can play this song.

"Then in the control room he started to sing the harmony. All along I was dying to get him to sing the harmony and he started doing it, so there was my in. I went, 'Hey, why don't you sing it?' So we did it live and the vocal was right there. "
And so it went on.