At Wall Street Journal, Pulitzer-Prize Winning Poet, Gregory Pardlo Discusses Housecleaning, Elton John

Who knew?! At Wall Street Journal, Gregory Pardlo, author of the Pulitzer Prize- winning collection, Digest, delves into his childhood in Willingboro, NJ and his ongoing attachment to the music of Elton John, including the difficulty of singing "Bennie and the Jets." More:

Like everyone else, I’ve been mangling the words to “Bennie and the Jets” for years. My initial attraction to the song was sentimental. When I was 13 in the early ’80s, my mother cleaned our house in Willingboro, N.J., on Sunday mornings with the Elton John single playing.

I remember waking up to the sound of that glorious lone percussive piano chord and the stadium concert crowd before Elton started to sing. I’ve always associated the song, which was originally on Elton’s 1973 album “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road,” with abundant sunlight and clean-house smells and security. It has authority, and for my mother, I think it was a glam work song, with its steady, pronounced beat and honky-tonk piano.

In our household, where R&B was a staple expressive form, only certain musicians who weren’t black fit into that genre without our questioning it. Elton’s appeal proved that I didn’t have to adhere to strict orthodoxies of our understanding of race and what it’s supposed to sound or look like. That was an exciting concept.

I was particularly drawn to Elton’s stuttering of “Buh-buh-buh Bennie and the Jets” and his slurring of the lyrics. It’s all part of the glittery, rhythmic personality of the song. But the only words that were clear to me then and lingered were, “She’s got electric boots, a mohair suit.” [...]

Rock on at Wall Street Journal.