Record Plant, New York City
Producer: John Lennon
John Lennon worked on two songs for his Walls And Bridges album on 31 July 1974.
Joining Lennon in the studio was Elton John, whom Lennon had recently befriended. Elton performed piano, organ, and harmony vocals on ‘Whatever Gets You Thru The Night’, the backing track for which had been recorded on 23 July.
He also added organ and backing vocals to ‘Surprise, Surprise (Sweet Bird Of Paradox)’, which had been recorded on 15 July.
Although Lennon didn’t rate the songs too highly, Elton declared that the slickly commercial ‘Whatever Gets You Thru The Night’ would be a chart topper.
I was fiddling about one night and Elton John walked in with Tony King of Apple – you know, we’re all good friends – and the next minute Elton said, ‘Say, can I put a bit of piano on that?’ I said, ‘Sure, love it!’ He zapped in. I was amazed at his ability: I knew him, but I’d never seen him play. A fine musician, great piano player. I was really pleasantly surprised at the way he could get in on such a loose track and add to it and keep up with the rhythm changes – obviously, ’cause it doesn’t keep the same rhythm… And then he sang with me. We had a great time.
Lennon was the only former member of The Beatles yet to have achieved a number one solo single, and told Elton John: “I’m out of favour at the moment”. However, he agreed to Elton’s wager that if the song made it to number one Lennon would join Elton on stage to perform it at a Thanksgiving concert that year at New York’s Madison Square Garden.
It was going to be like ‘Rock Your Baby’, but I often have an idea what it is going to be like but it never turns out anything like it. It’s a very loose track. I call it the ‘Jealous Guy’ of the album, you know, or the ‘Oh Yoko!’ of the album, which are tracks I made which people say I should put out as a single, and I always fought it. But this time I swayed with the people who told me to put it out. I think they were right. It’s almost the first or second take, and the musicians are ragged but swinging. We tried to cut it a few times again but it never got that feel.
New Musical Express
The pair sang their vocals around the same microphone, before Elton added piano and organ to both songs.
Me playing organ on someone’s record? I mean, really. That’s disgusting because I’m the worst organist. But we put that on and it was over and done with in five minutes.
Although Lennon’s popularity may have declined by the mid-1970s, he could scarcely pass up the opportunity to release a duet with the biggest star of the decade. In November 1974 ‘Whatever Gets You Thru The Night’ knocked Bachman–Turner Overdrive’s You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet from the top of the Billboard Hot 100, and Lennon performed with Elton John at Madison Square Garden on 28 November 1974.
[Elton] sang on a single that turned out to be a cut from Walls And Bridges, ‘Whatever Gets You Thru The Night’. He sang harmony on it and he really did a damn good job. So I sort of halfheartedly promised that if ‘Whatever Gets You Thru The Night’ became number one, which I had no reason to expect, I’d do Madison Square Garden with him. So one day Elton called and said, ‘Remember when you promised…’ It wasn’t like I promised some agent or something, so I was suddenly stuck. I had to go on stage in the middle of nothing.
All We Are Saying, David Sheff