On the label of the вЂњPhiladelphia FreedomвЂќ 45, John included a dedication: вЂњwith Love to B.J.K. And for years, it was a stand-alone single, available on none of EltonвЂ™s albums.

вЂњPhiladelphia FreedomвЂќ was credited to the Elton John Band, the unit that was in the process of dissolving by the time the song hit #1. And John wrote the music, fully intending that the song would become a single. So he just wrote what basically amounts to a generic uplift anthem. Taupin said that he didnвЂ™t know about tennis, so he couldnвЂ™t write about that. ThatвЂ™s when he gave Taupin the assignment. At the time, King was the player/coach of the Philadelphia Freedoms tennis team, and John told her that he was going to write a song for her. John started showing up at KingвЂ™s matches, cheering himself hoarse, and she had a custom uniform tracksuit made for him. And over the years, they both also became LGBTQ icons, though both were still in the closet back in the вЂ™70s. King proved him wrong, winning in three sets. Riggs, 55 at the time, had said that tennis was a manвЂ™s game and that he could beat any woman in the sport. A few weeks after she met Elton, King beat Bobby Riggs in the extremely hyped-up Battle Of The Sexes match at the Houston Astrodome. King was in the process of becoming a feminist hero. Later on, Taupin more or less admitted that his lyrics meant nothing.Д®lton had specific reasons for wanting Taupin to write вЂњPhiladelphia Freedom.вЂќ A couple of years earlier, heвЂ™d met the tennis great Billie Jean King at a party. Elton wanted a song called вЂњPhiladelphia Freedom,вЂќ and Taupin had to come up with something. But вЂњPhiladelphia FreedomвЂќ was one of the rare occasions where Elton John gave Bernie Taupin something to write. Elton John usually took whatever lyrics his songwriting partner Bernie Taupin gave him, and then he fashioned those lyrics into songs. The Philadelphia of вЂњPhiladelphia FreedomвЂќ certainly sounds like an abstraction. I wonder if Elton John felt something similar when he recorded вЂњPhiladelphia Freedom,вЂќ his jubilant ode to a town that was about 3,500 miles away from his birthplace.

And before he saw the city for himself, Stanley imagined the city as a pure abstraction. Philly soul, in all its crushed-velvet splendor, was aspirational music, music for dreaming of something better. It took that trip to Philly for Stanley, an Englishman, to learn something: Sometimes, soft and luxuriant sounds come from places that arenвЂ™t soft or luxuriant at all. Along the way, Stanley was shocked at what a dingy, grimy, tough city Philadelphia turned out to be. And as a devotee of the genre, Stanley needed to find this place. Stanley had heard tell of this one record store where you could still find rare, unheard Philadelphia soul singles. In his great critical pop-music history Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!, the writer and Saint Etienne member Bob Stanley tells a story about the first time he visited Philadelphia. In The Number Ones, IвЂ™m reviewing every single #1 single in the history of the Billboard Hot 100, starting with the chartвЂ™s beginning, in 1958, and working my way up into the present.

Elton john philadelphia freedom live