Elton John has announced his upcoming project, The Lockdown Sessions, set to release on October 22. The Interscope-produced project is a combination of 16 songs, 10 of which are original songs. The project is another product of last year’s pandemic lockdown, hence the name. John spoke about the album stating that it was the last thing he expected to do during the lockdown.
John claims the album is nothing like he’s created before and says it is interesting and diverse. John pulled together over 20 different artists in unique ways to develop the upcoming project. He explained what the process was like stating,
“Some of the recording sessions had to be done remotely, via Zoom, which I’d obviously never done before. Some of the sessions were recorded under very stringent safety regulations: working with another artist, but separated by glass screens. But all the tracks I worked on were really interesting and diverse, stuff that was completely different to anything I’m known for, stuff that took me out of my comfort zone into completely new territory.”
The album includes features from Nicki Minaj, Lil Nas X, Stevie Wonder, Miley Cyrus, and many more. John’s latest single is Cold Heart (PNAU Remix), featuring Dup Lipa. The music video for the song was released last month. John stated that although developing the album was done uniquely, it felt familiar. He had this to say,
“And I realised there was something weirdly familiar about working like this. At the start of my career, in the late 60s, I worked as a session musician. Working with different artists during lockdown reminded me of that. I’d come full circle: I was a session musician again. And it was still a blast.”
The album sounds like it will be a classic hit. John is currently on his retirement tour that was delayed due to the pandemic. Although fans may not see the artist perform songs from the upcoming album, it’s nice to see that John is leaving fans with a memorable album to close out his career.
Pre-save the album here.