THE GREATEST SONGS OF THE 1960s THAT NO ONE HAS EVER HEARD
2,010) Pearls Before Swine — “Rocket Man”
Written, as Pearls Before Swine’s (see #1,408) Tom Rapp recalled, “while watching the men landing on the moon” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NbvEyzEi6o) and cited by Bernie Taupin “as his inspiration for the lyrics” to Elton John’s [see #175, 1,598] “Rocket Man” , this is “[t]ruly one of the more haunting songs of this modern age” (srguy, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV_jDmSmu2g), “so achingly beautiful in its melody, lyrics, and delivery, that it is impossible to ignore.” (Ben_Moses, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV_jDmSmu2g) “It makes you stop whatever you are doing, listen closely, and perhaps cry a little bit. It is truly a masterpiece.” (Ben_Moses again) Indeed.
Rapp explained that “Rocket Man” “was based on a short story by [acclaimed sci-fi author] Ray Bradbury”. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NbvEyzEi6o) “Bradbury told . . . Rapp that he had captured the feeling of the story completely.” (tgdougherty2859, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rzi7dEzlDg)
As to the story, James Wallace Harris writes:
“The Rocket Man’ first appeared in The Illustrated Man and Maclean’s in early 1951. It’s about a 14-year-old boy who cherishes the few days his father is home from space. The father is always going off for three-month tours of duty as a rocket man. He tells the boy and his mother that when he’s in space he can’t wait to get home, but when he’s home, he can’t wait to get back to space. “The Rocket Man” deglamarizes space travel. In fact, the dad eventually asks his son to promise to never go into space.
https://classicsofsciencefiction.com/2025/04/01/the-rocket-man-by-ray-bradbury/
Rapp’s “Rocket Man” is told from the perspective of the spouse and child of a spacefarer who feels more at home in space: “Tears are often jewel-eyed My mother’s went unnoticed by my father For his jewels were the stars In my father’s eyes” Elton John and Bernie Taupin’s “Rocket Man” is told from the perspective of a spacefarer who feels more at home with his family: “I miss the Earth so much, I miss my wife It’s lonely out in space On such a timeless flight”
As to the LP The Use of Ashes, Lindsay Planer writes:
For their second Reprise Records outing, Pearls Before Swine worked primarily with Nashville-based musicians, including a small orchestra who provide a stately feel to the highly intimate nature of the material. According to Tom Rapp, the songs were written while he and his wife were living in the Netherlands, which Rapp said contributed significantly to the air of romanticism throughout.
https://www.allmusic.com/album/the-use-of-ashes-mw0000695770
Jason Ankeny tells us about PBS:
The psychedelic folk band Pearls Before Swine was the brainchild of singer, composer, and cult icon Tom Rapp . . . . [who] formed [the band] in 1965, recruiting high-school friends . . . to record a demo which he then sent to the ESP-Disk label; the company quickly signed the group, and they soon traveled to New York to record their superb 1967 debut, One Nation Underground, which went on to sell some 250,000 copies. The explicitly antiwar Balaklava, widely regarded as Pearls Before Swine’s finest work, followed in 1968; the group — by this time essentially comprising Rapp and whoever else was in the studio at the moment — moved to Reprise for 1969’s These Things Too, mounting their first-ever tour in the wake of releasing The Use of Ashes a year later. Two more albums . . . followed in 1971 . . . . [and] Rapp resurfaced as a solo artist [in] 1972[,] but . . . a year later he then retired from music, subsequently becoming a civil rights attorney.
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/pearls-before-swine-mn0000753485#biography
Here is “Rocketman” live:
And again:
Here is an alternate version:
Here is Elton John:
Pay to Play! The Off the Charts Spotify Playlist! + Brace for the Obscure 60s Rock Merchandise
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