Jamaica Jerk-Off

Album: Goodbye Yellow Brick Road (1973)
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Songfacts®:

  • The meaning of the phrase jerk-off needs no elaborating here, certainly not by Max Romeo. Although this has a happy sounding reggae lyric, its origin was anything but. Elton had planned to record the Goodbye Yellow Brick Road album in Jamaica, but for a number of reasons this was not considered feasible, or perhaps wise, due partly to the political situation, so the project was moved to the Château d'Hérouville in France where he had recorded both Honky Château and Don't Shoot Me... It may thus be said that Jamaica had been a jerk-off in a purely colloquial sense.

    Co-written with his original - and up to that time only - lyricist, Bernie Taupin, "Jamaica Jerk-Off" runs to 3 minutes 39 seconds. >>
    Suggestion credit:
    Alexander Baron - London, England

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