Vinyl Reports

On Record Store Day earlier this year on April 12, 2025, one of those blink-and-you-missed-it releases was the first-time official vinyl pressing of Elton John’s 1977 performance for BBC Radio, Live From the Rainbow Theatre With Ray Cooper. Its initial run of 5,000 was labeled as an RSD First Release. As we’ve been seeing a lot of those copies being sold online, we suspect that perhaps this album didn’t quite get into the hands of as many actual Elton John fans as originally intended. Thus, a quality, proper expanded global distribution effort — I’m hard-pressed to call this a “reissue” — was no doubt in order.

Before we get into the heart of the review of this fine new 1LP 180g edition of Live From the Rainbow Theatre With Ray Cooper — which received that broader distribution via Rocket/Mercury/UMR on July 25, 2025 — let’s first take a quick look at the all-important musical DNA behind it.

We had to do a little bit of sleuthing to find out that Live From the Rainbow Theatre was probably manufactured at Optimal in Germany, where parent company Universal have pressed many of their most important titles in recent years. From the Music Direct site, we further learned that this 180g black vinyl pressing was mastered at Lurssen Mastering in Burbank, California. Lacquers for pressing the vinyl were cut at Abbey Road Studios in London. Given the international scope of this particular production, we can educatedly assume that the mastering was done in the digital domain, and most likely in hi-res too, since this LP sounds remarkably good and warm for an archival recording initially captured by the BBC. The album itself was produced by Jeff Griffin, with the compilation listed in album credits as being produced by Matt Still.

The 12-song tracklist was personally curated by Sir Elton John himself, a special touch that makes this recording all the more enjoyable and, frankly, essential. For the record, Live From the Rainbow Theatre is also available both digitally and on CD, albeit with curiously different colorized cover art and a slightly expanded 13-song tracklist.

The SRP for the Live From the Rainbow Theatre With Ray Cooper 180g 1LP is a very reasonable $29.99, and you can purchase it via Music Direct here, and/or via the MD link graphic at the end of this review that’s just ahead of the tracklisting section.

Okay, so with all those nitty-gritty administrative details out of the way, let’s now talk about Elton John, the artist (pictured above and later below as well, both shots having been taken at the Rainbow Theatre gig by Watal Asanuma). First, I do feel it is important to establish the root of my enthusiasm for this album. You see, I am pretty much a lifelong Elton John fan. My older brother bought Elton’s eponymously titled first U.S. album on MCA subsidiary Uni when it was first released here in April 1970, and it quickly became a favorite of mine. I was about nine years old, and I played this record so very, very much. (Okay, yes, technically, Elton John was his second LP — but his actual first LP, June 1969’s Empty Sky, was not issued in the U.S. until 1975!)

Looking back, I see Elton’s music as arguably my first real post-Beatles music infatuation, especially since Liverpool’s finest had announced their breakup around the same time Elton first appeared here in America, and when Paul McCartney’s solo debut LP McCartney was issued on April 17, 1970. Interweb research tells us that Elton John came out a week earlier, on April 10, 1970 — the exact day the news of The Beatles’ dissolution hit the press!

As a little kid not yet fully understanding the mechanics of superstardom, I was super sad (devastated, really) about that news regarding the breakup of my first musical heroes, The Beatles. But that new music from Elton John certainly helped pick up my spirits and heal those wounds — alongside subsequent solo Beatle singles and then new music from the likes of England’s Badfinger, as well as Hawthorne, California’s other post-Brian Wilson super-composer, Emitt Rhodes.

Heck, even my dad liked Elton’s music, and he subsequently bought me Elton’s next two studio LPs, October 1970’s Tumbleweed Connection and November 1971’s Madman Across the Water, effectively sealing my fandom for Elton’s music for life, even through all the ups and down. So, I guess you can say I like Elton’s music a whole bunch! Fast-forward to the present day, where I was especially pleased to receive a copy of the Live From the Rainbow Theatre With Ray Cooper LP in order to do this review.

An excerpt culled from the official press materials underscores the significance of Live From the Rainbow Theatre, and it also offers valuable additional perspective: “In May 1977, Elton John took the stage at London’s iconic Rainbow Theatre with percussion legend Ray Cooper for a six-show residency. These performances were the first of 233 Elton-and-Ray only shows that would follow. [. . .] The first half of the set would be Elton alone at the piano, the second half would see him accompanied by Ray Cooper, the two performers working together telepathically, harking back to the earliest days of Elton’s rise to superstardom. The stripped-back performances have since been regarded as some of the finest of his career.

“The material selected represents a generous sampler of Elton’s career to date, yet without the big hits that were part of his regular set, offering a glimpse of what he would have been playing had he been a cult artist, not the global superstar he had become.”

That last paragraph is important to consider in your appreciation for this collection, which, as noted, eschews many of Sir Elton’s obvious big hits for deeper album tracks. Actually, when I first approached this review, I was momentarily disappointed to learn that Live From the Rainbow Theatre did not include the full concert. (That said, you can easily find the full two-hour set streaming out there on the interwebs, not to mention via other means, since the original June 11, 1977, radio broadcast has been long-bootlegged and shared among collectors for decades.)

However, I quickly considered the logistical notion of marketing the whole concert on vinyl, which would have brought this album into the realm of a very expensive 3LP multi-disc set. It might have been a cool thing for the completists amongst us, but it ultimately could have been seen as overkill with limited mass appeal.

In that light, I think Elton’s personal curation of this music is nothing short of brilliant, resulting in a fresh snapshot contrary to his glam-gone-glamorous public-facing image up to that point — just as the above-cited press release proffered. With that in mind, this sequence of songs works super-well as a single album listening experience. It is its own thing separate from the full concert experience, and it might even be considered something of a concept album in some ways. (Yes, I do plan on building my own playlist of the studio versions of these songs on Qobuz, and in this exact running order, to see how it fares).

For example, how great is it that we get to hear deeper tracks from Tumbleweed Connection like “Where to Now St. Peter?” (Side A, Track 4) alongside tunes from his then-current new album like “Cage the Songbird” (Side A, Track 3) and “Tonight” (Side B, Track 2), the latter two being from October 1976’s 2LP set Blue Moves, both of which hold up very well on their own in this lineup. Meanwhile, the jazz-flavored “Idol” (Side B, Track 3), also from Blue Moves, benefits greatly from the stripped-back presentation here with just Elton on piano and Cooper playing haunting vibraphone, resulting in a cabaret torch singer sort of presentation.

Likewise, I very much enjoyed hearing “I Feel Like a Bullet (In the Gun of Robert Ford)” (Side B, Track 4) and “Dan Dare (Pilot of the Future)” (Side B, Track 6) in fresh context outside of their original appearances on October 1975’s Rock of the Westies. We also get to hear one of the standout tracks from June 1974’s Caribou, “Ticking” (Side A, Track 5), which also works really well in this solo environment.

I was still quite a young lad when I noticed that Elton was possibly (consciously or otherwise) referencing John Lennon’s “Sexy Sadie” — from The Beatles’ eponymously titled November 1968 2LP magnum opus on Apple also known as The White Album — at the end of “Sweet Painted Lady” (Side B, Track 1), itself hailing from Elton’s equally mega-smash hit 2LP set, October 1973’s Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. Finally, the lone track from Sir Elton’s chart-topping, triple-platinum May 1975 hit album Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy — “Better Off Dead” — acts as a fantastically powerful album-side closer (specifically: Side A, Track 6).

Overall, I’m very pleased with Live From the Rainbow Theatre With Ray Cooper. The vinyl pressing — again, probably made at Optimal — is excellent. My copy is dark, well-centered, and dead-quiet, allowing the music to soar transparently through my stereo. The sound quality is top-notch — and immediately, I could hear that this new mastering sounds richer than the companion CD, and certainly better than any of the bootleg versions. Kudos to Lurssen Mastering for creating a rich, warm listening experience out of this vintage concert recording originally broadcast by the BBC in 1977.

If anything, my only disappointment is with the cover art. It is a little bit lackluster. And while I understand how it kind of loosely mimics the feel of a bootleg — right down to its wrinkled, printed Elton sticker near the top left — this feels like a missed opportunity to package this music a bit more, let’s say, magically. (Footnote 1) But that’s neither here nor there — and yes, that is a little playful pun pointing toward the equally lackluster packaging found on Elton’s April 1976 live LP, Here and There.

Perhaps someday, we’ll get to hear the whole two-hour Rainbow Theatre concert officially released. As I understand, it was also filmed, and that would make for a great video to have restored for BD release with a proper remix — maybe even in Dolby Atmos — not to mention get a collector-oriented multidisc LP set to boot.

As far as our ratings go, I have no problem giving Live From the Rainbow Theatre With Ray Cooper a solid 9 for the Music, and also a 9 for Sound. As radio broadcast recordings go, it’s excellent, and the balance between Elton’s piano and Cooper’s varying percussion elements often sounds lovely. It’s really interesting hearing how the producers of the live mix during the performance itself brought in various special effects on Elton’s piano and vocals at certain, on-the-fly points. It ultimately keeps the recording fresh, varied, and interesting start to finish.

Finally, I think I prefer that the vinyl edition of Live From the Rainbow Theatre omits the bonus track that’s on the CD — the beautiful Madman Across the Water album closer, “Goodbye” — since that song ends the whole experience on something of a down note. Instead, I’m much more okay with how the LP version rounds out, ending on the aforementioned “Dan Dare (Pilot of the Future).” (Footnote 2)

In my universe, Elton John’s Live From the Rainbow Theatre With Ray Cooper LP is an easy “yes” to continue to add to my collection, and cue it up whenever I can. Maybe it will be a “yes” for you as well.

Author bio: Mark Smotroff is an avid vinyl collector who has also worked in marketing communications for decades. He has reviewed music for eCoustics, among others, and you can see more of his impressive C.V. at LinkedIn.

Footnote 2: Mettler again: In case you’re interested, Mark has reviewed a few other fine Elton John LPs here on AP. He’s covered a) Elton John & Brandi Carlile’s recent collaborative Who Believes in Angels? tri-color LP here, on April 25, 2025; and b) he also assessed the expanded, 50th anniversary 180g 2LP reissue of January 1972’s Honky Château here, on March 24, 2023.

ELTON JOHN
LIVE FROM THE RAINBOW THEATRE WITH RAY COOPER
180g 1LP (Rocket/Mercury/UMR)
MUSIC: 9
SOUND: 9

LP sequencing curated by Elton John
Produced by Jeff Griffin
Compilation produced by Matt Still
Mastering by Lurssen Mastering of Burbank, California
Lacquers cut at Abbey Road Studios
LP manufactured in Germany (probably at Optimal)

Side A
1. The Greatest Discovery
2. Border Song
3. Cage The Songbird
4. Where To Now St. Peter?
5. Ticking
6. Better Off Dead

Side B
1. Sweet Painted Lady
2. Tonight
3. Idol
4. I Feel Like A Bullet (In The Gun Of Robert Ford)
5. Roy Rogers
6. Dan Dare (Pilot Of The Future)