1988 was, for George Michael, “what pop critics call an ‘imperial’ year.” In that year he “reigned over the charts and, essentially, could do no wrong.” It was the year of Faith, his debut solo album, which spent twelve weeks at number one, and produced four number one singles, each of which, if you were alive at the time, you still remember well enough to hum today. Chris Molanphy, on his Hit Parade podcast, explains “imperial period” with the paradigm case, the most imperial of imperial periods by any pop musician: Elton John, 1970-1975. In that short stretch of time Elton John recorded and released seven consecutive number one albums, and it all peaked in 1975, when he sent three singles and three separate albums to the top of the charts. One of those albums, Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, was the first album ever to debut in the number one spot. First album ever: no one had done this before, not the Beatles, who set so many chart records, nobody. Molanphy says,
there have been other imperial stars across pop history, from Elvis Presley to Michael Jackson to Justin Bieber. But Elton John’s Imperial Period was both extraordinarily prolific and concentrated, with a dizzying schedule of smash albums and singles, practically every month. Looking back on this period, a decade later, in a 1987 British interview, Elton didn’t say the word imperial, but he defined it perfectly:
Q: is there a period that you think was your most fruitful songwriting period?
A: ...obviously, you know, in the early 70s or in the mid 70s when we could do no wrong....if you’re successful you get to a point where you can’t do any wrong, it’s like Madonna goes through that period at the moment...you can’t fail.
Randomly-sample the greats, and it is evident that most of them do indeed “get to [that] point”: Elvis, from “That’s All Right” until the army. The Beatles from Rubber Soul to Sgt Pepper. The Rolling Stones from Beggars Banquet to Exile on Main Street. Fill in the blank.
For Elton John, the 1975 peak was also the end. Immediately, song quality and song quantity declined; and audiences turned against him when, in a 1976 interview, he came out as bisexual. He became, in Molanphy’s words a “modest, second-tier pop act.” This fall is part of the paradigm. When Elvis died in 1977, “all alone,” as Gillian Welch sang, “in a long decline,” John Lennon quipped that “Elvis really died the day he joined the army.” Even though there was a brief comeback (the 1968 Special, and From Elvis in Memphis) the music was never the same—Elvis as usual setting the trend. Comebacks come and comebacks go, but almost never does the artist wear again the Imperial Purple. The fall from the throne is often scary-steep. Goat’s Head Soup, The Stones’ follow up to Exile, has a few good tracks, but otherwise it sucks. After Born in the USA, certainly one of the greatest rock albums, Springsteen’s next few albums disappoint. Violator by Depeche Mode is note-perfect and so much better than every subsequent album they’re put out—I’ve bought them all with hope in my heart—I wonder it’s the same band. Don’t think my weirdo Boomer / Gen-X tastes have blinded me; the phenomenon isn’t limited to those eras.
These repeated tales of masters so divine in their powers losing their touch so quickly can make those of us in middle age quite anxious. These stories move us so strongly, in part, because they could be mistaken for the stuff of myth.
The aristeia is “the main compositional unit of battle narrative” in Homer’s Iliad.1 An aristeia displays “the excellence or prowess of a Homeric warrior when he is on a victorious rampage, irresistibly sweeping all before him, killing whomever of the enemy he can catch or whoever stands against him.” In the oral tradition from which the Iliad derives, the aristeia was a major element: “the audience would have been able to appreciate both the fulfillment of the norm and artful, meaningful variations on it.” If during a hero’s aristeia he displays god-like powers, it is because his powers have in fact been enhanced by the gods. When the Greek leader Diomedes got his aristeia, in Book 5 of the Iliad, Athena “gave to Diomedes / courage and energy, so he would win / great glory and shine bright among the Greeks.”2 “She spurred him to the center of the fray.” Just as “no dam, no fence around the verdant vineyards / can hold its place against the sudden onslaught / during a downpour sent by Zeus,” “So Diomedes routed the dense ranks / of Trojans, forced them into retreat.” Diomedes is shot by a Trojan archer, but a comrade pulls out the arrow, and Athena “made his feet and hands and limbs feel nimble, / and stood beside him, speaking words on wings,” urging him back into battle: “In your chest I put / the dauntless courage that your father had.” In battle, Athena “steered [Diomedes’ spear] beneath [Pandarus’s] eye and through his nose, / smashing his white teeth,” and later, emboldened, Diomedes does battle with, and gets the better even of Ares, god of war. Eventually a hero’s aristeia ends, but woe betide he whose aristeia ends mid-fray, divine favor removed just when the shield-wall opens a flood of charging Trojans.
Calling aristeia a “compositional unit” is calling it a convention attached to a genre. That’s not right at all. Aristeia a real phase in real life-histories. In a culture where glory was available in battle, the portraits of aristeia were bloody, but prowess and excellence are available in other domains, and therefore so is aristeia. Elton John’s imperial period was his aristeia: greatness was effortless and everything he touched turned to gold. Aristeia, in anticipation, is the brass ring you’re reaching for, and the vision you will manifest, as you stumble through the twentieth mile, nail another rejection letter to the wall, and wipe the latest thrown-tomato from your face. And then afterward, looking back, it’s apt to be the cause of nostalgia or of depression.
Aristeia comes only to those who are prepared. Diomedes—or Meneleus or Achilles, each of whom has an aristeia in the Iliad—did not spend the years before the Trojan war eating potato chips on the couch. But also it comes only to those who are in the right place at the right time. A soldier’s aristeia can come only in battle, and so in a time of peace none are to be had. Elton John was a musical genius who studied at the Royal Academy of Music, but also 70’s pop music audiences were in just the right 50s-nostalgia mood to receive Crocodile Rock. I remember Bill Clinton lamenting that no wars were on the horizon, through which he could hope to elevate his presidency to the American pantheon of Washington, and Lincoln, and FDR. Yet still, even preparation and context together are not enough. Also needed for aristeia is that last ingredient, divine aid or inspiration. It’s Athena guiding Diomedes spear; it’s Paul McCartney finding the words “the movement you need is on your shoulder” in, of all years, 1968. Without something watching over you, a well-trained soldier may die quickly from a chance arrow, or engage only in minor skirmishes on the margins; a band might break up before its evident chemistry produces any hits.
These days I think aristeia, and imperial periods, they’re a trap. Held up as ideals, they are apt to cause burn-out in the young, and in those past their prime, or who never had a prime, dejection. Hasn’t imperialism had its day? Even Neil Young, in the end, preferred fading out to the alternative. I think about Paul Simon, who in fact had at least two imperial periods himself, the last one of which ended around 1991. Since 2011, when he was seventy years old, he has put out four albums, none of which muscled all competitors aside to tower over the musical landscape. (To be fair, they did sell.) But they’re the best work he’s every done; better, I will say it, than Graceland. I look ahead to a long future of steady, excellent work.
An earlier version of this piece was published in November 2023. See also Song as Thoughtwriting.
Pre-Elvis examples: Sinatra. Armstrong.
Damn. This is something beautiful you’ve done here.