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>Rock of the Westies
>Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy
Yeah, these are amazing. Here's a quick rundown of his classic period with my own subject-to-change ratings:
Empty Sky/Elton John: these have a lot of crucial tracks but aren't really mandatory listening in terms of full albums (though the second is better than the first). Your Song, Border Song and Take Me to the Pilot are the hits on the eponymous lp, but don't sleep on Grey Seal, Bad Side of the Moon, and Sixty Years On.
The next run of albums is seriously one of the best in pop music history. Tumbleweed/Honky Chateau/Madman/Goodbye Yellow/Captain Fantastic/Rock of the Westies are just classic listening, and the two less successful lps - Don't Shoot Me and Caribou - are only "less successful" because they're too long and, relative to the other lps, have a bit too much filler. But even his filler here is smarter than your average bear's filler.
For what it's worth, I think you identified the two best "sleeper" albums, the ones ignored today, with RotW and Captain Fantastic. Why "I Feel Like a Bullet" from the former isn't recognized for the brilliant vocal performance it is, or "Curtains" from the latter for the epic that it is... errgh, I get angry just thinking about it. Despite Goodbye Yellow Brick Road's success, I still think it's overlooked for its deeper level of musical structure and conceptual coherence. It is essentially an album that digs into the dirt underneath the shiny exterior of American life (I think of it as the musical equivalent of David Lynch's Blue Velvet).
From Blue Moves onward, things get a lot more spotty. I used to defend more of his 80s catalog, but as I've grown older I've realized just how dated it sounded even for its time, and how terrible much of the songwriting is. If you're looking for full albums, you can skip these, or just put all the 80s stuff on shuffle and listen through at your leisure. The *only* one I'd encourage you to seek out is "The Fox" - it suffers from much of the same problems of his other '80s work (overproduced, half-baked songs), but there are some real bright spots (I like the "Carla" suite a lot).
The 90s were a bit better: Made in England is overproduced but easily has some of his best music-writing since the late '70s (see "Belfast" and "Latitude"). It isn't really until 2001's "Songs from the West Coast" that he recovered his groove; there's filler on this one, and a lot of it is still adult contemporary, but there's also some songwriting that would fit just fine with his classic era (the opening track, "I Want Love," "This Train Won't Stop..." and others). It's probably his first album since RotW where the top-notch stuff outnumbers the filler in quantity. "Peachtree Road" and "Captain and the Kid" are both solid albums - the former better than the latter - that deserve close listens. None of these albums are the daring version of Elton, but they have his ear for inventive melodies and smart progressions (if frequently weighed down by ponderous arrangements).
A few years ago I made a two-disc Elton set for myself of his "sleeper" tracks, including the 80s gems that are buried in his junk from the period. I don't think I ever posted it here - I'll see if I can dig it up sometime soon for kicks.
-thebigfunk
~ i could still snort you under the table ~
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