10 Best Soft Rock Albums Of All Time

As the '70s started to become the decade we know today, you couldn't touch Elton John's level if you tried. Along with his right hand man Bernie Taupin writing every single lyric, John was practically a hit factory at the time, getting bigger and bigger off the strength of Tiny Dancer and Rocket Man. And when everything pointed to the next album going wrong, the man came through with one of the greatest double albums in history.

After originally trying to record in Jamaica, the band were rushed out and ended up renting an estate in France to complete the album, which made for the perfect inspiration for John's writing. Living amongst the countryside, there's a certain homespun quality to most of these songs, whether that be going for some pure rock and roll on Saturday Night's Alright or the disillusioned kid getting used to the power of fame on the title track.

Bringing Elton's career into the stratosphere, almost every song on here could be among his best, even when he's having fun on tracks like All the Girls Love Alice or reminiscing on his youth as an English boy watching westerns in something like Roy Rogers. While you weren't going to run short on singer songwriters at this stage of the game, no other one was going to give you songs that sounded like they were coming from another plane of existence like this.