Elton John has announced The Lockdown Sessions, an album of collaborations recorded remotely over the past 18 months, due October 22 via Interscope (pre-order). Some of these have been released already, but others will get their first release with this comp. Guests include Stevie Nicks, Stevie Wonder, Eddie Vedder, Dua Lipa, Miley Cyrus, Lil Nas X, Brandi Carlile, Gorillaz, Glen Campbell, Young Thug, Nicki Minaj, Rina Sawayama, 6LACK, and more. Elton says:
The last thing I expected to do during lockdown was make an album. But, as the pandemic went on, one‐off projects kept cropping up. Some of the recording sessions had to be done remotely, via Zoom, which I’d obviously never done before. Some of the sessions were recorded under very stringent safety regulations: working with another artist, but separated by glass screens. But all the tracks I worked on were really interesting and diverse, stuff that was completely different to anything I’m known for, stuff that took me out of my comfort zone into completely new territory. And I realised there was something weirdly familiar about working like this. At the start of my career, in the late 60s, I worked as a session musician. Working with different artists during lockdown reminded me of that. I’d come full circle: I was a session musician again. And it was still a blast.