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The Fox is the fifteenth studio album by British singer/songwriter Elton John, released in 1981. The track "Elton's Song" was banned from radio play in some countries due to its content,[citation needed] which included references to homosexuality. The album was produced by John, Clive Franks and for the first time,Chris Thomas, who would produce many more albums with John through most of the 1980s and '90s.

Five of the songs (noted below) were recorded during the sessions for his previous album 21 at 33. All B-sides released around this time were also from those sessions.

Contents[]

 [hide*1 Track listing

Track listing[edit][]

All songs written by Elton John and Bernie Taupin, except where noted.

Side one[edit][]

  1. "Breaking Down Barriers" (John, Gary Osborne) – 4:41
  2. "Heart in the Right Place" (John, Osborne) – 5:11*
  3. "Just Like Belgium" – 4:08
  4. "Nobody Wins" (Jean-Paul Dreau, Osborne) – 3:37
  5. "Fascist Faces" – 5:10

Side two[edit][]

  1. "Carla/Etude" (John) – 4:46*
  2. "Fanfare" (John, James Newton Howard) – 1:26*
  3. "Chloe" (John, Osborne) – 4:40*
  4. "Heels of the Wind" – 3:32
  5. "Elton's Song" (John, Tom Robinson) – 3:01*
  6. "The Fox" – 5:11

(*): Recorded in August 1979 and produced by John and Clive Franks. Chris Thomas produced the other tracks.

On some versions of the CD, "Carla/Etude", "Fanfare" and "Chloe" are combined into one track, making it a nine-track album.

French and Quebec releases of the album included "J'Veux de la Tendresse" in place of "Nobody Wins". "Tendresse" was the original French version of the song which Osborne wrote English lyrics for, thus transforming the song into "Nobody Wins".

In 2003, Mercury/Universal and The Rocket Record Company reissued the album on CD, remastered by Gary Moore. The line-up contained no bonus tracks.

B-sides[edit][]

Song Format
"Fools in Fashion" "Nobody Wins" 7" (US/UK)
"Nobody Wins" (extended version) "Nobody Wins" 12" (US)
"Je Veux De La Tendresse" (French version of "Nobody Wins") "Nobody Wins" 12" (US)
"Can't Get Over Getting Over Losing You" "Just Like Belgium" 7" (UK)
"Tortured" "Chloe" 7" (US)

Visions: The videos from The Fox[edit][]

Visions, released on VHS in 1982, is a video of all ten songs recorded for The Fox album. It is notable as one of the first long-form video releases of an album. The collection was also released on RCA's CEDdigital video disc, a precursor to the Laserdisc and DVD, but has not been released since. One of the videos, for the song "Elton's Song", dealt with a teenager's admiration of another teenage boy he yearns for, but is too shy to confront—it was excluded from the UK video release, because the public school it was filmed at objected to the theme of the song. All the videos were directed by Russell Mulcahy.[citation needed]

Personnel[edit][]

Charts[edit][]

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