Elton John came around at a time—the late ’60s and early ’70s—when the supremacy of the stand-alone single was giving way to the strange post-Beatles possibility that albums themselves could be artistic statements, filled with surprises, experiments and peripheral stuff that turned the artist’s vision into a full, inhabitable world. Mixing album cuts with soundtrack contributions, collaborations (including a track with one of his most formative influences, Leon Russell) and other curiosities, traversing country, gospel, glam-pop and centre-stage balladry, here’s a playlist collecting some of the lesser-known—but no less fabulous—tracks by Sir Elton Hercules John.