Elton John Puts Down in Words How Wonderful (and Weird) Life Has Been

AIDS, which killed Mercury, has been an important cause to John for a long time. He founded the Elton John AIDS Foundation in the early 1990s, and the memoir — carefully apolitical about anything but L.G.B.T.Q. issues — more than once refers to his advocacy to explain away some controversy or other. When he performed at Rush Limbaugh’s wedding in 2010, he says, he donated his fee to the foundation; and when he plays in Russia he uses the opportunity to promote gay rights.

John describes himself as a sexual voyeur, and speculates that his desire to look rather than touch may have kept him safe from the disease. Aficionados of rock star memoirs, take note: This one also gets into John’s bout of prostate cancer, complete with his surgery and use of adult diapers. The latter may be a first in the genre.

He is even more frank about addiction. Most of his best-known work was behind him when cocaine became part of his life. But he is not someone who does anything in small doses: “Nought to nuclear” is more his style. And he had the money and access to indulge in huge amounts of drugs, to the point where he once spent two weeks in his bedroom coked up and drinking. He also had bulimia, and would become furious when anyone suggested he get help for any of these problems. As an example of how low he could go, he describes being shown a hotel room with the furniture in splinters, asking who did the damage and being told that the rampage had been his.

This is no sob story. Even the worst of it can be ghoulishly funny: On another bad morning he wakes up to the news that he spent part of the previous night throwing oranges at Bob Dylan, exasperated by Dylan’s poor charades skills. (“He couldn’t get the hang of the ‘how many syllables?’ thing at all.”) What finally sobers him up is the combined effect of losing so many friends and watching what happens when somebody he cares about goes to rehab. He is scornful about the process until, suddenly, he isn’t. And it works. Among other tidbits from the sober life, John reveals that he is Eminem’s A.A. sponsor and reveals the obscenity Eminem uses by way of greeting.

A book that sweeps from the world-class parental cruelty John experienced to Queen Elizabeth’s slapping Viscount Linley in the face to John’s fondness for Gianni Versace (an even wilder spendaholic than he is, which is no small feat: John at one point had a squash court full of unopened shipping crates) surely has something for everyone. “Me” was written with the help of the British music critic Alexis Petridis, who met with John frequently, heard his stories and created a facsimile of how John speaks. There’s the hand of a pro in the book’s polished transitions and foreshadowing. But judging from the glimpses of John’s own writing that the book provides — at one point in rehab, he writes a letter to cocaine that contains the sentence “I don’t want you and I to share the same grave” — the voice here sounds just right, even if it has been unfamiliar until now. It’s a gift to finally hear from someone who has delivered so many of Taupin’s words and so few of his own.