Editing Tumbleweed Connection (section)

=== Critical reception ===
Reviewing later for [[AllMusic]], [[Stephen Thomas Erlewine]] wrote: 
"Half of the songs don't follow conventional [[Pop music|pop]] song structures; instead, they flow between verses and vague choruses. These experiments are remarkably successful, primarily because Taupin's lyrics are evocative and John's melodic sense is at its best."<ref name="Erlewine" />

[[Robert Christgau]] wrote in his 1981 ''[[Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies|Record Guide]]'': "good melodies and bad Westerns on it. Why do people believe that these latter qualify as songpoems?"<ref name="Christgau" /> (Note: There's an earlier Christgau review of the album, written in 1970 for ''[[The Village Voice]]''). Reviewing for ''[[Rolling Stone]]'', [[David Fricke]] wrote: "1971’s ''Tumbleweed Connection'' needs no improvement; it is one of the best [[country-rock]] albums ever written by London cowboys."<ref name="Fricke" />

[[Robert Hilburn|Robert Hillburn]] wrote for ''[[The Los Angeles Times]]'': "''Tumbleweed Connection'' is that near-perfect album that artists often spend a whole career trying to produce."<ref>{{Cite web|date=30 June 2017|title='Tumbleweed Connection' – An Early Favourite Reissued on Vinyl|url=https://www.eltonjohn.com/stories/tumbleweed-connection-an-early-favourite-reissued-on-vinyl|access-date=13 October 2020|website=eltonjohn.com}}</ref> Dave DiMartino wrote for ''[[Yahoo! Music]]'': "A step up from the slightly more overtly commercial ''Elton John''... ''Tumbleweed'' is beautifully recorded and filled with very fine songs... Bordering on classic status."<ref name="DiMartino" /> In ''[[Rough Guides|The Rough Guide to Rock]]'' (1999), Neil Patrick wrote that the album highlighted John and Taupin's "shared obsession with [[Wild West]] mythology", and deemed it the best of the three albums John released in 1970.<ref name="Patrick">{{cite book |last1=Patrick |first1=Neil |editor1-last=Buckley |editor1-first=Jonathan |editor2-last=Duane |editor2-first=Orla |editor3-last=Ellingham |editor3-first=Mark |editor4-last=Spicer |editor4-first=Al |title=The Rough Guide to Rock |date=1999 |publisher=Rough Guides |edition=2nd |location=London |isbn=1-85828-457-0 |pages=519–521 |chapter=Elton John}}</ref> [[Martin C. Strong]], writing in ''The Great Rock Discography'' (2006), considers the album a "relatively successful attempt at retro [[Americana (music)|Americana]]".<ref name="Strong">{{cite book |last1=Strong |first1=Martin C. |title=The Great Rock Discography |date=2006 |publisher=Canongate Books |location=Edinburgh |isbn=1-84195-827-1 |chapter=Elton John |page=544}}</ref>

In an overview of John's career, Andy Gill of ''[[The Word (UK magazine)|The Word]]'' deemed the album "a full-bore paean to a forgotten America" clearly inspired by the Band's first two albums, but added that "credit should be given for the way that the [[swamp rock|swamp-rock]] sound of 'Ballad Of A Well Known Gun' and 'Son Of Your Father', with its braiding of disparate guitar and piano lines in rhythmic symbiosis, paralleled the contemporary work of real Americans like [[Ry Cooder]] and [[Little Feat]]."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gill |first1=Andy |title=Elton John: Panning for Gold |journal=The Word |date=August 2012 }}</ref> ''[[New Musical Express]]'' contributor [[Charles Shaar Murray]] opined that the record "mined some new ore, and explored a few new things", with Taupin's love of the Band reflected in the lyrics' preoccupation with "the Old West, full of images of guns, fathers, stagecoaches, plantations and the like"; he added: "Buckmaster's orchestrations were played down, and the band worked overtime and really got funky. Apart from Lesley Duncan's 'Love Song', it was virtually raunch all the way, with some really sweet touches carefully placed en route."<ref name="Shaar Murray">{{cite journal |last1=Shaar Murray |first1=Charles |title=Elton John: They Laughed When He Played the Piano |journal=New Musical Express |date=3 February 1973 |url=https://www.rocksbackpages.com/Library/Article/elton-john-they-laughed-when-he-played-the-piano |access-date=12 March 2025}}</ref>