Elton John appeared on the Fitzy & Wippa show in Australia. Photo / Getty Images
Elton John appeared on the Fitzy & Wippa show in Australia. Photo / Getty Images
Elton John has confirmed a hilarious rumour that has been following him for many years, involving one very wild night out in Sydney with Molly Meldrum.
Joining Fitzy & Wippa on Thursday morning, Fitzy asked about the "urban myth" he wanted clarification on.
"There is an urban myth here in Australia, and I'd love to know if you can remember this. We want to know about one night where you threw and hosted a party on a huge boat in Sydney Harbour," Fitzy began.
"Now, we've heard that Molly missed the small boat to get out to the large boat – and the story goes that Molly couldn't get to the party, and all of a sudden the water police come past and go, 'Molly Meldrum! Oh my God, what are you doing?'
"He then said, 'Oh I've missed my boat, there's a party out on the harbour that Elton is hosting.' They said, 'Jump on board, we'll take you out!' The water police then took Molly out to the boat, and as they approached… there may have been some things that were thrown off the side, seeing that the police were there."
John responded: "It sounds like something from my past, absolutely! Those of you who saw the film Rocketman, crazy things happened [back then] and I've done so many crazy things with Molly Meldrum."
"It sounds like Molly and it sounds like me – but I can't confirm it because I can't remember it. It doesn't seem fictional to me, at all."
Meanwhile, John also revealed that he recently went out for lunch in LA with The Kid LAROI, while listing off a number of Aussie artists that he loves.
Elton John and Molly Meldrum go way back. Photo / Getty Images
"I love Amy Shark very much. I have a big soft spot for Winston Surfshirt, and of course Tame Impala. I've had Kevin Parker on my show, Amy, Tones and I," John listed.
"You watch them grow and … The Kid LAROI, I had on my show quite a long time ago now and he's just become so big now. He's such a great kid, I went for dinner with him recently in LA and we just had the best time."
Back in 2015, promoter and writer Stuart Coupe explained the experience as the time Molly "ruined" John's party.
"It was back in the 1980s and as was fairly common in those days, major record labels seemed to have a thing for boat cruises," said Coupe.
"They would take the artist and the management and a bunch of media and key record label staff out on harbour cruises which were incredibly tedious, because if it wasn't fun you couldn't get off for hours.
"In this particular instance with Elton John, Molly Meldrum was running late. The boat had left and was somewhere out on Sydney Harbour. Molly, without thinking about the implications of what he was about to do, thought that the best way for him to join Elton on the boat was to get the water police to help take him out to the boat where he would jump on board."
It sounds like a good plan right? But it actually resulted in Meldrum being the most unpopular person at the party when he arrived.
"Molly was blissfully unaware that everybody on board that boat, who may or may not have been hoovering huge amounts of cocaine and other drugs, saw the police boat heading towards them at a rapid rate and immediately got rid of the pharmaceuticals they had, either by flushing them down the loo or throwing it overboard," said Coupe.
"When Molly climbed aboard he was somewhat surprised that he wasn't greeted with a warm hug, because it was obviously going to be a fairly dull next few hours on the harbour."
