best post-'80s Elvis Costello album

I'd agree it's solid.

New album seems promising, thanks yall. I haven't really kept up with him since the 80s, but remember thinking he'd had some kind of emotional breakthrough, rather than just singing lessons (although maybe those too), to put across those songs so well, on Painted From Memory---mind you, I thought it would have sounded even better if they'd presented the whole thing to Dionne Warwick, for lead or solo vocals--but still. Maybe it was that he'd loved Bacharach so long, even covering him on Stiffs Live, and the chance to write with him, the challenge of it too, made a breakthrough baby. Also mind you, I haven't heard it since 2000 at the latest, don't know what I'd think now. But my friend had the edition with a bonus disc collection, EC performing some of those songs here and there, also very nice indeed.
Local jazz station still occasionally plays tracks from the xp Frisell version:
...The Sweetest Punch...consists of jazz arrangements of the Painted From Memory songs done by Frisell and his studio group. It features vocals by Costello on two songs, and by jazz singer Cassandra Wilson on two songs, one of which ... The Sweetest Punch, was made concurrently by jazz guitarist Bill Frisell, released in 1999 on another Universal label, Decca Records. It consists of jazz arrangements of the Painted From Memory songs done by Frisell and his studio group. It features vocals by Costello on two songs, and by jazz singer Cassandra Wilson on two songs, one of which is a duet employing both.

Fuck, sorry!