Elvis Costello: Classic or Dud

1. Encountering him in 80s childhood: the almost capuccino-pop textures (I may be off the mark there) and heavy wordy satire of Punch The Clock seeped into me and made it my favourite EC LP for ever amen.

2. His eternal 'returns' and reinventions... come the end of the 80s I get mildly more clued up and start to work out how EC's career fits together, what he's been up to, what are the highs and lows... I decide, roughly, that he is pretty much a genius. People have said before that 'genius' is an unhelpful term, and I agree that it tells you little save that I admire EC. But what I mean is, a) I think he is the most accomplished lyricist in the history of pop over the last 40 or so years - at least amongst what I have heard. b) he is able to be comic and serious, elaborately tongue-in-cheek or straight-out sincere (but maybe I shouldn't exaggerate the range here - I'm not sure, I think there is an 'EC mode' somewhere). c) he is able to dip in and out of genres with rare distinction and understanding; he always shows huge (even excessive?) respect for the genres he uses. (This makes for a slight difference with Merritt, who clearly loves lots of the genres he essays but is still less 'respectful' towards them.) d) He has a rare melodic gift which gets rather eclipsed by his even rarer lyrical gift; he reminds me of McCartney, really. So, classic, classic, classic.

3. But hang on. I don't actually *listen* to EC that much. I have to admit that for all his brilliance, he's not always what I want to hear. Possibly there's a certain lack of... 'lightness' in his work - he's so 'full-on' about everything that I can't quite see him pulling off the nonchalant grace of, say, 'Ask', 'Here's Where The Story Ends' or 'The Saddest Story Ever Told'.

4. Then again - his 1998 collaboration with Bacharach, Painted From Memory, seems to me magnificent. Lyrical simplicity yet point; fabulous melodic dynamism; lush arrangements. From my particular POV, one of the most vital records of the last 10 years, and a great highlight of EC's entire career. In the end, I can only admire this fellow.

I'll have to combine this with the 'records never played' answer. Somehow I have a near complete EC collection and I've never listened to any of it!

My favorite quote about him came from Bernard Sumner, god among men:

Interviewer: "What do you think of wordsmiths like Elvis Costello?"

Sumner: *deep breath* "Don't talk to me about that overrated fucking jerk."

Genius.

Heh.

Ned - it must be really cool to have a complete collection of records by people you dislike.

I wouldn't mind looking like Beck, or even Elvis Costello, but I guess that just proves David Lee Roth's point - but I'm not a critic, so maybe it's OK.

I find Sumner's voice far more compelling than EC's; like Ned, lyrics to me are not the be-all-end-all qualification for "good vocals." (Even though I'd take Sumner's lyrics over EC's...) But I can see why people like EC; he does have a knack for a hook (but so does Sumner--no pun intended ;-)--but I must say, I have two of his records, and I hardly listen to them, ever.

Dylan I like, though. He sounds quite fragile ("Har-har-har, that's 'cause he can't sing in tune!" NOT FUNNY, CLICHE-WIELDING ASSHOLES!), as opposed to EC, who comes across to me as pretty smug a lot of the time. Of course, Bright Eyes sounds fragile, and I don't know if I could name one vocalist whose teeth I'd rather kick in...

My Aim Is True is a great record that took me a long time to get into. In fact, it's one of my favourites, despite the pub-rock backing group. I always thought they were the perfect band for the 50s Punk Buddy Holly thing he was being marketed as at the time. The lyrics are great, too: "now that your picture's in the paper / being rhythmically admired"? Brilliance. I haven't listened to any of his other stuff except "Pump It Up" and "I Don't Want To Go To Chelsea" and "Veronica" and they're all good too. Hey Ned, how much for the collection?

that said, he's not luther vandross and when he sings out of his range, it's at best endearing, at worst really, really, really bad.

i like e.c. because he's got a lot of pop smarts, see for example his nicks of everyone from abba to stax. i can listen to him rather than, say, dylan because not only does he have fine lyrics but he takes an active interest in the recording process and is an underrated melodist.

Well, Slick Rick was cool...and I think I would like to see a Morrissey rap record.

I think if Morrissey created a rap album I'd have to kill myself. I'd listen to an Oasis rap album because it'd be hella funny.

Oasis definitely should make a rap album -- couldn't be much worse than their last album. I could see Liam rapping a la Lil Kim about his designer clothes. Noel could learn how to mix or be a backup dancer, because he would be boring on the mike.

I love the idea of "musical director," which is almost always shorthand for "guy that leads the rest of the band at practice because the main dude doesn't want to deal with it anymore."

Eh, I think “musical director” is more the formally-trained session hotshot who can translate for the other musicians. EC: “Can we get maybe a more melancholic chord for that section?” Sexton: “Steve, can you play a Bb diminished 9th in that section?”

lol, I don't think ECs band needs any help with that stuff.

I saw the Imperial Bedroom tour and it was fine, but I would personally be way more psyched about a King of America show.

Confession: I like some things about Imperial Bedroom but there is an overall fussiness born of ambition. I have often found myself wishing he'd just played those songs straight, rather than trying to harsh them up and make them weird just to be difficult.

King of America has good, catchy songs that work well live. If he asked me (which he won't), I'd want tours based on:

1. My Aim Is True
2. Punch the Clock
3. King of America
4. All This Useless Beauty

On second thought, the "A Case for Song" DVD was pretty heavy on ATUB content, as I recall, and it worked.

happy birthday, Elv!

I always wanted to do a show that was just “Blood and Chocolate” front to back. Hard to find a band that wants to go through with it (& probably harder to find a venue that would want you to do it) (& maybe even harder to find an audience that would want to listen)

lol, I don't think ECs band needs any help with that stuff.

Sure, Steve and Pete and Davey don’t, but any additional/auxiliary/session players probably do.

Oh, whoops, my bad, lol, I missed the comma! When I skimmed through the post I thought it said "Charlie Sexton, who has been playing guitar in Costello’s band for the last year as its musical director." Yes, in a big production with guests and stuff a musical director makes total sense.

> I always wanted to do a show that was just “Blood and Chocolate” front to back.

That makes two of us. Would absolutely ~love~ to see a two-night series of King of America and Blood and Chocolate.

I'm surprised he's never done a residency where he just plays a bunch of his albums in their entirety.

Agreed, Josh, on a selfish level I would love that. But I also get the sense that he'd be immediately bored by that and get restless. I recall that on the Bedroom tour he didn't really stick to IB nor was it in sequence.

Similarly to how it went on Bob Mould's show for the Workbook anniversary. Departures are going to happen and that's okay.

Isn't there a famous T. Jefferson quote about expecting a man to wear the clothes that fitted him as a boy?

Has there been anyone besides Bowie that explicitly retired their old songs? Granted, he eventually started playing them again, but still. I suppose Fogerty sort of did it, out of spite. Prince kind of did it.

iirc, the Jam wouldn't play any songs of theirs that were over two years old. But on a few 1982 shows, they dipped back into 1977-78. Weller solo didn't play Jam songs until the mid-'00s, I think.

And speaking of Bob Mould, he really didn't dip into Husker Du until relatively recently, right?

I just finished the great Joe Strummer bio from a few years ago, where it was pointed out that while he played a lot of songs associated with the Clash during his solo years - I Fought the Law, Armigideon Time, Police & Thieves, Junco Partner, Police on my Back, Pressure Drop - he deceptively didn't play many Clash originals.

JiC I have seen Bob several times without (knowingly) hearing an HD song.

A classmate of mine saw Prince around 2002, I *think* at this show:

https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/prince/2002/the-chicago-theatre-chicago-il-7bdb625c.html

Mostly Rainbow-era material, but a handful of Prince classics (albeit very few that could be considered "hits"). IIRC she said at one point, Prince said, "last time I checked it was 2002, so if you're here for "Purple Rain," you better head to the exit right now." He dove back into the hits two years later with the Musicology tour and I think he gave away why years later. When André 3000 was very unhappy following the first show of the OutKast reunion, Prince gave him a pep talk that lifted his spirits about doing old material - he basically said you have to give the audience what they want before you can reach them with something new, and that's okay.

he deceptively didn't play many Clash originals

Maybe not, but he did do a pretty blistering White Riot with the Mescaleros.

Christ, I miss Joe Strummer.

He would've been 70...I guess the upshot is that his heart ailment could've claimed him much earlier and we're lucky we got so much from him as it is. JFC, Dick Cheney can have like 17 heart attacks but we had to lose Joe.

XXXP - I saw Bob solo in Glasgow in late '91 and he played Celebrated Summer, Could You Be The One?, Chartered Trips, Hardly Getting Over It, and Too Far Down

Todd Rundgren also very much in that vein, when I saw him in 2018 the only pre-2000 song he played before the encore was “Secret Society”. It still ruled, though unfortunately none of it sounded as good in the studio.

The Strummer book I read was illuminating, coming close to "don't ever meet you heroes" territory. He did at heart seem like a genuinely great guy, just haunted and likely struggling with depression.

xpost I was at that Prince show. I want to say the only notable old song was ... Starfish & Coffee?

With Mould maybe it's that he generally shied away from full band version of HD stuff? Frank Black also avoided Pixies stuff live for a long time.

I mentioned this elsewhere but I deeply regret missing Grant Hart at Cake Shop in 2009. The tiniest venue and he was in great spirits, did a TON of HD songs by request. Instead I caught one of his last shows where he did one and only one HD song. Then he mentioned that some fool went up to him before the show and said "Celebrated Summer" was his favorite song. Then he fielded requests, and after hearing like twenty different HD songs shouted his way, said "I ain't playing that old shit."

had "beyond belief" threading thru my dreams last night

That’s a good one. Don’t know how’d I feel about it as part of a dream soundtrack though.

Pre-sales for Elvis Costello's Gramercy Theatre residency has begun with general sales tomorrow. FWIW, Live Nation apparently is jacking up the price - if you bought tickets through EC website's own pre-sale, it's a LOT cheaper, though they also sold out really fast. His site also had a deal on a 10-night pass that gets you into every show, with seats guaranteed to be in the center of Row A - all of those sold out.

Each night is 20 songs - he's posted 10 songs that will be played each night (all different setlists), but the remaining 10 at each show will be a surprise. He's also going to have guests, which will probably be a surprise as well.

Elvis Costello will be on the Latin Grammys tonight Thursday on Univision channel

Of course.

Oh god, does he pronounce it “Coh-STAY-yoh” now?

Oh I forgot. He did that This Year’s Model in Spanish thing.

He did nowt

I think Elvis sang "Peace, Love, & Understanding" and did some English verses while Jorge Drexler sang both Spanish and English

Wasn't he invited because of this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmD6so5aZ-s

Yes!

I didn’t buy any concert tickets but I wish there was a way to donate the $$ to Alan. Maybe buy merch on their band camp or something.

X-post - Elvis Costello doing peace, love … with Drexler was apparently recorded separately from the Latin Grammys. For some reason, the Latin Grammys folks had Costello guest on Drexler’s song of the year nomination “Tocarte” on the televised show. Drexler did the song on his album with C. Tangana not Costello. Drexler won song of the year for it btw. Drexler sang “Night Rally “ with Costello on Spanish Model version of This Year’s Model.

Apparently an excerpt from the upcoming Uncut:

Songs of Bacharach and Costello

Four-album set that revisits a favourite collaborator

It’s Painted From Memory (1998) and Taken From Life, which is a collection of songs that Burt and I wrote over the last 15 years for a proposed Painted From Memory musical. So you’ll hear other people singing a couple of those original songs, but also a bunch of songs that have never heard before. We’ve compiled them with a couple of songs from Look Now (1998) and some recordings that were piano/voice explorations of what the songs would sound like if they were sung by other people. We’ve put them all together to create an impression of what it would have been like to have that score.

There’s another disc of live performances of Painted From Memory songs, mostly with Steve Nieve and myself, a couple of them orchestral. Finally, a whole album of Bacharach/David songs, which I thought would be fun to include. This is a love letter to Burt. We went into the studio last september and recorded two songs with Vince Mendoza conducting a 30-piece orchestra. So the bookends for this Taken From Life are newly recorded. The Imposters and I recorded a third song, in Capitol Studios with an orchestra. It was a few years since we’d worked together, but it didn’t take very long before I’m in the booth and he was on the call-back saying, “Elvis, you’re not singing the right melody.” So I had to be on top of it.

Ha, I like those final 2 lines

I like a little of the Bacharach material here and there but the album as a whole is Too Much (for me). It's also the point where he definitely starts oversinging EVERYTHING. There is still some tethering to subtelty in the singing on All This Useless Beauty. I find his "She" voice painful to listen to.

I mean there is a high drama to the singing on e.g. Imperial Bedroom and Juliet Letters, but it's much less earsplitting

Imagine him singing this now:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCDy7sKKLy0

It took a long time for the Bacharach album to grow on me, but I also kind of wish Dusty Springfield was the vocalist. She was very ill when they were recording it so it would never have happened, but still, that would've been a pretty amazing comeback.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-GL9dCvREc

Hey, that song has its own thread!

But you can just leave that one right here, thanks.