So here we go, folks, the dream we all dream of: Elvis Costello and the Roots (aka Questlove aka the guy with the huge Afro) have united for an album on Blue Note (aka Universal) Records Wise Up Ghost and have released a video for the first song “Walk Us Uptown” for it and so with no further ado, this kinda sucks.
Costello always sounds like Costello and here he sounds like like Costello singing something off Trust with the Roots backing up. Maybe “Clubland” with a hip hop blues band, the most overrated hip hop blues band on earth.
This is just not very good and it is part of Costello’s problem that he thinks he is a Renaissance man, a jack off of all trades , when what he is is a rock and roll singer songwriter who can’t write good songs any more.
And if that is too harsh will somebody please tell me where I have made my mistake, where the last good (not even great) Costello album is because you can go back as far as 2001’s For the Stars, or MAYBE 2003’s North. That would make ten years.
I haven’t much cared for the Roots ever, except maybe bits of 2002’s Phrenology. One thing is for sure, Doc Severinsen is not waking in the night in a cold sweat. Neither is Paul Shaffer come to that.
The song us a nightmare vision of some non-existent Uptown, as two New Yorkers are singing it, one would guess they mean the Bronx and somewhere there is a racial uptown,but the concept is too sketchy so it is just just a jitter jutting nightmare of a song. It is like a caffeine jag or a bad dream but it doesn’t really sound good, certainly doesn’t sound original and at least I expected. The lyric, once Costello’s calling card, is all dirt in mouth and bodies buried upright. You know they’re gonna tour, right? God help us all.
PS: Pitchfork got the exclusive video so just wait for the rave review.
Grade: C
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