A purely excellent two and a half hour set. I always write exactly what I believe and I have ragged on Costello for a couple of years now, but credit where it is due. He reformed the Attractions (c’mon, that’s what he REALLY did) and played an Attractions set. Just like that. And he was so good he made iffy songs sound like masterpieces.
Not unlike Bruce Springsteen, Elton John, U2 and the Rolling Stones, Elvis Costello is a white rock and roll superstar who has lost the knack and can only very occasionally write a killer song. Of course, occasionally isn’t never, and since I have a working knowledge of, well, everything he has ever written, I thought I’d try and find some of the better tracks you may have missed. In order of release (more or less). I passed on the opera and I passed on great great covers album called For The Stars.
So not the longest story ever told by any stretch of the imagination and what is strange is the man is a gasbag and so you’d expect him to tell the story long and hard. I remember seeing him at the “Spectacle” gig years ago and he kept on stepping all over his guests line…
Why was Costello the great rock and roll savior? I might claim he was my savior because he was the first rock start to look like me but he didn’t really, he was better looking than me in 77 and he is fatter than me in 09. And his love life wasn’t mine -he may have been getting fucked over but he was getting fucked anyway unlike, well, certain unfortunate 18 year olds.
I wrote this Elvis Costello overview back in 1982 for a Creem “New Wave” special. Kinda funnily, I claimed I’d always put Get Happy!! in the center of his career. Which, considering this was some six years into a career still going nearly 40 years later, has proven inaccurate. Though it is still my finest EC moment
Sure, songs remind you of times and places but does it remind you of some girls. For me I tend to let the girl dictate to me the song and I don’t mean our song, she might not even know it is our song, but somethings a song and a girl will come together…. Here is five such times.
Here is a story I wrote after watching Costello go on and on and on at a taping of his actually excellent when you see the finished product “Spectacle” talk show way back in 2009. Needless to add, Costello fans didn’t like it.
Why is Costello opening for Steely Dan on what is a really pretty big tour? What sense does that mean. To be fair, Costello has played a whole lot over the past two years, you can’t throw a brick without seeing him and I personally have seen him something like five times since he opened for the Who at a charity gig a coupla years ago.
If “We Can Be Together” sounded like a good trip (man, that Grace Slick can sing, how did you lose her cool?) it wasn’t, it was based on Black Panther’s war cry, “Up against the, motherfucker”) and from there it blows blues hot (try a terrific “Wooden Ships” and folk cool. Add on top two of the best songs, the title track and “Somebody To Love” and you have a career peak.
‘Florida Key’ is one of these tracks, and it seems to me that the project is part too-ambitious, part already-doomed … how can you possibly adapt a lost, abandoned Dylan song? isn’t Dylan totally untouchable? absolutely iconic?
As Costello notes on one of these songs, poverty is a different sort of enlistment but anyhow, three songs about war and all A Plusses
Costello sounding much like he did with the Roots nevertheless comes up with a nice bluesy low key very rhythmic take that works for me, Rihannon Giddens, of Carolina Chocolate Drops,sings back up. And it took me back to “Nothing to It”and it is better than I thought it was.
“Age of Consent,” New Order. Three years after permanent mope Ian Curtis offed himself, New Order effectively established a new post punk sound, sounding a bit like a less attention needy version of the The Cure. An unexpected entry on your “Songs About Jailbait” playlist.
Point of No Return – Gene McDaniels – the early 60s pop star made a sweet, masterful samba out of a little know Goffin-King new romance ode, you just can’t get out of its way, a gorgeous romantic work – A
“Oh I know that she has made a fool of him” Costello sings in “No Dancing”, “Hey girl I wanna shake your hand, all I ever do is bow”, “I wanna get right through the way I feel for you”, “I can’t be wounded because I’ve got no heart”, “they told me everything was guaranteed, somebody somewhere must have lied to me”, “if I was a Saint with a silver cup…” , “I can hear you whispering as I crawl by your door”… it is like every line goes bing in the back of your pain valve.
Elvis Costello – Carnegie Hall – June 25th, 2014 – The second of a two night stand but this is the one to have watched. A solo performance, started with half of My Aim Is True, ended with a brand new song, a good one, and “Peace Love And Understanding” and in between he spend two and half hours wandering round his future history with unvarying, unwavering and very thrilling results
Do You – Spoon – Here is a song even Spoon agnostics but unequivocally approve of, a sticky, handclapping, nonsense syllabicating masterstroke, which I noticed when I caught em at Governors Ball and am now insane about – A
Yes, the US lost against Germany in the World Cup, but they still made the next round and considering the Germans had control of the ball an astonishing 70% of the time and only managed one goal, this is something in the nature of a miracle and the miracle has a name: Tim Howard., US Goalie. By the time you read this, they may be out but it doesn’t matter any way, Tim did well.
It is a real achievement, performing solo and invitingly and interesting so the audience isn’t dozing, for 165 minutes. The penultimate song of the evening found him strapping on his electric song for the first time all night for the new and excellent “The Last Days Of My Youth”. Perhaps it is, or perhaps he will never grow old.
“Alison,” Elvis Costello. Declan MacManus delivered a debut album that couldn’t be ignored; pairing pub rock licks with punk rock attitude and the wordplay/songwriting skills of a learned veteran, not a rookie that had just quit his day job. On “Alison,” he stumbles across an old flame that is drowning in unsalvageable sorrow
I Could Easily (Fall In Love With You) – Cliff Richard And The Shadows – On Saturday, Cliff mentioned recording in Nashville and you might wonder how he would do with country, this is a modified country (not even rockabilly lick) drenched in melodic goodness – A
I can’t predict this one though Elvis Costello, one man show, Carnegie Hall, you have to assume he is gonna bring out the heavy arsenal, though when I saw him a coupla years ago doing a coupla songs solo I thought he wasn’t happening. And that entire the Roots deal was a major bummer. So I dunno, Helen bach liked him so… I guess we will see Wednesday!
Tokyo Storm Warning – Elvis Costello And The Attractions – An astounding achievement, the words pull on and out and on and on till he has a dream of that revolver in her pure and but what dow e care of the world is just a joke? Now they’re hanging protest singers – A+
For the first time in decades, Costello caught my mood, the sense of time passing by and of ends arriving and yes he over sings it and over writes the lyrics but I don’t care: it reminds me of a pop version of Kings Of America. In its own way it is a straight up masterpiece
Hong Kong Gardens – Siouxsie And The Banshees – The purely disparaging colors Siouxsie is painted in Moz’s autobiography at least leaves some musical room to maneuver. Well, I’ll give her this one – A-
Wonder how he got to Carnegie Hall anyway… practice practice practice. A two night stand June 24 and June 25, catch it if you haven’t already tired of this ‘solo’ tour.
The songs I am working on with Burt Bacharach are not being prepared for recording. Initially they are being prepared for performance on stage and for a musical.
Bloody Burnett. I am so tired of this guy, there isn’t a thing he does I approve of any more. I blame the Coen Brothers, it all delves from the O Brother Where Art Thou, where he took Harry Smith’s work and put his name on it.
Roving Eye – James Chance – Not only does Chance blow like a dream that is emerging out of a nightmare, he sings like a white boy coked out yelping twitching basket case channeling James Brown in the best way and this is a Ze Records peak from the early years.
It Takes A Woman – Walter Matthau – Jokey sexism turned on its tail with growly jowly and curt Walter claiming you need a woman to help clean the stables and shoe the horse, that all romantic. “The important things in life come gift wrapped” he tells his prospective fiancee… hard to disagree right? – B+
The original version of ‘She Used To Love Me A Lot”, chock full of slide guitar and pluckin’, with a two step sawdust floor back beat. Not a bad thing- it fits just right- but with the help of Mr Costello, this ’80s rarity gets the thump and momentum of a 2014 anthem.
The tune tells the story of how Cookie Monster eats Costello’s red 2, thus making it impossible for him to count to ten. Set to the tune of “(The Angels Want To Wear My) Red Shoes”, its a perfect pairing for an adorable video.
Runaway Dreamer – Sophie Ellis-Bextor – The album drags me but this is a clever pop rock MORer which snapped the UK to attention, not least because Sophis is a popular model, but also because the song is as catchy as this kinda stuff can kind – A
I went to visit Joseph and Donna and they had changed hospices by then and the new one was quieter, but it had the quiet of neutral, a place where everything was grounding out of time, where it felt like you had falled down a trap door, where you were floating in a sea of grief
you can tell the strength of a Costello album from the outtakes. ‘Watching The Detectives’ and ‘Radio Radio’ from My Aim Is True. The superb ‘Big Tears’ and ‘Tiny Steps’ from This Year’s Model. The weak ‘Talking In The Dark’, the awful ‘Wednesday Week’ and the touching ‘My Funny Valentine’ from Armed Forces. From the Get Happy!! sessions in Holland, a splendidly rewritten ‘Clowntime Is Over’ and a cover of Van McCoy’s ‘Getting Mighty Crowded’.
Runner – Laura Stevenson – Not only is her singing lovely, her lyrics are kinda great “Static transmit me to the other side of another room in pieces; like a steady beating, the summer hurts” but the guitars are all zoom lens Byrdsy excellence – A
hen all the planets are in line and all the cosmic pressures balance, magic happens. This year only three of those occured, but man oh man did they occur. Over the years I have seen many live shows and 2013 gave me ‘the show of my life’, and that’s no small feat
I remember the 1980s as one long nightmare, never ending, never pleasant, buying the new Costello album and discovering it was Spike, being so broke I couldn’t afford a gyro before work, contemplating suicide on a daily basis and no fucking music to get excited about.
“Tonight’s all about love!,” he called out to the crowd after the first few numbers, though he later amended this to add, “But the other side of that is deceit, betrayal, and heartbreak.”
“”Tripwire/Peace, Love, and Understanding”. I knew that he went from one to the other by reading setlists and hearing about it, but I had no idea how it would work. It was like the two songs were made for each other. It was an overwhelming sense of his true talent, with combining the old and the new, the classic and the contemporary.
The Calvin Theater sits under a shabby marquis and the staff were kind, greasy and bespectacled. as if it were the costume required to work the Costello gig. With fabulous seats I was prepared for just about anything. Seeing Elvis is always a hit or miss.
Folk isn’t the most exciting of visual life forms and though Willie Watson was a revelation, I still didn’t learn much from the proceedings. Except that the Folk music revival has stalled and that Tom Paxton wasn’t there, is awesome, and I plan to catch him next time he plays.
Still Into You – Paramore – Perhaps their finest song, an astounding, very addictive piece of power pop that held their pretty damn good anyway current album together – A
On a glorious Saturday afternoon drifting into Saturday evening, 60,000 New Yorkers became “Global Citizens”. Well helping the poor is one thing and music is something else entirely and I for one, actually, will be happy to dismiss the entire enterprise for you.
Hard To Handle – The Black Crowes – The apex of the Southern boogie boy’s coolness came with this Otis Redding cover which they whitened while shaking it up – A
