Elvis & The Imposters with Charlie Sexton at House Of Blues, Houston, TX, January 17, 2024

[Man out of Time]

The 7-0-7 Tour with The Imposters and Charlie Sexton will reach the House of Blues in Houston, TX on Wednesday, January 17, 2024.

This will be Elvis' 11th appearance in Houston, and his first since 2016 when the Detour with Larkin Poe reached the Revention Music Center.

The House of Blues opened in Houston in 2008. It seats 1,800. Tickets are priced between $49.50 and $99.50. The area immediately in front of the stage is General Admission and standing only. Tickets for this part of the venue are still available. Seated areas are nearly sold out with less than 20 tickets left for sale. Upgrade packages are available including (for $600) either the Bowie Suite or the Prince Suite for up to six guests.

Who's going?

MOOT

[Charles]

I’ll be there (+1) along with catching the other Texas shows and the Ryman! It should be a great start to the new year!

[johnfoyle]

Looking forward to accounts

[Charles]

Town Called Riddle
Waiting For The End of the World
Hetty
Radio Radio
Mystery Dance
My Baby Just Squeals
I Don’t Want Your Lyndon Johnson
Like Licorice
Tear Off Your Own Head (It’s A Doll Revolution) with an unknown snippet at the end
WTD
Who Will The Next Fool Be?(Charlie Rich)
Blood and Hot Sauce
Everybody’s Crying Mercy
Be Real Baby Be Real?
Red Shoes
Clubland with a snippet of Ghost Town
Big Stars Have Tumbled
Chelsea
Magnificent Hurt
Pump It Up
Farewell OK
Everyday I Write The Book
Alison
What’s So Funny

[And No Coffee Table]

Thanks, Charles!

"Be Real Baby Be Real" has to be the Sir Douglas Quintet's "Be Real," which EC played once before with T Bone Burnett.

https://elviscostello.info/wiki/index.php?title=Be_Real

[Charles]

Excellent show, appreciative crowd, the band sounded terrific, and Elvis was in a great mood. Lots of smiles and banter! I tried to keep an accurate setlist, but he loses me sometimes with the snippets…

[johnfoyle]

Charles Martin's photos'

[johnfoyle]

Elvis Costello /Twitter X

Would have shared this with you but The Imposters ate ALL of it before the show…
⁦

[johnfoyle]

Anhorn Rich N Amanda , via Facebook

[And No Coffee Table]

Review by "Bob" on Facebook:

Very uneven show w delayed start and technical issues (keyboard wiring delayed about 20 minutes, EC unhappy w volume of gut-string guitars in seated part of show.)
Bar crowd w the folks in the back less than thrilled w the old-timey vaudeville songs.
A Town Called Riddle
Waiting For The End of the World
Hettie O’Hara (w solos) (my daughter: “Davey looks like he’s in The National”)
Radio, Radio
Mystery Dance
(“New Orleans was closed by cold weather. Went to Euclid Records and bought 45’s from Justice Label in Ft. Worth. Artist name is just a question mark.” - Paraphrase -)
My Baby Just Squeals
Lyndon Johnson / Gimme My Wine
Black Licorice
Doll Revolution w First I Look at the Purse (at end : “This is for Sue”)
Detectives (slow w Steve on Melodica - loses crowd nearly entirely. Momentum of Doll Rev squandered.)
Who Will the Next Fool Be?
Blood & Hot Sauce (long. Crowd extremely restless w some loud heckling : “Turn It Up!” , for example.)
Everybody’s Cryin’ mercy (preceded by story about philosophers - Mose Allison is fave - guitar volume issues)
Be Real (?) / Red Shoes (slow version)
Clubland / This Town
Big Stars Will Tumble (?) / Made You Call My Name (?)
Chelsea
Magnificent Hurt
PIU
Farewell ok
(Bows but stay on stage)
Everyday I Write The Book (diff arrangement)
Allison w snippet of Kenny Rogers “Ruby don’t take your love to town”)(meaningful glance offstage left by EC after Ruby)
PLU
no encore
Roughly 2 hours 10 minutes after 8:20 start

[sweetest punch]

https://www.houstonpress.com/music/last ... s-17281221

Elvis Costello and the Imposters
House of Blues
January 17, 2024

"It's good to be back in the great state of Texas."

Elvis Costello is no one's circus monkey. The singer-songwriter was a progenitor — if not the primary architect — of British New Wave; he's influenced everyone from Radiohead to the National, enraged Lorne Michaels when he went off script in his 1977 SNL appearance, and was one of the few musical luminaries to appear as someone other than themselves in the 1997 cinema classic Spice World.

Costello (né Declan P. McManus) occupies that enviable stratum in entertainment where he's been successful enough to make a (presumably) comfortable living at his chosen profession, but not so successful he feels the need to hew to expectations.

At any of his shows, the question remains: which Elvis will make an appearance? There's rockabilly Elvis, blues Elvis, earnest Elvis, rock and roll Elvis, and folk Elvis. Happily (for some, more on that later), all of them made an appearance at House of Blues last night.

Backed by the impressive Impostors (keyboardist Steve Nieve, Pete Thomas on drums, bassist Davey Faragher, and Austin's own Charlie Sexton on guitar), Costello played a set designed to both please and piss off hardcore fans and casuals. Clad in a suit, trilby, and scarf (and often bathed in red spotlights) Costello and the Impostors performed stoically in spite of the HoB's muddy mix.

Early songs included cuts from Trust ("Strict Time") and debut My Aim Is True ("Waiting For the End of the World"). From there, the set ran the gamut from somewhat obscure (a rollicking "Hetty O'Hara Confidential", from 2020's Hey Clockface) to puzzling (“My Baby Just Squeals (You Heal)" and its not-so-cryptic B-side "I Don’t Want Your Lyndon Johnson”), the fruits of a recent trip to a vinyl store in New Orleans, or so we're told.

That store, by the way, provided some of the biggest cheers of the night when Costello shouted out its 8-tracks.

Was it a bit contrarian for his not playing some of his bigger hits? Perhaps. We didn't hear his highest U.S. charting song ("Veronica") or "The Only Flame in Town," but Aim was well represented. The songs on which, he said, were partially inspired by "that Dutch fellow, Springsteen" and his songs about girls named Mary in red dresses at the tilt-a-whirl, whatever the f*ck that is.

Certain audience members didn't do themselves any favors, going full Houston and hollering for "Pump It Up" and "Red Shoes" and Christ knows what else.

So as a result, we got a deliberately off-tempo "Watching the Detectives," a tent revivalist "Blood and Hot Sauce" (Costello's idea for a campaign song, apparently), a rockabillying "Like Licorice on Your Tongue." He briefly referenced his SNL debut (which writer Anne Beatts credited as her inspiration for the recurring "Nerds" sketch) and — in what might be a first for this writer — actually managed to shut a Houston crowd up for the intro to Mose Allison's "Everybody's Cryin' Mercy."

It wasn't the best night for H-Town audiences, but far from the worst. From the constant stream of fashionably late Boomers strolling it 45 minutes into the set to the mooks bellowing for The Hits like a bunch of Homer Simpsons demanding "Takin' Care of Business" from BTO, the show almost felt like an exercise in how many suburbanites he could drive away before the encore.

Quite a few, as it turns out. Costello can be a prickly fellow, but hot damn if it wasn't hilarious,.

So it was something of a shame the mix turned out as as bad as it was. His guitar and Faragher's bass were too high, while Costello's vocals were too restrained. "Pump It Up," which he finally played (almost resentfully), was barely recognizable until several bars in.

Even then, to be in the presence of a songwriter whose influence stretches across decades, and Elvis Costello is still as cheerfully garrulous and witty at 69 as he's ever been, was a treat. And seeing how many people came out on a frigid Wednesday night to celebrate his career was hopefully not lost on him.

Personal Bias: I've actually always wanted to go to Chelsea.

The Crowd: Some more enthusiastic than others, all of whom trotted out their finest Baja and Chess King jackets for the occasion.

Overheard In The Crowd: “Is that the first guy or is it Elvis Costello?”
"It’s Elvis Costello."
"So the first guy *was* Elvis Costello?”

Random Notebook Dump: "Charlie Sexton looks like an English lit professor. 'The Beat Generation's So Lonely.'"

[Charles]

There was no “Strict Time”, but otherwise, a pretty accurate representation.

[sweetest punch]

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/entert ... 615426.php

Review: Elvis Costello offers a few favorites while showing off next year’s model at House of Blues

In his first Houston show in several years, the singer took the capacity audience on a glorious trip through his past and future

Over the past 20 months I’ve seen Elvis Costello three times in three very different settings: Houston’s teenage House of Blues (born 2008) this week and a pair of nonagenarian venues in New York’s ornamental Beacon Theater (b. 1929) last summer and Tulsa’s earthy Cain’s Ballroom (b. 1924) in 2022.

The latter two are especially fitting as I’ve long maintained Costello is a vaudevillian scribe in the guise of a rock ‘n roll singer. Regardless of the space, the beloved entertainer inhabits it with panache. He also looks for ways to localize his show for the forum. Here for the first time in more than seven years, he referenced some natives like two Johnnys (Guitar Watson and Nash), a Monkee (Michael Nesmith), a teen idol (P.J. Proby) and the leader of the Drells (Archie Bell).

Though our House of Blues lacks the historical heft of the Beacon or Cain’s, Costello came across as more playful and animated at his Houston show than those previous two. Perhaps he enjoyed a lift from getting to play tourist for a day in New Orleans after a wintry snap caused the postponement of his concert there earlier in the week.

The rough format for Thursday night's show was similar to what I’d seen before: The first third was loaded with new and new-ish material. The middle was filled with some carefully curated deep cuts, a "Live by Request" type scenario with Costello the curator calling in the requests to Costello the performer. The conclusion was stuffed with the songs — “(I Don’t Want to Go to) Chelsea,” “Pump It Up,” “Everyday I Write the Book,” “Alison,” “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace Love and Understanding” — that unlock the fervor of familiarity for those gathered.

Costello’s patter proved both entertaining and informative: He told a story of creative longing based on hearing Bruce Springsteen’s music. Thanks to “Thunder Road,” Costello envisioned some exotic Jersey tableau with carnival rides, Mary in a red dress, and a Roy Orbison song that didn’t quite reveal itself when Costello first arrived in the States. The banter was funny, but also utilitarian. With it, he mapped out how Springsteen’s DNA runs through Costello’s “Radio Radio.”

I struggle to think of many active comparisons for Costello. As a writer and recording artist, he remains as prolific in his 60s as he was in his 20s. As a performer, he finds a lane of his own, too. Springsteen is a pleaser. Bob Dylan is not. Costello splits the difference. The compartmentalization of his catalog allows him to appease fans who want a best-of set while affording him the opportunity to play what the songs that interest him. In the case of his Houston show that included a beautiful Charlie Rich song that I don’t believe Costello has recorded (“Who Will the Next Fool Be”) and an even lovelier Mose Allison cover that he has recorded (“Everybody Cryin’ Mercy”). He offered a clutch of songs from recent-ish albums, as well as some unreleased tunes from a musical theater production he’s been working on.

“Do you mean ‘Cold War’?” you may ask. “The musical I read about last week that’s about to open in London?”
Well, no. Costello has another musical theater project that seeps into his sets. That musical is based on Elia Kazan’s “A Face in the Crowd,” a 1957 movie about a huckster entertainer who plays dumb to rile up a mass of followers who revere him despite his resentment of them. Take from that what you will.

Costello opened his set with “A Town Called Riddle,” a song from what may eventually be “A Face in the Crowd” — or bedazzled with Broadway flair: “A Face! In the Crowd!”

Two other songs, “Blood and Hot Sauce” and “Big Stars Have Tumbled” both offered a little glimpse at that work-in-progress. Costello’s discography is peppered with unflinchingly political songs about England. The “A Face in the Crowd” narrative offers him a little cover for commentary on his adopted home. But not too much cover: “Put your hand on the Bible,” he sings in the former. ‘Keep your finger on the trigger.”

I find the makeup of a Costello show well proportioned to accommodate both performer and audience. Each time I see him, I usually feel particular affinity for one little sequence of songs. In Houston, that moment came mid-set when he sat down with an acoustic guitar, moving from the Allison song (not to be confused with his “Alison” song) into “(The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes” and “Clubland.” His Imposters band — longtime collaborators Pete Thomas on drums and Steve Nieve on keys, bassist Davey Faragher and guest Imposter and Texas legend Charlie Sexton on guitar — can push out songs with great verve and energy.

We are closing in on the half century mark for Costello’s ever-growing songbook. He’s a fountain of words and music, one that has offered more than 600 original songs. So if you attend a Costello show eager to hear any particular tune other than the two -- "Alison," "(What's So Funny Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding" -- that close the set, you’ve set yourself up for disappointment.

In the time it took me to type this review, he may have written another. Costello’s catalog is the ground upon which he clops. And for some, it’s the reason to head out on a cold Wednesday night.

But he has for years given the impression that the next song is, for him, the carrot.

[MOJO]

Snippet of J Geils with Doll Revolution? That would be a fun cover for the band. Wish I could see a show on this tour. Looks like loads of fun… although the winter weather, I could do without. Enjoy to all fans heading to the remaining shows

[sweetest punch]

Who Will The Next Fool Be: https://youtu.be/Lrmc4kjgwrw?si=_A1d7bUaVXsLQzVC