Boston Phoenix, October 28, 1986: Difference between revisions
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<center><h3> ''Blood & Chocolate'' is Elvis's bleak house </h3></center> | <center><h3> ''Blood & Chocolate'' is Elvis's bleak house </h3></center> | ||
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[[image:1986-10-28 Boston Phoenix page 08 clipping.jpg| | [[image:1986-10-28 Boston Phoenix page 08 clipping.jpg|360px|border]]{{t}} | ||
<br><small>Photo by [[Keith Morris]].</small> | |||
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The chilly sidewalks outside the Orpheum were crowded on October 16 before the first of the three Elvis Costello (Declan who?) shows — all of them sold out for weeks. But diligent politicos were arduously hawking the Revolutionary Worker, hoping to snare lumpen fans of one of the few rockers with both an articulate political turn and a sizable audience. This turned out to be an odd bit of ancillary merchandise, because Costello was mounting quite an unconventional idea of subversion that night. The stage set resembled a combination low-rent circus and no-cover nightclub: you had the Sensational Spinning Songbook — a multicolored pinwheel with the titles of vintage and recent Costello songs and one or two covers stenciled on the segments — with a go-go cage for dancers off to one side and a mock cocktail lounge complete with little black-and-white TV and Gatorade on the portable bar stand. After an irritating hour delay, Costello waded through the standing front rows toward the stage; he was already in full flight as Napoleon Dynamite, the unctuous but impassioned master of ceremonies gasping that, with the help of the Attractions, gyrater "Trixie Lafayette of Atlantic City," and sleazy assistant [[Xavier Valentine]], he was about to orchestrate a singular bit of audience participation. Plucked from the mob up front, you spun the wheel, you got a song, you danced in the cage, you reclined at the bar and sipped glucose juice. | The chilly sidewalks outside the Orpheum were crowded on October 16 before the first of the three Elvis Costello (Declan who?) shows — all of them sold out for weeks. But diligent politicos were arduously hawking the Revolutionary Worker, hoping to snare lumpen fans of one of the few rockers with both an articulate political turn and a sizable audience. This turned out to be an odd bit of ancillary merchandise, because Costello was mounting quite an unconventional idea of subversion that night. The stage set resembled a combination low-rent circus and no-cover nightclub: you had the Sensational Spinning Songbook — a multicolored pinwheel with the titles of vintage and recent Costello songs and one or two covers stenciled on the segments — with a go-go cage for dancers off to one side and a mock cocktail lounge complete with little black-and-white TV and Gatorade on the portable bar stand. After an irritating hour delay, Costello waded through the standing front rows toward the stage; he was already in full flight as Napoleon Dynamite, the unctuous but impassioned master of ceremonies gasping that, with the help of the Attractions, gyrater "Trixie Lafayette of Atlantic City," and sleazy assistant [[Xavier Valentine]], he was about to orchestrate a singular bit of audience participation. Plucked from the mob up front, you spun the wheel, you got a song, you danced in the cage, you reclined at the bar and sipped glucose juice. | ||
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[[image:1986-10-28 Boston Phoenix | [[image:1986-10-28 Boston Phoenix photo 01 km.jpg|360px|border]] | ||
<br><small> | <br><small>Photo by [[Keith Morris]].</small> | ||
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{{Bibliography box 360}} | {{Bibliography box 360}} | ||
<center><h3> The Confederate state</h3></center> | <center><h3> The Confederate state</h3></center> | ||
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If his earlier and later nights with the Attractions proved that working with his regular band brings out the rocker instinct in Elvis Costello (not to mention his spleen), the expansive show on October 17 with the Confederates made it clear why working within the Attractions' strictures doesn't satisfy his broader moods or his knowledge of pop that predates garage rock. Splitting his time between two solo segments and two sets with a band headed by ex-Presley guitarist [[James Burton]] and bassist [[Jerry Scheff]], Costello gave us performances rather than the labored renderings that this most literate of rockers has often settled for. Literacy and, yes, supremely singable melodies have always come easy to Costello, perhaps too easy; it's only recently, in his frequent solo performances and the patient ''King of America'', that his singing has been able to support the ambitious songs to which he has aspired since ''Trust''. One of the delights of this second evening, the richest and most complex of any performance I've seen Costello give and probably the show of the year, was hearing him reclaim songs that had been lost to fussy arrangements on record. The solo version of "The Deportees Club" opened you up to the cruel deception of its deceived immigrants; and when he closed out "Shipbuilding" by plunking a solitary string and softly repeating the phrase "Diving for pearls," he imbued the song with a terror it never possessed in the fluffed jazz setting of ''Punch the Clock''. Even Costello couldn't save the wounded-water-buffalo harmonies of Aimee Mann and Jules Shear as the trio tried to make emotional sense out of her "[[What About Love]]" — but then, he never claimed to be a miracle man. | If his earlier and later nights with the Attractions proved that working with his regular band brings out the rocker instinct in Elvis Costello (not to mention his spleen), the expansive show on October 17 with the Confederates made it clear why working within the Attractions' strictures doesn't satisfy his broader moods or his knowledge of pop that predates garage rock. Splitting his time between two solo segments and two sets with a band headed by ex-Presley guitarist [[James Burton]] and bassist [[Jerry Scheff]], Costello gave us performances rather than the labored renderings that this most literate of rockers has often settled for. Literacy and, yes, supremely singable melodies have always come easy to Costello, perhaps too easy; it's only recently, in his frequent solo performances and the patient ''King of America'', that his singing has been able to support the ambitious songs to which he has aspired since ''Trust''. One of the delights of this second evening, the richest and most complex of any performance I've seen Costello give and probably the show of the year, was hearing him reclaim songs that had been lost to fussy arrangements on record. The solo version of "The Deportees Club" opened you up to the cruel deception of its deceived immigrants; and when he closed out "Shipbuilding" by plunking a solitary string and softly repeating the phrase "Diving for pearls," he imbued the song with a terror it never possessed in the fluffed jazz setting of ''Punch the Clock''. Even Costello couldn't save the wounded-water-buffalo harmonies of Aimee Mann and Jules Shear as the trio tried to make emotional sense out of her "[[What About Love]]" — but then, he never claimed to be a miracle man. | ||
Revision as of 14:05, 6 February 2018
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