Sunday, November 23, 2008

Elvis Costello, "The First 10 Years"


I have to admit, I don't know a lot about Elvis Costello and his music. I've always known who he is, and I've heard for a long time that he's really awesome, but for whatever reason I had never really listened to him. Getting into Nick Lowe really made me make the final jump and actually buy an Elvis CD, so I recently bought "The Best of Elvis Costello-The First 10 Years." It's awesome. Now I'm beginning to understand why people like this guy! He matches catchy melodies to literate, intelligent lyrics, how can you go wrong? He's also British, so that gives him like 10 extra coolness points right there. (Why are all the cool people British? Someone needs to look into this.)


Anyway, I'm blown away by Elvis's lyrics, here are some samples, thanks to the CD booklet: (extra credit will be given to those who can name which songs these come from)


"Oh, I said, 'I'm so happy, I could die.' She said 'Drop dead,' then left with another guy."


"Sometimes I wish that I could stop you from talking when I hear the silly things that you say."


"You snatch a tune, you match a cigarette, she pulls the eyes out with a face like a magnet."


"They say you better listen to the voice of reason, but they don't give you any choice."


"And I would rather be anywhere else but here today."


"The long arm of the law slides up the outskirts of town."


"Her body moves with malice, do you have to be so cruel to be callous?"


"There's a girl here and she's almost you."


"All your compliments and your cutting remarks are captured here in my quotation marks."


"She said that she was working for the ABC news, it was as much of the alphabet as she knew how to use."


"And though the sparks would fly, I thought our love was fireproof."


"It's the stupid details that my heart is breaking for, it's the way your shoulders shake and what they're shaking for."

4 comments:

Holly A Hughes said...

Oh, I love quizzes! And I'm really going to try to do this without looking any of it up...

"Oh, I said, 'I'm so happy, I could die.' She said 'Drop dead,' then left with another guy." -- (The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes

"Sometimes I wish that I could stop you from talking when I hear the silly things that you say." -- Alison (Love how he makes the song crash to a halt momentarily after "stop")

"They say you better listen to the voice of reason, but they don't give you any choice." -- Radio Radio (I love how he pronounces "voice" so it sounds like "vice" -- is it the vice of reason, or the vise of reason? I could spend days on that line alone)

"And I would rather be anywhere else but here today." -- Oliver's Army

"Her body moves with malice, do you have to be so cruel to be callous?" -- Beyond Belief (I wrote a whole blog post on this "cruel to be callous" line, comparing it to Hamlet, Nick Lowe, and the Kinks' Schoolboys in Disgrace)

"There's a girl here and she's almost you." -- Almost Blue

"All your compliments and your cutting remarks are captured here in my quotation marks." -- When I Write the Book (again, as you know, a whole blog post)

"She said that she was working for the ABC news, it was as much of the alphabet as she knew how to use." -- King of America (brilliant line, I'm so glad you quoted this one!)

"And though the sparks would fly, I thought our love was fireproof." -- Indoor Fireworks (an absolutely killer song, isn't it?)

"It's the stupid details that my heart is breaking for, it's the way your shoulders shake and what they're shaking for." -- I Want You (I did a blog post on this devastating song too)

I know that "face like a magnet" line, but I just can't get the rest of the song right now -- GGRRRR!!

My personal favorite line (well, tonight, at least) is from "The Beat" -- "I don't wanna be your lover / I just wanna be your victim."

I have looked into that British people equals coolness thing. At length, in fact. However, I believe it needs more research, and I'm sorry, I'll just have to go to the UK to get it done properly....

Mark said...

Wow, good work Holly! Almost a perfect score! The face like a mag-a-net, as Elvis sings it, is from Watching the Detectives.

I think I may have read your post on Hamlet, Nick Lowe, and the Kinks...I know Ron Sexsmith has a song with the line "cruel to be kind" as well. Yeah, I Want You is just a wrenching song, like you're overhearing something you really don't want to know...but brilliant, nonetheless.

So, which Elvis CD's would you recommend? I've heard that My Aim Is True and This Year's Model are both brilliant, are those good places to start?

Holly A Hughes said...

My all-time favorite is Get Happy -- it's just song after song of brilliant R&B-flavored pop. Imperial Bedroom, Armed Forces, and This Year's Model are great places to start, too. I find King of America very interesting, but not everyone does. Of the later CDs, I deeply adore Brutal Youth and When I Was Cruel.

The good thing is that now you can get the Rhino reissues with all the extra gems of bonus tracks. I have bought most of these albums three times -- once in vinyl, once in CD, and then the reissued CD packages. But I have a hard time passing up any Costello tracks!

Mark said...

Thanks for the advice! (Elvis does not sing mag-a-net, as I incorrectly stated before. Don't know where I got that from.) I've only got 2 songs from Get Happy on the best-of, but one of them is High Fidelity, which I just love. (Might be a future blog post.)

Yes, I've heard that Elvis's catalog has been re-issued numerous times on CD! That must be fun/frustrating. (I've had to double-buy some of David Bowie CD's because of bonus tracks, deluxe versions, etc. And it's hard for me to pass up any Bowie. I should do a Bowie post too.)

Anyway, thanks again for the good advice, I will keep it in mind!