Inside the Composer's Studio: Elvis Costello Gets Live and Orchestral on My Flame Burns Blue
Written: Mar 01 '06 (Updated Mar 01 '06)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: Lavish big-band jazz arrangements, and an intimate, ballad-heavy "repertoire"
Cons: Often stuffy and academic
The Bottom Line: In which the author sighs... Elvis, Elvis, Elvis, what am I going to do with you.
|
|
|
| plorentz's Full Review: My Flame Burns Blue - Elvis Costello/Metropole Ork... |
It seems that every time Elvis Costello gets ready to put out another record on the venerable classical music label Deutsche Grammophon, he undergoes a curious metamorphosis, not unlike that of a lesser actor in the presence of James Lipton "In the Actor's Studio". He gets sober. And pompous. Not that I'm going to begrudge him his right to pomposity. He's a genius, right? As both a composer and a performer, he's versatile and encyclopedic. Not only does he appear to love all music, but he knows it, and, for the most part, he can do it too.
Still, have a gander at this excerpt from the liner notes of his latest album, My Flame Turns Blue, a concert performance from the 2004 North Sea Jazz Festival with Steve Nieve and the Metropole Orkest, in which he describes his classic 1977 single "Watching the Detectives":
...the oldest original song in this repertoire. Even though the song was then recorded in a reggae rhythm, there were small references to orchestral film and television music, particularly that of Bernard Herrmann... Naturally, given the resources of the time, these ideas were expressed on a Vox Continental organ or an old upright piano.
Well, yes, naturally, of course. And naturally, if 1977 Elvis met 2004 Elvis in a Manhattan bar, 1977 Elvis would beat the living shite out of 2004 Elvis for saying something like that.
- - - - -
Aside from the bloated track-by-track commentary, the main fault of this new Elvis Costello CD is that it seems woefully ill-marketed. Just because a guy's got an orchestra backing him up doesn't mean the music is classical, even by the most inclusive definition of the word. Indeed, My Flame Burns Blue is no more classical than Brian Setzer's big-band revival schtick. Granted, Costello invests far too much of himself in this music to dismiss it as that kind of gimmicky nostalgia-mongering. But his highbrow affectations both in the liner notes and in his performances certainly work against him. In fact, the biggest offender here isn't even the main event. It's the tacked-on bonus disc which essentially, and for no good reason (other than, perhaps, a futile attempt by the record company to sell Costello fans on his emergent classical alter-ego), reprises two-thirds of the 2004 recording of Costello's Il Sogno suite.
At any rate, be warned (and maybe, relieved): My Flame Turns Blue is an old-fashioned, big-band-plus-crooner type affair - a live extension of the persona Costello introduced with his 2003 album North (and dedicated once again to his wife, Diana). As such, while the sound of the album is very appealing, the feel of it is often stuffy, stiff and academic. A song like the opener, a cover of Charles Mingus's "Hora Decubitus" with lyrics (authorized by the Mingus estate) by Costello should be a blast, and towards the end, it almost turns into one as it breaks down into a dirty blues groove culminating in Costello's unhinged vocal affirmation - Life is a wonderful thing! - but it's so calculated, so studied, so that's-the-correct-answer that it somehow feels distant. Last year, when I saw Costello in concert (doing a regular dirty southern rock show), I remembered having a hard time actually connecting to Costello's performance as much as I could respect it from afar. I thought it might just have been where I was sitting, but I run into the same problem here.
Not surprisingly, the best numbers here are ballads, where Costello can take his time and really inhabit the songs. His performances of his own classic "Almost Blue" and an adaptation of Billy Strayhorn's "Blood Count" are emboldened by lush, expansive arrangements that create sweeping cinematic melodramas around Costello's voice as he slides effortfully into those high notes. Likewise, he delivers his first collaboration with Burt Bacharach, "God Gives Me Strength", with confidence and heart, while not necessarily bringing anything new to it. The most effective track here is a performance of "Can You Be True?" from the North album, which realizes the kind of sensitivity and intimacy Costello only pretended toward on the original.
But Costello also has a hard time leaving well enough alone, digging out and doing no small amount of violence to two chestnuts from his bloking days. While, on paper, a television dragnet theme reworking of "Watching the Detectives" seems like a nifty and wholly appropriate idea, Costello has a hard time keeping tempo, spitting the words out harshly and indeciperably; the song loses much of its melodic appeal, wearing this wink-wink novelty arrangement like an uncomfortable Halloween costume. It's clever, but sweaty. Still it's positively flattering next to the train wreck that is "Clubland" which sounds like music for dancing pachyderms. Horrible, horrible stuff.
But then, such are the hazards of following an artist as ambitious and prolific as Elvis Costello. Can I fault him for flexing in the name of artistic exploration? Absolutely not, and as with any Costello record, there's just enough on My Flame Turns Blue that's revealing and wonderful and nice to make me not regret having bought the record. But I can't imagine I'll actually be listening to it all that much.
- - - - -
BECAUSE YOU NEED TO KNOW:
"My Flame Turns Blue" by Elvis Costello w/ The Metropole Orkest
Deutsche Grammaphon Records
Released 2/28/06
Produced by Elvis Costello
116 min.
SONGS: Hora Decubitus - Favourite Hour - That's How You Got Killed Before - Upon a Veil of Midnight Blue - Clubland - Almost Blue - Speak Darkly, My Angel - Almost Ideal Eyes - Can You Be True? - Put Away Forbidden Playthings - Episode of Blonde - My Flame Burns Blue (Blood Count) - Watching the Detectives - God Give Me Strength
- - - - -
MORE ELVIS COSTELLO:
The Monkey Speaks His Mind Tour, April 17, 2005, Milwaukee, Wis.
The Clarksdale Sessions (2005)
The Delivery Man (2004)
Il Sogno (2004)
North (2003)
Painted From Memory (w/Burt Bacharach) (1998)
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
plorentz
|
 - Top 500 |
|
Member: Paul Lorentz
Location: The Land of Limburger and Leinenkugel's
Reviews written: 953
Trusted by: 276 members
About Me:
Somebody turn the lights on...
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2010 Shopping.com, Inc.