summer album of the week 07/18
elvis costello: imperial bedroom (released july 1982)
This might just be Elvis Costello’s finest hour - a lavish, ultra-summery set from 1982 that juggled British pop eccentricity, sweeping American soul and Costello’s still acidic gift for lyrical gab. Imperial Bedroom may have edged Costello closer to the pop mainstream, but songs like Beyond Belief, Shabby Doll and Man Out of Time retained the ragged literary darkness that defined Costello’s music over the preceding five years. The broader pop excursions, however - the Kinks-style Pidgin English, the grand orchestral pop nugget … And in Every Home, the after hours piano lament Almost Blue and one of the most vibrant but overlooked gems in the entire Costello canon, The Small Faces-esque The Loved Ones - illuminate the breadth of an ever expanding pop vision. Elvis lives, indeed.
I am a native Kentuckian and freelance journalist who has been writing about contemporary music for the Lexington Herald-Leader since 1980. I have not a lick of honest musical talent myself, just a pair of appreciative ears for jazz, folk, blues, bluegrass, Americana, soul, Celtic, Cajun, chamber, worldbeat, nearly every form of rock 'n' roll imaginable and, when pressed, the occasional tango and polka.