Elvis Costello

[Jorge]

Mitchell Froom, who produced that Suzanne Vega album, plays keyboards throughout Mighty Like a Rose, which was released just one year earlier. Might have been a bit of creative cross-pollination there

[Jorge]

Lol, and interestingly Bruce Thomas from The Attractions (who does NOT play on Mighty Like a Rose, in fact there's a diss track aimed at him!) plays bass on the Suzanne Vega album

[tragabigzanda]

[Kevin Davis]

Mitchell Froom also produced a few Richard Thompson albums from around this time -- Rumor and Sign and Mirror Blue -- "industrial coffee-shop" isn't a terribly bad description of those albums, honestly.

Trag, have you ever listened to Robin Holcomb? She sings a few songs on Bill Frisell's Nashville. Her first album from 1990 is one of my favorites of all-time (Frisell guests on at least one song). For some reason this discussion made me think of that album and that you might really dig it.

[tragabigzanda]

[Kevin Davis]

Mitchell Froom also produced a few Richard Thompson albums from around this time -- Rumor and Sign and Mirror Blue -- "industrial coffee-shop" isn't a terribly bad description of those albums, honestly.

Trag, have you ever listened to Robin Holcomb? She sings a few songs on Bill Frisell's Nashville. Her first album from 1990 is one of my favorites of all-time (Frisell guests on at least one song). For some reason this discussion made me think of that album and that you might really dig it.

listening to Robin Holcomb right now, I love it!

That makes me so happy! The first self-titled album?

[tragabigzanda]

Top 10 maybe?
Hello Morning
Close Captioned
The Kill
Place/Position
Do You Like Me?
Latest Disgrace
Recap Modotti
Nightshop
Break
Life & Limb

I'd maybe bump Life & Limb for Epic Problem

[Kevin Davis]

Oh nice, I didn't realize she had anything prior to the 1990 album. That album produces a feeling unlike any other I know -- rural and vaguely ominous, like a small town that has been given a bad premonition from a fortune teller, and everyone's living in this state of anxiety waiting for it to come true.

I could be misremembering but I think Frisell plays guitar on "Waltz" -- maybe my favorite song on the album.

Her next one Rockabye is a solid listen as well, but it lacks the atmosphere I love so much about the first album.

[liebzz]

Oops. See next post.

[liebzz]

Armed Forces

This is another fantastic album. The Attractions are still firing on all cylinders, and really from Party Girl through the end, this album really takes off. Accidents Will Happen starts things off quite well, it’s at Party Girl, then Good Squad that made my favorite one two punch. Sunday’s Best, Moods For Moderns, and the bonus (?) of (What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding that rounds this one out.

Songs I Knew but didn’t know I knew: (What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding

[Kevin Davis]

"Two Little Hitlers" is my favorite Armed Forces tune.

[Jorge]

Not crazy about some of the songs on Armed Forces, if I'm honest. "Moods for Moderns" never did anything much for me, for example

[tragabigzanda]

[Jorge]

Oh just wait til we get to Get Happy

[liebzz]

Sometimes I am not sure if there’s a rhyme or reason why I like or dislike something. Every time I do one of these journeys I fear my lack of a scientific method will come back to haunt me. So far though so good. There’s a charm to this concise but somehow also loose sound that’s keeping me engaged. We’ll see if it keeps up.

[Higgs]

Scientific method hasn't got much to do with what you like or don't imo. Sometimes you can read about an album or artist that, by all descriptions at least, should be 100% up your alley, but on listening just doesn't grab, or worse - feels contrived. But then a random tune from some 'unknown genre' band hits you right in the feels. I love how music is like that.

[Jorge]

Yep

[liebzz]

Get Happy!!

Four albums in and we’ve gotten two big turns. This second turn towards what I hear as largely a push towards ska, pushes the pace (20 songs in 48 minutes…damn). While some of this sort of just exists, a lot pops out of the speakers. Love For Tender, Opportunity, Possession, Men Called Uncle, and Clowntime is Over stuck out in the first half, while nearly all of the second half seemed to pick up even more and everything was great, though the run of High Fidelity, I Can’t Stand Up For Falling Down, Black and White World, and Five Gears in Reverse definitely won the day for me. This might feel more ska/soul than the previous albums, but Costello is still rolling along nicely for me.

[Jorge]

A lot of people consider Get Happy their favorite EC album. And I like it too! I just think it's a bit overrated among the fanbase. I enjoy its manic energy but some of the songs, like you said, "just kind of exist." "High Fidelity" is an incredible tune, and the bass work throughout the album is mind-boggling. I also really love the straight-up ska of "Human Touch," EC is an odd fit for that sound but he pulls it off well. "The Imposter" is just great. "Motel Matches" might be my favorite of his country ballads. There are a couple songs I actively dislike; I'd be perfectly fine with never hearing "New Amsterdam" or "Temptation" ever again. And "Riot Act," the much-lauded closing track, I find musically pretty boring and lyrically almost offensive (the lyrics are EC's response to press coverage of the Columbus incident, and they carry a tone of petulance that always struck me as overly flippant and inappropriate given the context)

Still a very good album and a good pick for a quick energy boost. I sometimes play it when I'm in the home stretch of a long editing project. It really does make you wanna dance.

[Kevin Davis]

Get Happy isn't my favorite EC album, but I'd put it pretty comfortably in my top five; there's a time when I would have said top three, but a few others have probably leapfrogged it at this point. I do think it is a "whole is more than the sum of its parts"-type album, and that there are a handful of lesser songs that get kind of brought along for the ride by the frantic sweep of the whole program, and manage to glean a bit of extra fairy dust as a result. While I think This Year's Model is probably the Attractions' strongest physical performance on record, I feel like Get Happy is the album that really finds them at a sort of telepathic peak and catches them at a moment where they really could (and damn near did!) do anything, and do it at a comparable level of virtuosity, precision, and interplay, without ever losing support of the songs. They'll expand their repertoire even further over the next few albums (especially Trust and Imperial Bedroom), but those albums also bring about some other things as well -- a squarer focus on the songwriting, lush orchestrations, etc. Get Happy is the band and only the band, shifting gears at will and killing it damn near every time out.

I'd also add that Get Happy feels like the first album where EC really goes on pun/wordplay overkill in the lyrics, in the best possible way. The songs whiz by so fast that the words can be hard to catch, but if you read along, it really is a lot of fun (though I respect Jorge's point about "Riot Act"**).

That said, if I had to make a list of my 20 (or even 50) favorite EC songs, Get Happy probably wouldn't get a lot of representation. Pulling the songs off one at a time doesn't serve them well, and EC is generally an artist that is highly conducive to compiling and shuffling. The album is the proper context for all of these songs.

**Had to edit my formatting of "Riot Act." In PJ world, it's Riot Act, but it's "Riot Act" in EC world.