Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

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Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by Man out of Time »

Preview in the New Jersey Stage published on April 8, 2019:

"Elvis Costello & The Imposters and Blondie To Perform At Camden's BB&T Pavilion

Elvis Costello & The Imposters and Blondie will co-headline a coast-to-coast tour this summer. The 13-city tour will kick off July 20th in Bethel, NY at the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts and make stops in Boston, Las Vegas, Los Angeles and more, before wrapping August 10th in Seattle, WA. Locally, the tour comes to the BB&T Pavilion in Camden on July 27.

Elvis Costello and Blondie shared spots near the top of the UK Singles Chart 40 years ago when Blondie's "Heart Of Glass" sat neck-and-neck alongside Elvis Costello & The Attraction's "Oliver's Army" in the company of The Bee Gees, Gloria Gaynor and ABBA. The same week, Blondie's seminal album Parallel Lines reached #1 on the Album Chart while Costello's Armed Forces landed at #3.

Elvis Costello & The Imposters' last tour in late 2018 found the combo reaching new live performance peaks. The band "came out swinging" (Star Tribune) in Minneapolis, were "unstoppable" in Anaheim (OC Register) and played an "epic and euphoric" (Variety) show in LA that even at nearly three hours "[left] ‘em wanting more." The Imposters are: Steve Nieve (keyboards), Davey Faragher (bass) and Pete Thomas (drums) with Aisha "Kitten" Kuroi and Briana Lee on vocals.

In 2017, Blondie hit the road in support of their most collaborative album yet, Pollinator (BMG). Their spectacular live shows drew acclaim for their "flair and precision" (Rolling Stone), while being called "formidable" (LA Weekly) and "artful, rocking" (City Pages). Pollinator was praised by the likes of New York Times, Rolling Stone, NPR, Entertainment Weekly, Pitchfork and many more for its dynamic blend of Blondie's trailblazing sound and new influences from some of modern music's greatest innovators including Sia, Dev Hynes, Charli XCX, Dave Sitek, Joan Jett, and more. It features the euphoric disco-infused single "Fun," the propulsive 80s-esque anthem "Long Time," and the irreverent "Doom or Destiny."

Elvis Costello's wide-ranging recording career began in 1977 with the release of My Aim Is True in a catalogue that include such diverse highlights as This Year's Model, Get Happy, Imperial Bedroom, King Of America, Blood & Chocolate, The Juliet Letters with the Brodsky Quartet, The River In Reverse with Allen Toussaint and Wise Up Ghost with The Roots.

The 1998 release, Painted From Memory contained the first of more than thirty songs composed with Burt Bacharach, while the 2017 box-set re-issue of Paul McCartney's Flowers In The Dirt includes 15 demo duet recordings made by McCartney and Costello prior to the release of the albums Spike and Flowers In The Dirt on which his co-written hit singles, "Veronica" and "My Brave Face," were first released.

Costello previously appeared alongside Deborah Harry with composer/poet Roy Nathanson and the Jazz Passengers both in concert and on the recordings Fire At Keaton's Bar and Grill and Individually Twisted in the 90s.

Elvis Costello & The Imposters' widely renowned Look Now was released by Concord Records in 2018 and of which Variety said, "It's so funny to be seeing him, after all this time, making a great cake of an album that doesn't really sound that much like any of the 30 before it." The catalogue will soon include the E.P., Purse, containing songwriting collaborations with Burt Bacharach and Paul McCartney and musical settings of lyrics by Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan.

Since the release of their self-titled debut album in 1976, Blondie has brought the worlds of rock, punk, disco and ska together and racked up four indelible Billboard Hot 100 #1 hits - "Heart of Glass," "Call Me," "The Tide Is High" and "Rapture " - as well as six #1s on the UK Singles Chart including "Maria," "Sunday Girl," and "Atomic." Debbie Harry – genre-spanning visionary, complex songstress, incandescent front woman and style icon - and the band's boundary-pushing pop have shaped the look and sound of many chart-topping female artists who have followed and have made Blondie widely recognized as one of the most influential bands of our time. Debbie will reflect on this and more in her highly anticipated memoir out later this year. Blondie's Chris Stein recently released a photo book of his own entitled Point of View: Me, New York City, and The Punk Scene, following his successful first photo book, Negative: Me, Blondie, and the Advent of Punk. Selected as one of Amazon's best photo books of 2018, Point of View showcases Chris' brilliance as a photographer and documentarian, chronicling his life among his punk and new-wave peers and the downtown New York City scene in the 1970s through his insider lens.

Elvis Costello, Pete Thomas and Steve Nieve are all members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Elvis Costello is an Oscar-nominated and BAFTA and Grammy award-winning composer and member of the Songwriters Hall Of Fame. Costello has received an Honorary Doctorate of Music from both the University of Liverpool and the New England Conservatory. Costello's unconventional memoir, Unfaithful Music and Disappearing Ink, was published by Blue Rider/Penguin in 2015. The New York Times review began, "Songs can be many things," Elvis Costello writes in his new autobiography: "an education, a seduction, some solace in heartache, a valve for anger, a passport, your undoing, or even a lottery ticket. Mr. Costello's book, Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink, manages to be all these things, and a pint of Guinness and a bag of chips. It's streaked with some of the best writing – funny, strange, spiteful, anguished – we've ever had from an important musician." The book went on to spend several weeks on the NY Times Best Seller List.

Ever the bona fide international ambassadors of New York cool, Blondie - vocalist-songwriter Debbie Harry, guitarist and co-writer Chris Stein, powerhouse drummer Clem Burke, and long-time band members bassist Leigh Foxx, guitarist Tommy Kessler and keyboardist Matt Katz-Bohen - has become and still remains a true national treasure; one whose influence both shaped and continues to inform the worlds of music, fashion, art and pop culture. Blondie's chart-topping success, fearless spirit and rare longevity led to an induction into the Rock 'N' Roll Hall of Fame in 2006, a NME Godlike Genius Award in 2014, a Q Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 2016, and more than 50 million albums sold worldwide to date. "

Anyone going?

MOOT
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by johnfoyle »

Anyone ? :D
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by jmm »

Mrs and I headed to Camden tonight. Looking forward to the show and maybe some catching up too!!
I too am a limited, primitive kind of man
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by bronxapostle »

jmm wrote:Mrs and I headed to Camden tonight. Looking forward to the show and maybe some catching up too!!

Enjoy M and J....i know you will. See you in October
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by GetHappy!! »

Well, maybe it was just me, but the sound tonight was awful. Went with a couple of EC neophytes, and the mix was muddy, vocals were indistinguishable unless you were aware of the lyrics. Crowd was enthused, but they barely wanted to sing along with “Less Than Zero”. Geez, I remember in ‘94 when EC & The A’s would play down to a whisper with that one, leave the stage, and the audience would still be singing the response vocals. Times have changed, and the way I see it is if it has not been on any recent compilation, no one knows the songs. Sad, but at this point probably truer than I’d like it to be.

On the plus side, “Episode Of Blonde” was fantastic, and he got a lot out of “Clubland”. Now that I think of it, they both share a lot of similarities live (not that they were played consecutively, because they weren’t). A Face In The Crowd is coming soon...we shall see.

And I must be totally out of the loop, was that truly a new song (which EC said he just wrote) played before “PL&U”?
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by bronxapostle »

GetHappy!! wrote: And I must be totally out of the loop, was that truly a new song (which EC said he just wrote) played before “PL&U”?

DON'T KNOW, WASN'T THERE. any lyric or other clue for us? If he said that, probably true. I HOPE SO. thanks
GetHappy!!
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by GetHappy!! »

bronxapostle wrote:
GetHappy!! wrote: And I must be totally out of the loop, was that truly a new song (which EC said he just wrote) played before “PL&U”?

DON'T KNOW, WASN'T THERE. any lyric or other clue for us? If he said that, probably true. I HOPE SO. thanks
Mea culpa, I misunderstood what he said until I just watched the video I took. It was NOT new, it was “This Is A Test”, which I haven’t heard since the Wendy James demos were first circulated. Forgot all about the song. Was this it’s live debut?
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by docinwestchester »

GetHappy!! wrote:
bronxapostle wrote:
GetHappy!! wrote: And I must be totally out of the loop, was that truly a new song (which EC said he just wrote) played before “PL&U”?

DON'T KNOW, WASN'T THERE. any lyric or other clue for us? If he said that, probably true. I HOPE SO. thanks
Mea culpa, I misunderstood what he said until I just watched the video I took. It was NOT new, it was “This Is A Test”, which I haven’t heard since the Wendy James demos were first circulated. Forgot all about the song. Was this it’s live debut?
Yes! According to wiki:
http://www.elviscostello.info/wiki/inde ... _Is_A_Test

Is there any recorded version of this song?
GetHappy!!
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by GetHappy!! »

docinwestchester wrote:
GetHappy!! wrote:
bronxapostle wrote:

DON'T KNOW, WASN'T THERE. any lyric or other clue for us? If he said that, probably true. I HOPE SO. thanks
Mea culpa, I misunderstood what he said until I just watched the video I took. It was NOT new, it was “This Is A Test”, which I haven’t heard since the Wendy James demos were first circulated. Forgot all about the song. Was this it’s live debut?
Yes! According to wiki:
http://www.elviscostello.info/wiki/inde ... _Is_A_Test

Is there any recorded version of this song?
Not that I’m aware of. I meant to say in my previous post that I haven’t heard it since the Wendy James album came out, as I don’t believe it ever circulated with the demos. Long night last night, I shouldn’t post until my second cup of coffee!
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by bronxapostle »

No " mea culpa" necessary AT ALL, GH.... especially if you recorded this debut, audio or video. WE ALL THANK YOU.
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by sweetest punch »

https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/elvis-co ... e05fb.html


Setlist

Pump It Up
Clubland
Accidents Will Happen
Green Shirt
Photographs Can Lie
(I Don't Want to Go to) Chelsea
Episode of Blonde
Beyond Belief
Watching the Detectives
A Face in the Crowd
Monkey to Man
This Year's Girl
Less Than Zero
I Can't Stand Up For Falling Down
High Fidelity
Everyday I Write the Book
Alison
This Is A Test
(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding
Last edited by sweetest punch on Sun Jul 28, 2019 4:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by johnfoyle »

Image
Elvis Costello | photo by Ashley Gellman for WXPN



https://thekey.xpn.org/2019/07/28/xpnfe ... au_tOhgJGQ

Pump It Up
Clubland
Accidents Will Happen
Green Shirt
Photographs Can Lie
(I Don’t Want To Go To) Chelsea
Episode of Blonde
Beyond Belief
Watching The Detectives
Face In The Crowd
Monkey To Man
This Year’s Girl
I Can’t Stand Up For Falling Down
High Fidelity
Every Day I Write The Book
Alison
Encore:
This Is A Test
(What’s So Funny ’Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding



XPN Fest Recap: Elvis Costello and Blondie celebrate the past while looking to the future
July 28th, 2019

By John Vettese

When an artist has been making music for over four decades, there are a couple common routes they can take with they live shows. One: stick to the tried-and-true, deliver a crowd-pleasing hit-parade, dial down the surprises or spontaneity. Two: write immersive new records and focus only on them, jettison the career-making singles that they’re tired of playing and don’t feel connected to anymore anyway.

Or they could find a third option in between phoned-in and alienating. On Saturday, two elite members of the post-punk / new wave vanguard, Elvis Costello and Blondie, did just that, headlining night two of the XPoNential Music Festival with sets that played equally to the casual listeners and the die-hards.

-----

In similar fashion, Costello front-loaded his set with bangers — “Pump It Up” opening the show and, this being XPNFest, oddly evoking the opening to every Free at Noon concert, then launching directly into “Clubland” from 1981’s Trust, and a double-shot from from 1979’s Armed Forces with “Accidents Will Happen” into “Green Shirt.”

While Costello was one for coherent conversation moreso than Harry, there was still an odd mix of pomposity and cheesiness to his routine. Introducing the Burt Bacharach co-write “Photographs Can Lie” from last year’s record with his current band The Imposters, he told a long and ridiculous story about reclining backstage in a waterbed (“as I have at all my concerts”) when a phone rang, and it was Bacharach himself on the other end of the line, beseeching that he play the song tonight. Okay, then.

But the balance that the set began to strike at this point was it’s biggest strength — the esoteric Bacharach collab into one of his most beloved cuts of his punk era, “(I Don’t Want To Go To) Chelsea.” The suave samba “Episode of Blonde” from 2002’s When I Was Cruel into the garage energy of “Beyond Belief” from the recently-revisited Imperial Bedroom, into the film-noir dub of the classic “Watching The Detectives.” It seemed like this set was equally aimed at the casuals, the fans, the hyper-fans, and Costello himself. Even if the title song to his forthcoming musical Face In The Crowd (“you’re gonna come see it, right?”) was a bit self-indulgent, it spotlighting Costello’s outstanding piano playing, and gave backup vocalists Kitten Kuori and Briana Lee room to shine.

In addition to the setlist variety, we’d be remiss not to give The Imposters themselves a shoutout. Keys player Steve Nieve, drummer Pete Thomas, and bassist Davey Faragher are a lean, mean unit — Thomas’ drum kit is only a kick / snare / rack / floor setup, with a couple cymbals, and his bandmates operate on humble amps, only Nieve flirting with excess. It’s stripped down in a relative sense (look at all the stuff Blondie had onstage just before them, or Hozier the night before) and yet they did so much with it.

But the songs themselves were the centerpiece, and Costello’s have so many touch points, from the listeners in the cheap seats to the nerdy obsessives, the latter of whom got a huge treat with “This Is A Test,” the opening track on a 1993 solo album by Transvision Vamp singer Wendy James that Costello co-wrote. And from there, it was one for everybody, a roaring singalong to Nick Lowe’s “(What’s So Funny ’Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding” — another cover that has become just as much the cover-er’s own — that sent the crowd humming into the night.
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by verbal gymnastics »

This is a test - wow. Elvis never fails to surprise.
Who’s this kid with his mumbo jumbo?
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by bronxapostle »

verbal gymnastics wrote:This is a test - wow. Elvis never fails to surprise.
Ain't it the truth??? Wish i went for the one song. :lol: :lol:
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by And No Coffee Table »

partial "This Is A Test" and most of "PL&U":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO4w5X45vzk
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by bronxapostle »

Well, as short as that piece of 'THIS IS A TEST' and the short song that it is, IT SURE SOUNDS GREAT!!! Thanks taper....I imagine this will NOT be a one off with those polished b vox and Imposters powerhouse finesse. It does sound great into PLU too. If this song is a good indication of how much we can indeed JUST TRUST our guy come October, i sure might attempt a road trip to add to the two Port Chester dates.
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by cwr »

WOW!!

I was at the Forest Hills show and was just telling someone how I have the curse of Costello in the sense that he almost always plays something unexpected either at the show before or after the concert I am at, and this fits the pattern! (Anytime he has done 2 nights in NYC and I can only do one of them, I always pick the wrong night!)

However, in this instance, I am just so thrilled that he has dipped back to The Gwendolyn Letters that I am excited despite the missing out on it. I thought by now that these songs were forever in the rear view mirror.

This has reactivated my hope that maybe at some point EC could put out those demos on a special Record Store Day 10" or another round of hard-to-get Lupe-O-Tone releases. I have been pining for these since 1994, when I first read about them in an Bill Flanagan article in Musician magazine about Brutal Youth.

http://www.elviscostello.info/wiki/inde ... March_1994

Even if he just did this as a one-off, and this is the last we hear of the Wendy James songs for another 20 years, I think this is really fun that this happened.
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by bronxapostle »

cwr wrote:WOW!!

I was at the Forest Hills show and was just telling someone how I have the curse of Costello in the sense that he almost always plays something unexpected either at the show before or after the concert I am at, and this fits the pattern! (Anytime he has done 2 nights in NYC and I can only do one of them, I always pick the wrong night.

Even if he just did this as a one-off, and this is the last we hear of the Wendy James songs for another 20 years, I think this is really fun that this happened.

Lol....i feel you Conor. I like to think usually i pick the RIGHT NIGHT. :lol: but when you are dealing with this loose of a cannon and the canon which is his songbook, ONE CAN NEVER KNOW WHAT'S NEXT.

I reiterate...i think THIS gem of a surprise is a goodbye East Coast tidbit for this BEASTLY tour AND a "BEWARE FOR OCTOBER, JUST TRUST!!" hint at what we might encounter then.
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by Harry Lime »

This sent me back to listen to Now Ain't the Time for Your Tears for the first time in a long, long while. It sounded better than I remembered!
Who put these fingerprints on my imagination?
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by bronxapostle »

It was always great to my ears!!! PETE THOMAS on the drums NEVER disappoints, most especially alongside EC songwriting.
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by Harry Lime »

bronxapostle wrote:It was always great to my ears!!! PETE THOMAS on the drums NEVER disappoints, most especially alongside EC songwriting.
Yeah, he makes the album.
Who put these fingerprints on my imagination?
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Re: Elvis & The Imposters play BB&T Pavilion, Camden, NJ, July 27, 2019

Post by jmm »

Been thinking about how much I enjoyed this show for a few days now, couldn’t decide???

This is a test was a really nice surprise at the end and there were plenty of other highlights in the set. I think my problem is the high expectations I come in with based on other shows and them being out of reach for a format that limits the number and diversity of songs.

For instance, I found myself both enjoying episode of blonde and thinking about what that time could have been used for that I’d have enjoyed even more, and there are many, many things (even say me & mrs hush from other nights)

It’s great to have seen so many shows that I can see this glass as “half-empty” but it seems crazy. Since the format dictated that this could never be in the top 10 or 20 or maybe even 50 shows we’ve been to.

I guess appreciating what it was and looking forward to the fall is a pretty darn good place to be!

EC & I pushing out expectations is a good part of the fun for me.

PS - had no meaningful expectations for Blondie’s and really enjoyed it
I too am a limited, primitive kind of man
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