Discuss your rediscovery of Elvis Costello?

[artemetra]

The last monster album for me was Punch the Clock, (maybe Goodbye Cruel World, actually. well maybe. Talking monster here.) But then certain things really hit me on this or that album. Anyone care to share a moment when you got walloped again, like if you found another monster? Or even what album just hit you or even what song, after, say the first 12 EC albums rocked your world and it faded? Or tell me I'm cracked - "faded? wtf???". But to this day I can't get "Let Them All Talk" out of my mind, and not at all because of tricky cliched wordplay on the word "luck." So it is with every song on PTC. Is this a fair topic?

[artemetra]

The "Wish you luck" line was in Love Went Mad, bonehead.

(Can't get that one out of my head either.)

[bronxapostle]

have you checked your temperature today? feel better!

[Emotional Toothpaste]

Never did care for Punch the Clock. Too poppy.

[pophead2k]

The albums that hooked me were 'Spike' (the first one I'd really listened to, although I had been familiar with some of the earlier singles) 'Trust' and 'King of America'. After those, I backtracked and got into all of them. 'Mighty Like a Rose' was great, but it was 'Brutal Youth' that nailed me and kept me around. I'm one of those indiscriminate fans; I like everything to some degree or another. I don't hate any of EC's albums. For most recent, 'River in Reverse' was a huge fave, but a lot of that had to do with my love of Allen Toussaint.

[ReadyToHearTheWorst]

Had been a fan from WTD on, but grown weary by GCW. Just too much, I needed a break (and maybe EC did too). Then, picked up KoA in a bargain bin and, wow! Songs! Not just stream of conscious, impenetrable ramblings, but songs! Willie Nelson, or even Frank, might sing some of these.

[artemetra]

WTD? GCW? I need to think a little.

MAiT - My Aim is True
TYM - This Year's Model
AF - Armed Forces
GH - Get Happy
AB - Almost Blue
IB - Imperial Bedroom
Trust
OoOI - Out of Our Idiot
PtC - Punch the Clock
GCW - Goodbye Cruel World
KoA - King of America
Spike getting to be the wrong order here
MLaR - Mighty Like a Rose
BaC - Blood and Chocolate
WIWC - When I Was Cruel
TDM - The Delivery Man
ATUB - All This Useless Beauty
BY - Brutal Youth
KJ - Kojak Variety
North
IS - Il Sogno

That's most of em. What's WTD? Must be the UK release name for something, like Emotional Fascism...

[ReadyToHearTheWorst]

Watching the Detectives

[krm]

Watching the Detectives

No! That abreviation is not approved in the official EC abr. dict.

br

krm

[Mikeh]

I must admit I wasn't a fan in the early years, but I was at a friend's house and he played the Trust album very loud and the first track he put on was Fish n Chip paper. A strange song to get hooked on I know, but from then on, I was a fan!

[Miclewis]

Spike was the album that got me into Elvis first. I had "rediscovered' the Beatles in the late 80's because their albums, and ex-Beatle solo albums, had finally come out on CD. So, I bought Spike because of Paul McCartney's involvement. I remember being impressed first by Elvis' vocals-then of course by the songwriting and musicianship.
Next, I went backwards and loved King of America (still my favorite), Blood and Chocolate, Get Happy!!, and My Aim is True. It took me the longest to appreciate Imperial Bedroom, for some reason. Now, it is another favorite.

I so wish Kojak Variety had come out when it was supposed to: right after Spike. I would have loved it so much in 1990. (it still has an affectionate place for me in the Elvis canon)

[taramasalata]

Great to read something other than the usual canon praising the first 3 or 4 records as all time best, though undoubtedly they really were something unique. But for myself being one who got into Elvis with PTC and still thinking that "Everyday I write the book" ist one of the most well-crafted and elegant pop songs ever to have apperared on FM radio, it's still that poppy Elvis of that period that makes me jump up and sing along.
And that definetely includes -despite some lame mid-80s-sound - most of GCW and all these nearly lost gems later to be released on the B-sides-compilation OOOI like "Black sails in the sunset", "The stamping ground", "The flirting kind" or the fantastic cover version of Yoko Ono's "Walking on thin ice (Note: Also an 80s production....and what a fantastic sound!).
Spike still is a great record (despite some exaggerated ambition, though the later rather harmed MLAR) and then there's another one of his record that isn't fully appreciated in its class and that's BY with melodies and hooks, some as catchy as "You tripped at every step", some as weird and fantastic as "My science fiction twin" and others as plain and true as "Rocking horse road".
Better stop worrying if there are any new liner notes in just another reissue of TYM, I wonder what are you still waiting to read, better keep in mind: It's the songs that made us all worship this guy, so better listen to them, there are so many terrific ones (until the very present if you think of the brilliance of the new ones he just sang when opening up for Bob Dylan),
I don't need another reissue.