The 100 Greatest Singles of the Post-Punk Era
Uncut, 2001-02-01
- David Stubbs

 

25	Elvis Costello (I Don't Want To Go To) Chelsea (Radar)
	Release date: March 1978 Highest UK chart position: 16

NME write Nick Kent described Elvis Costello as a "walking time bomb" around teh period of This Year's Model, from which this Yop 20 hit was taken. Twitching with specky, punky, amphetamine edginesson TOTP, cerebral yet savage, you knew that Costello was never going to be blown away with the more one-dimensional shouters of his generation. He had a great deal more up his sleeve. And he was looking ahead. Having already absorbed reggae and ska into his complex songwriting amoury, Costello jinks and jerks, ducks and dives, through this wary lyric about the upcoming pitfalls of success.

Turns out he was far too prickly himself to be subsumed into the King's Road blandness of celebrity. "I don't want to go to Chelsea/Oh no, it does not move me/Even thoughI've seen the movie." And, you know, he never did.