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Elvis Costello is proving to be the most important rock music influence to cross the waters from Britain since the Beatles.
Though he assimilates, and even pilfers, elements of many different rock traditions — especially the "pure" rock 'n' roll of the '50s and the Beatlesque musicality of the early '60s, set against lyrics more truculent than Springsteen's or Dylan's — Elvis Costello has rendered labels like "New Wave" and "punk" totally inapplicable. Costello remains in a class by himself.
In just one year the 23-year-old avant-garde songwriter has released three albums in the United States. Although Costello has inspired a fiercely loyal cult following since the beginning, his latest Columbia album, Armed Forces, is finally making it on the national charts. That's not bad, considering that only two years ago Elvis Costello was still a computer operator named Declan Patrick MacManus.
Costello made his third Kansas City appearance Monday night at Memorial Hall, bringing out a crowd of 2,500. True to his eccentricities, Costello demanded that no photographs be taken during the performance, and all cameras were checked at the door. Perhaps this was a calculated example of the "emotional fascism" that constitutes the theme of his new album.
In performance, however. we saw a much more amiable Elvis Costello than ever before. He has dropped much of his angry stance, and by the time the Attractions plunged into the windup with "Big Boys," Costello was smiling whimsically. He even winked. So much for the anticipated evening of cathartic hostility.
Nevertheless, the lyrics still had enough of the characteristic Costello delivery to hit with brutal frankness, even though the words were at times obscured by an inadequate sound system. "You can please yourself, but somebody's gonna get it," Costello menaced through clenched teeth in "Green Shirt," and it was clear that, no matter how congenial he seemed, it could always go either way.
The Rubinoos, who record with Beserkley, opened, setting the mood with an a capella version of an old, old doo-wop tune by the Eternals, "Rocking in the Jungle." This California-based quartet started off with some of its own power-pop material, but gained the most points with the crowd for its faithful cover versions of the Beatles' "Please Please Me" and the Ventures' "Walk, Don't Run." The group wound up with an entertainingly tongue-in-cheek, hard-rock spoof called "Rock 'n' Roll Is Dead" and cleverly encored with the old Seeds' hit "Pushin' Too Hard."
Elvis Costello and his group, the Attractions, appeared among shouts of "We want the King!" Costello, known for exquisitily bad tailoring, outdid himself with a black and white checkerboard jacket, a white-on-black polka dot shirt, pink tie and white penny loafers. The band members have grown out their burr haircuts and are looking surprisingly conventional.
Leading off with "Accidents Will Happen" and "Goon Squad" from the Armed Forces album, Costello and the Attractions gunned it through more than an hour's worth of no-mercy rock 'n' roll, delivered with hardly a breath between numbers. Only "Watching the Detectives" was included from the group's first album, and two new songs were introduced. One, a funky anti-disco tune called "Ain't No Need to Hustle," is one of Costello's most biting statements yet.
The Attractions, an impressively tight musical unit, are playing stronger than ever. Pete Thomas kept that ever-changing pace popping like machine-gun fire, boosted by the undulating bass work of Bruce Thomas (no relation), while "Steve Naive" Manson filled in with creative keyboard chaos. Costello's own unique guitar leads were economically eloquent. His vocals were consistently strong, from the tongue-swallowing sound of "The Beat" to his surprisingly pleasant crooning of the Bacharach-David ballad (I'm not kidding,) "I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself."
The lighting was especially effective, ranging from spikes of white light to bright red and green shining upward to give Costello that characteristically psychotic-looking air in eerily dramatic songs like "I Don't Want to Go to Chelsea" and "Watching the Detectives."
Exceptionally powerful versions of "Pump It Up" and "Big Boys" were saved for the encores, following Costello's indictment of the airwaves, "Radio, Radio," which he introduced by saying that many things had changed since his last trip to America. "It's gotten worse," he joked.
Radio may have gotten worse, but at least now some enlightened souls are playing Elvis Costello.
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