Milwaukee Sentinel, November 19, 1993

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Costello boxed-set sizzles


Ira Robbins / Newsday

There is no trigonometry for predicting the creative trajectory of a new artist — even one making a startlingly strong debut might lack the capacity for developing much beyond that. A great voice is a commodity that does not quickly depreciate, but the intangible gifts — songwriting, stylistic ambition, vision — are beyond the calculus of first perceptions.

The scope of Elvis Costello's vast cavern of talent wasn't immediately apparent from his nonetheless exciting 1977 debut album, My Aim Is True, but the singer-songwriter-guitarist was already racing ahead, escaping his initial image as a bitter, punky nerd with a passion for puns, country music and R&B.

By the time he and the Attractions arrived in the United States to promote his debut album, their live set already consisted of songs from its follow-up, This Year's Model, a high-wire rock record packed to the rafters with seething venom, daring ideas and rapier wit.

The following year's monumental Armed Forces stuck to the same ingredients, but hit harder and drew more blood as Costello, blessed with an affecting but imperfect voice, became a supremely skilled singer.

Released as the first salvo in Rykodisc's overall Costello career reissue program, 2½ Years consolidates those three albums, adding in all of the tracks originally omitted in America to create collectably different international editions, plus contemporaneous B-sides, non-LP cuts, a live single and unreleased demos.

The box also includes Live at the El Mocambo, a sizzling concert broadcast recorded in Toronto in March 1978. All that's missing from this compete collection of Costello's early work is a seat belt to prevent whiplash from the rocketing acceleration of his artistry. (The studio albums are also being issued individually, with the live disc provided gratis by mail to those who buy all three.)

With the remainder of Costello's catalog to follow, Rykodisc was on solid conceptual ground assembling this opening salvo, the period that brought him from bedroom folksinger to the most articulate spokesman of the New Wave era, turning from easygoing swing to intense, breakneck rock and roll.

After Armed Forces, Costello set a pattern of disassembling his past and moving on, testing his abilities by dedicating albums as stylistic monuments to R&B, country and even classical music. Costello's art and craft grew more accomplished, more sophisticated and possibly more enduring after this original burst of emotion and energy. But 2½ Years is, track for devastating track, an untoppable work of genius.

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Milwaukee Sentinel, November 19, 1993


Ira Robbins reviews the 2½ Years box set.

Images

1993-11-19 Milwaukee Sentinel page D-28 clipping 01.jpg
Clipping.

1993-11-19 Milwaukee Sentinel page D-28.jpg
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