Newark Star-Ledger, August 28, 1989

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Costello makes a dazzling lab of his brilliance


George Kanzler

If you had to pick one of the 13 songs on Elvis Costello's latest album, Spike, as a candidate for a sing-along, "God's Comic" would undoubtedly be on the bottom of the list. Yet that was the first song Costello urged the audience at Waterloo Village's concert field to sing with him on Friday night.

Since the chorus of the song, the subject of Costello's sing-along, is dominated by two phrases, "Now I'm dead" and "I was (or Are you) scared," each repeated five times, it doesn't seem like promising material for a rousing group chant. In addition, the song itself is probably one of the most intellectually witty, complexly ironic songs to come along this decade.

"God's Comic" not only climaxes with a brilliant pun worthy of the meta-physical poetry of the 16th century, but it has enough levels of ambiguity, most of it involving ontology or ethics, to keep a Ph.D. candidate in English busy writing a thesis for a couple of years. However, it is hardly highbrow in style, as Costello uses low comedy in much the same manner as Samuel Beckett does in Waiting for Godot, and for the same ontological purposes.

The song begins as the trepidatious monologue of a "comical priest" who has died and is waiting to enter heaven, not knowing if God will appreciate his clown's life approach to theology. When the priest meets God, who is reading an "airport novel" and reclining on a water bed, God takes over the monologue, ending by reassuring the priest that everything is alright, since God is comic.

Not only isn't it a typical candidate for a sing-along, but its audacious of Costello to even do it in a concert, especially one in a cold, star-canopied field in New Jersey filled with rock fans. But do it he did, and even more, he made the song a centerpiece of the concert by extending it, giving it a full, complex band treatment, further elucidating the story in an extended narrative, and even adding musical material, such as interpolating two lines from another song when the priest meets God: "I saw her face / Now I'm a believer."

"God's Comic" was the most, but hardly the only, ambitious performance during the concert Friday night. Costello, like very few pop performers today, is constantly challenging himself when he performs, taking risks with arrangements and material that most other rockers confine to the recording studio, if they bother at all.

Almost profligate in his use of styles and themes, Costello's approach isn't so much eclectic as it is inspired abandon. He is so full of ideas that they just burst out, musically and verbally, in a dazzling profusion of styles and moods. In order to facilitate his sweeping conception of what performing is, Costello has assembled a band, The Rude Five (actually six), who are much more versatile than most rock bands, including his former group, The Attractions.

So when Costello does "Let Him Dangle," his vitriolic anti-capital punishment song, the bass player switches to tuba, and the rhythm guitarist plays trombone. And when the band plays a country waltz, "American Without Tears," the percussionist takes up the accordion, and at other times he plays the xylophone. While lead guitarist Marc Ribot, who is quite versatile with his main instrument, also picks up bass trumpet for a number.

The band's command of the many styles Costello employs, from scorching hard rock to Bo Diddley beat, Springsteen-ish grand anthemics to vintage rock 'n' roll dance hops, was impressive despite the somewhat muddy sound mix. That sound mix also made almost half of Costello's words unintelligible — and that's a shame, since Costello is one of rock's great lyricists — although his words did fare better during his solo segment.

Outdoor sound can be a lot cleaner than it was Friday night, but the band and arrangements Costello is touring with cry out for the aural care and nuance that can only be achieved in a theater or sophisticated club. This is definitely the kind of rock show that deserves to play Broadway.

During his solo turn, midway in a set that lasted about 90 minutes, Costello reprised some of his more familiar songs, including "Girls Talk," interspersing old pop tunes like "Pretty Flamingo" and "When You Smile" among them as ironic allusions.

When the band returned, he continued to mix his own songs with rather sentimental pop songs, like "Hidden Charms," and the band capped off the set, before obligatory encores, with a rocking, romping version of Costello's fond tribute to dance hop songs, "Mystery Dance."

The encore eliciting the greatest response was "Veronica," the song from Spike co-written by Paul McCartney that weds an infectious pop melody to a serious consideration of the plight of a dying old lady. You have to listen carefully to the words, or you miss the point of the song. But then, that's the whole point of almost any Elvis Costello performance.


Tags: Waterloo VillageStanhopeNew JerseyThe Rude 5SpikeGod's ComicI'm A BelieverLet Him DangleAmerican Without TearsGirls TalkPretty FlamingoWhen You SmileHidden CharmsMystery DanceVeronicaPaul McCartneyMarc RibotJerry ScheffLarry KnechtelSteven SolesMichael BlairPete ThomasThe Attractions

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The Star-Ledger, August 28, 1989


George Kanzler reviews Elvis Costello with The Rude 5, Friday, August 25, 1989, Waterloo Village, Stanhope, New Jersey.

Images

1989-08-28 Newark Star-Ledger page 27 clipping 01.jpg
Clipping.



Photos by Gene Boyars.
1989-08-28 Newark Star-Ledger photo 01 gb.jpg


1989-08-28 Newark Star-Ledger photo 02 gb.jpg
Photos by Gene Boyars.


Page scan.
1989-08-28 Newark Star-Ledger page 27.jpg

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