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Elvis Costello, rock 'n' roller, had become just a memory, the drive and fury of his early albums replaced since the early 1980s by a more refined, sophisticated approach that had little to do with rock's brash venting of energy.
Costello even went so far as to change his name back to Declan MacManus, his given name, as if to distance himself from the angry rocker he had been.
To confuse things even further, the singer in the black suit and Buddy Holly eyeglasses who ended a three-night Boston stand Saturday introduced himself as "Napoleon Dynamite." But the show he put on — taut, pulsating, yielding to none in rocking power — cut through the garble of multiple identities. Elvis Costello, rock 'n' roller, was back.
A good deal of the credit belongs to the Attractions, the crack, three-piece backing band of fellow Britons Costello had left virtually idle over the past two years. The Attractions fairly lived up to Costello's introduction as "the best band in the world."
They played nearly all of Costello's new album, Blood & Chocolate, which includes several songs in the raw-rocking style of Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited. The two-hour set, virtually nonstop, with only one pause for a bit of amiable banter, also offered a generous retrospective of the early, high-voltage Costello: "Pump It Up," "Watching the Detectives," "Peace, Love and Understanding" and many more from the angry young days, capped by a withering, extended assault on "Lipstick Vogue."
Costello's more recent work as craftsman of sophisticated, painful broken-love songs that would play in a cabaret was represented, too, but the emphasis was on the rockers. In a strange finale that was rough on the ears but fascinating, "Poor Napoleon," a quiet song from the new album, was turned into a wailing wall of assaultive sound worthy of the Velvet Underground at their most avant garde. It might have been a warning that Costello refuses to be pinned down, that his fans shouldn't draw assumptions or form expectations from the straightforward rock show they'd just seen.
Costello's six-stop tour of big cities consists of multiple-night stands so that he can explore different styles with different lineups. The first Boston show was reportedly a frothy affair, complete with an onstage go-go cage and song selection determined by having audience members spin a wheel; the second, mostly acoustic, featured American musicians from the recent King of America album. Whatever he wants to call himself, it's a joy to find that that great spitfire rock 'n' roll is still in his repertoire.
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