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In the three years since he burst upon the New Wave/Rock scene, Elvis Costello has been cranking out songs at a machine gun pace. Indeed, in the last six months of 1980 he released two albums, Get Happy, and Taking Liberties, each packed with 20 songs. If his fans thought those two records would be enough for a long while, they were wrong.
Costello is already back with a new Columbia Records release called Trust. On the new record, he has opted for songs that are slightly longer than his usual two-minute bits, and the result is an extremely well-conceived album.
Elvis's band, The Attractions, is in top form; drummer Pete Thomas and bassist Bruce Thomas provide plenty of rhythmic punch, and Steve Nieve has shunned his electronic keyboards for an acoustic piano which adds a melodic touch to many of the songs.
The recurring character in most of Costello's tunes has always been a hurt and confused lover, and that same figure haunts the emotional landscapes in most of the songs on Trust. In "Lovers Walk," the vocals keep pace with a rapid-fire drum beat while proclaiming, "Your love walks where three's a crowd, be on caution where lovers walk." In "Pretty Words," the character at first suffers abuse: "I ask you nicely, get my face slapped..." then gets a little more rebellious: "All I see are snap shots, Dig shots, dead spots, mug shots, machine slots, you don't know what's what, you don't know what you've got."
In "White Knuckles," the scene finally becomes physically violent: "It doesn't matter if your face doesn't fit, there's no charge for changing it... white knuckles on black 'n' blue skin, you don't have to take it so you just give in."
The album's centerpiece is "Strict Time." Costello's guitar and Nieve's piano bounce the tune along while Elvis spits out lines like "You talk in hushed tones, I talk in lust tones, tryin' to look Italian through the musical valium."
The song that has received radio airplay is "Shot With His Own Gun." Nieve's grand piano sounds like a melancholy voice of doom while Costello's alienated character is "losing his touch with each caress." This song is Elvis at his best.
Not all the songs work; The Jerry Lee Lewis-style vocals on "Luxembourg" are lost in a cave of echo, and one tune, "Fish 'N' Chip Paper," is annoyingly obnoxious.
All of Elvis Costello's albums demand attentive listening. The lyrics are often hard to understand, but once they are figured out they are always fascinating. Costello is a master at twisting words and phrases around each other in extraordinary ways, and he is one of the more musically creative New Wave style artists. Trust is an album that Costello fans are sure to enjoy.
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