Audio, June 1986: Difference between revisions

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The problem with Elvis Costello has always been the same — credibility. How do you believe a guy who seems more to be playing with words than to be saying something he really feels? How do you believe a guy whose chords and chord progressions have gotten so runny, vague, and noncommittal that you suspect they'd be just as effective played backwards? How do you believe a guy whose singing style is distinguished by its ironic mock sincerity?


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In that it reveals the artist's own struggle with these questions, ''King of America'' marks an important departure for Costello, whose real name, Declan MacManus, is used in the album credits. Based closely on a small variety of traditional genres such as folk, blues, and country & western, the music is harmonically clearer and cleaner than that of Costello's last few albums. Thankfully, the glitzy, ambiguous chords are fewer. The best thing about the music is the production by T-Bone Burnett, which is spare, simple, and direct, in stark contrast to the busy, murky, funhouse hurly-burly into which The Attractions, Costello's backup band, had degenerated. Solid, understated playing by former Elvis Presley sidemen serves to clarify, rather than to obscure, the impulse behind each song.
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Costello's struggle to come clean, and the partial extent of his success, is most apparent in his singing, which had gradually turned into a monstrous parody of the oozing, smarmy lounge crooners of yesteryear. Now, through his new resolve to be himself, he has managed at least to keep this parody at bay long enough to turn in two or three of the most genuinely moving performances of his career.


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*[http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Audio-Magazine.htm americanradiohistory.com{{t}}][http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Audio/80s/Audio-1986-06.pdf {{t}}]
*[http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Audio-Magazine.htm americanradiohistory.com{{t}}][http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Audio/80s/Audio-1986-06.pdf {{t}}]


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[[Category:Bibliography]]
[[Category:Bibliography]]
[[Category:Bibliography 1989]]
[[Category:Bibliography 1986]]
[[Category:Audio| Audio 1989-06-00]]
[[Category:Audio| Audio 1986-06-00]]
[[Category:Magazine articles]]
[[Category:Magazine articles]]
[[Category:Album reviews]]
[[Category:Album reviews]]
[[Category:King Of America reviews]]
[[Category:King Of America reviews]]

Revision as of 22:45, 1 May 2018

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Audio

US music magazines

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Coming clean

Elvis Costello / King Of America

Susan Borey

The problem with Elvis Costello has always been the same — credibility. How do you believe a guy who seems more to be playing with words than to be saying something he really feels? How do you believe a guy whose chords and chord progressions have gotten so runny, vague, and noncommittal that you suspect they'd be just as effective played backwards? How do you believe a guy whose singing style is distinguished by its ironic mock sincerity?

In that it reveals the artist's own struggle with these questions, King of America marks an important departure for Costello, whose real name, Declan MacManus, is used in the album credits. Based closely on a small variety of traditional genres such as folk, blues, and country & western, the music is harmonically clearer and cleaner than that of Costello's last few albums. Thankfully, the glitzy, ambiguous chords are fewer. The best thing about the music is the production by T-Bone Burnett, which is spare, simple, and direct, in stark contrast to the busy, murky, funhouse hurly-burly into which The Attractions, Costello's backup band, had degenerated. Solid, understated playing by former Elvis Presley sidemen serves to clarify, rather than to obscure, the impulse behind each song.

Costello's struggle to come clean, and the partial extent of his success, is most apparent in his singing, which had gradually turned into a monstrous parody of the oozing, smarmy lounge crooners of yesteryear. Now, through his new resolve to be himself, he has managed at least to keep this parody at bay long enough to turn in two or three of the most genuinely moving performances of his career.

Sound: C
Performance: B+

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Audio, June 1986


Susan Borey reviews King Of America.

Images

1986-06-00 Audio page 146.jpg
Page scan.


1986-06-00 Audio photo 01 px.jpg
Photographer unknown.


1986-06-00 Audio cover.jpg 1986-06-00 Audio page 02.jpg 1986-06-00 Audio page 143 advertisement.jpg
Cover, contents page and advertisement.

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