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Not too many singers can describe lovers sitting on a sofa as "two little Hitlers fighting until, one little Hitler does the other one's will."
And most pop singers don't address the girl of their dreams with, "If I go down, you're going with me."
And most rock singers don't give a damn about anything more than this week's platinum album enough to half sing, half shout, "What's so funny 'bout peace, love and understanding?"
In fact, some couldn't do it without people seriously questioning their heterosexuality, or something like that.
Elvis Costello can, and he did in Birmingham last Thursday night before a packed, hungry crowd at the Brothers Music Hall.
There was plenty of food, beer and other beverages to be consumed by the 650 or so rock 'n' roll die-hards, but Costello provided the meat of the evening with his irreverent, electric, often heavy-handed power rock.
As the warm up band, the Rubinoos, heated up the audience with power chords wrapped around words like "Rock 'n' roll is dead, and we don't care," everybody just new that evening would celebrate the rebirth of a dying art form.
Rock 'n' roll ain't got no drive no more. The roll has left. The rock has crumbled. Disco has struck. California pop rock has taken its gold records and sold out, and the Who, Stones and Kinks work not to become pitiful self-parodies of themselves.
Thank God for England — again. Out of the social-economic-political anarchy that recently shook lower class youths into punk rock, Costello took his sometimes brutal rock 'n' roll drive and spirit.
Out of the critical, repressed, active intellect of an unhappy computer programmer, Costello borrowed his penetrating, sometimes incisive one-liners and lots-of-liners that lend relevance and a give-a-damn-but-don't-act-like-it stance to his songs.
Costello, molded into a small, packed music hall, charged with a packed crowd's electricity and backed by a hard-driving, rock-steady band, justified the still-flickering faith in rock 'n' roll evidently embraced by his audience.
Costello and the Rubinoos brought back the sheer enjoyment and excitement of the early Beatles. The short, lively hymns recalled a time when rock was a celebration of youth and an expression of new-found freedoms and experiences.
In short, Costello and the Rubinoos, a young band from north California, painted a picture, evoked a memory and recaptured a life style that many in the audience had only lived in through rock 'n' roll.
Thanks be that the image is still clear and burning with a sometimes savage intensity on the road, in concert halls and stages around the country.
Bruce Springsteen has the electricity — he still cares about rock 'n' roll as an end and not a means to big bucks — and so does Costello.
Funny thing is, Costello could have played Auburn last year for a free concert, but the concert-planners-that-be decided nobody would have come.
They're probably right. There aren't that many people in Auburn that maybe even care about rock 'n' roll any more. Only 1500 people caught Springsteen's show here a few years back. And the Commodores packed 'em in last year.
So be it. Rock 'n' roll is dead in Auburn, Alabama, at least for all but a die-hard few.
It's nice to know, however, that a few strongholds — monuments to a music, spirit and lifestyle if you will — still offer a pure, honest rock 'n' roll to people that still give a damn about it.
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