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"I'd like to do some songs from the new album Spike," said Elvis Costello at the first of a series of Sunday night shows at the London Palladium. "And some other ones too," he added mock-defensively, pre-empting the possible assumption that he was only there for the plug.
Having denied himself the limelight for nearly three years, Costello's instincts do seem to be anti-commercial. On stage, furthermore, he played songs as they would never be heard on vinyl. The Attractions, his erstwhile backing band, have not been replaced, and he performed throughout With only an acoustic guitar for accompaniment, give or take the occasional flirtation with electric piano and guitar.
What this format does is to take us back to Costello the songwriter. Without instrumentation "Deep Dark Truthful Mirror" and "Blue Chair" sound infinitely more caustic. Pared down to the bare essentials "I Want You" and "Watching the Detectives" came over more haunted than ever. And without a rhythm section, several songs, especially "Veronica," acquired a more defined rhythm.
On the down side, his chord selection on "A Good Year for the Roses" seemed a touch erratic, a conventional Spanish guitar solo was beyond him in "Baby Plays Around," and former associate Steve Nieve was conspicuous by his absence in "Almost Blue," in which Costello played the piano like a blunt instrument.
It is the overwhelming nastiness of many of his songs that prevents this lone Costello from turning into what Dylan started out as, a sermonising soloist. He is too privately angry, too satirical to be a preacherman. (Even ABBA's "Knowing Me, Knowing You" sounded bitter in his rendition.)
In fact, in the smooth elision of his own "New Amsterdam" with the Beatles' "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away," an affinity with the other bespectacled maverick of British music was emphasised. Costello and Lennon have the same acidic Scouse wit. In and amongst the songs, he turned it against legitimate, if obvious targets — the tabloid press, the works of Andrew Lloyd Webber, and America and its rock music.
Costello bade the audience good night after an hour, and returned for a further 90 minutes, first duetting with his long-term producer Nick Lowe, then performing a long series of requests and finishing with a sarcastically pumped-up version of "Pump It Up." That someone requested "something not by you" was no barometer of audience enthusiasm. At least to this reviewer, Costello has never strummed better.
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