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“I was asked to write an autobiography when I was 24,” says Elvis Costello, “and I said ‘Can I get back to you when I’ve done something?’” Now at age 61—and ten years after he was approached again— he’s finally published a memoir.
“There’s a lot of stuff ahead,” he tells Metro, “and if I had to carry all this memory around with me without any other account of it...I never kept a diary. All of this is what I remembered.”
Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink is more than a review of life lived in music; it’s a love letter to a father, a massive influence on his life. Elvis’ dad worked as a jazz singer for decades. Before that, his granddad was a trumpeter with the White Star Line playing standards to passengers.
His father met his mother in a record store — “It’s lovely. It’s a beautiful thing!” he exclaims — so it’s no surprise that Elvis was exposed to all kinds of music as a child: Dizzy Gillespie, Sinatra, the Beatles, Peggy Lee. If ever he challenges you to a game of musical trivia, politely take a pass and save yourself the embarrassment.
There are some very clever descriptions in the book. He recalls his New Wave period as “being tipped into a shoebox with all the other broken toys” featuring “anyone who played fast, spiteful songs in a narrow tie, rather than with the authentic voice and attire of punk outrage.”
He’s had more than his share of hits, but has always refused to be pigeonholed. Some in the industry say that he could have been much more commercially successful if he hadn’t been so prolific.
“They’re businessmen, not artists,” counters Elvis, “But let me remind you of this:
How many proper albums did the Beatles put out in 1965 and 1966? (Three: Help!, Rubber Soul and Revolver.) That’s what I grew up with.”
Elvis lives to make all kinds of music: country, ballet scores, operas, co-productions with Burt Bacharach, Allen Toussaint and even Paul McCartney, sessions where McCartney good-naturedly accused him of “getting all the good lines.”
He keeps plugging along but he also says he won’t record new music now because his dad is gone and he was the sole audience about whom he cared.
The e-book comes with additional photos and there’s a companion soundtrack CD featuring many of the songs discussed in the book.
“I see now that I was lucky to work in the record business during that brief interlude between the time when they bought your songs outright for 50 bucks or the keys to a Cadillac, and now, when everything is supposed to be free.”
Yes, he’s been lucky. And so have we.
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