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There's a fine line between intelligence and madness; and between insight and incoherence. Elvis Costello treads these lines in Armed Forces, his third album, and so far the best new album of 1979.
Reportedly, Costello intended to name his new work Emotional Fascism. The title made his record company nervous, and it's just as well that it was dropped. It's imprecise, for one thing, and Armed Forces conveys the sense of Costello's apparent intent much better. As in his first two U.S. albums, the songs on Armed Forces portray him as a stray, powerless loner, single-handedly raging against the forces of triviality, prejudice, hypocrisy and emotional blackmail.
Clearly, Costello doesn't feel he can conquer these forces. All he can do is rage effectively and chillingly. The credibility of this rage — for it isn't just hurt feelings or disillusion — is what separates Armed Forces from madness and sheer, reasoning paranoia. If you're still able to complain, you're not crazy yet.
Still, paranoia lives in songs like "Green Shirt," which seems to be about a female member of a military force who just may turn Costello in for unspecified crimes. "Goon Squad," another slightly obscure song, shows Costello as captive, crying to his parents in a futile appeal to be set free.
Were it not for the fact that Costello's words are set to music, some of his visions would be even more terrifying. He doesn't beat around the bush. In "Two Little Hitlers" a song about some sort of
love-hate affair, he carried out the "fascism" theme in the refrain "We'll fight it out until one little Hitler does the other one's will." It's a distasteful observation, but one that certainly applies to many love relationships — like marriage.
In "Chemistry Class," he strikes a similar chord by using one of his favorite writing devices: making the mundane mutate into horror. Alfred Hitchcock could have done this song. "Are you ready for the final," he sings. "Solution," he adds.
Costello also likes to twist cliches: "Death worse than fate" and "Griplike vise," are two he uses here. This makes his language both allusive and elusive. When this works, it's poetry. When it doesn't, it's merely incoherent. One of Costello's
major faults as a writer is that he tends to become obscure. The song "Oliver's Army," for example, is swept along by a dramatic, melodic keyboard; musically, it is one of the most arresting on the album. Lyrically, it's a different story. "Oliver's Army" may be about imperialism or militarism or racism or mercenaries. I can't tell.
So why is an album that's filled with hate and paranoia — to say nothing of being hard to understand — the best of 1979's new releases? In the first place, it's genuine. Costello's words are unmistakably felt. That's harder to do than it sounds, and it's an increasingly rare thing in a popular music scene that's filled with moody, superficial "love" songs. Emotions comforting or frightening are in short supply in a world of euphemism. Costello's words might not cheer you up, but they'll certainly affect you — even if they only make you furious.
In addition, Nick Lowe's production on Armed Forces is outstanding. Lowe is a member of Rockpile, the British group that is notable for its back-to-basics simplicity in rhythm and arrangement. With Costello, Lowe has produced a music that is both simple and complex. The voice alone carries the melody on most of the songs, backed by an insistent rhythm track. Strings and keyboards underlie the whole production. Sometimes the keyboards are brought to the forefront, but usually, they're mixed down, so that when you really listen, it's as if a whole new tune is being played behind the rest of the band. This manipulation of rhythm and keyboards makes the music both a counterpoint to and a mitigator of Costello's hostility.
With his first two U.S. albums, My Aim Is True and This Year's Model, Elvis Costello gained considerable critical approval, and a formidable standing on the sales charts. Those albums also made it clear that he had a very good chance of moving beyond the British new-wave fringe and into the mainstream of popular music. With Armed Forces, he has done so. Impressively.
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