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When Elvis Costello came out of England in 1977, and for several years thereafter, he'd storm onto stages with a frown on his face. He wouldn't sing so much as he'd unleash diatribes against the hypocrisy he seemed to find everywhere, from the political arena to the workplace to the bedroom. And then, after 45 minutes, he'd storm off.
In a world that had seen rock 'n' roll grow woefully flatulent, his was still the real rebellious thing.
As his career continued, though his music broadened in scope and grew more brilliant than ever, much of it and many of his newer lyrics seemed softer. Last summer when he performed at the Cape Cod Coliseum, he stayed on stage for nearly three hours. And his most recent LP, Punch the Clock, contains some of the most overtly pop-sounding songs he's ever written.
So when he called this week to promote his concert at the Providence Civic Center tonight at 8, I asked him. Elvis, aren't you angry anymore?
There was a tense silence. I could practically see his lips getting tight.
"That's a bit of an inane way of looking at it, don't you think?" he finally said. "I'm the same as I always was."
But then his tone lightened, and he added, "I was never really all that angry to begin with.
"That whole 'angry young man' business was just a pidgeonhole," he said. "'Ah, we've got him tagged, he's the angry one.' But even on my first album, anger wasn't all there was to it. I never could have written 'Alison' if that were the case.
"Of course, this isn't to say that I don't feel strongly about things. But I wouldn't call it anger. I am, and always have been, appalled at the conditions people are forced to contend with. But I've never been angry at people themselves.
"If my music has in fact 'softened,' it's because my way of working has changed. Instead of carrying on in that old, rather frantic way, doing one uptempo number after another, I'm trying to employ different kinds of music, different styles, different emphases.
"I actually think my new album is quite deceptive. The major lyrical substance can be found in four songs, two especially — 'Shipbuilding' and 'Pills and Soap.'" The former is one of the most articulate and disconcerting songs about war that anyone has written in years, while the other is an almost surrealistic look at the human cost of life as we live it today.
"Those songs trace situations one couldn't help feeling angry about," he said. "They are, in fact, as 'angry' as any songs I've written. But, especially with 'Shipbuilding,' I tried to draw people in with melodies that aren't as aggressive as some of mine have been.
"The entire album is an extension of that approach. A certain amount of the 'pop' sounding stuff is there to draw people into the rest of it, so when I'm trying to say something significant, something I really want to say, they'll be paying attention.
"A whole album full of songs like 'Shipbuilding' and 'Pills and Soap' would have been very depressing. No one would have listened to any of it. It's a question of using range instead of ranting on like a raving idiot who no one will listen to.
"By the way," he added, "the fact I wouldn't stay on stage longer than 45 minutes in the old days had nothing to do with anger. Back then, I really didn't feel I'd earned the right to take up more of an audience's time than that.
"When I was starting, the audience probably wouldn't have given me the chance to sing as many, and as many different kinds of, songs as I can sing now — even if I'd had the confidence then, which I didn't." Costello said he'd probably be on stage about an hour and a half tonight.
When Costello talks about singing different kinds of songs, he isn't kidding. He's written everything from country-western tunes to cosmopolitan, almost supper-clubby numbers in recent years, and has given Punch the Clock a rhythm & blues flavor.
The album utilizes a brassy horn section — something brand new for Costello — which will accompany him at the Civic Center tonight along with his regular three-piece band, the Attractions.
"The whole album sort of grew out of that horn section," he said. "I had two nights booked at the Albert Hall in London over Christmas and I wanted to do something special, and I realized I'd never used a horn section on stage so I thought I'd rearrange some of my material. And it worked so well that I wrote much of the new album with a horn section in mind."
Critics and fans often use the word "courageous" in discussing Costello's propensities for rearranging his older material and for switching forms completely from one album to the next. But Costello himself doesn't see anything courageous about it.
"I certainly don't think it's anything I should be congratulating myself about," he said. "First of all, the Attractions and I don't really make conscious decisions to rearrange songs. It's not as though we sit down before a concert and say 'let's do this number really weird.'
"The songs just sort of evolve as we play them over time; what may strike you as a drastic rearrangement is just the culmination of one little change here, another little change there. It's simply a matter of our trying to keep things fresh.
"And as the sound of the music changes, it helps inspire me to keep singing the older songs. It helps me keep finding new things in them.
"As far as switching styles from album to album is concerned, well, different kinds of music should be available to people, don't you think? Music belongs to everybody, after all.
"These musical ghettos the radio stations have created don't allow people to have a completely open interest in music. Radio's a bit better than it was a few years ago, perhaps, but it still isn't exposing people to enough different kinds of music that they have a choice between one style and another.
"It's all just marketing. The record companies and radio stations say they're labeling things to provide an element of convenience to the consumer, to help you keep from buying a record you're not going to like. But in fact, all they're doing is making certain kinds of music unavailable to you, so you can't tell whether you like them or not.
"I was lucky when I was growing up in England because radio was going through a bit of a revolution there at that point, and it was allowing listeners to get on from one thing to another. Now, though, it's very depressing that certain stations refuse to play R & B, soul music, whatever you want to call it. It's bad for music in general.
"I can't pretend that these so-called 'stylistic barriers' don't exist in the marketplace. But I do refuse to let them be limitations to me. If I feel like making a jump from one style to another I just do it.
Costello dismisses critics who say Punch the Clock isn't quite as impressive a jump as his last album, Imperial Bedroom, a record some described as a "quantum leap." It revealed a degree of sophistication that Costello hadn't previously approached and had some critics hailing him as "the Cole Porter of the '80s." Punch the Clock's foray into R & B, a relatively simpler form, has been seen in some circles as a retreat.
"For critics to compare the new album to Bedroom is absolute nonsense that's more self-congratulatory than anything else," Costello said. "Because it was so dense and varied, it appealed to the critics' sense of being members of some sort of knowledgeable clique. But I thought it was too dense and varied.
"I want to appeal to people, not just critics. That's why the new record is much more direct, much cleaner, a much more concise production. There are some very good songs on Bedroom, I think, but there's a lot of excess baggage, too. I dispensed with all those excesses this time. What's there is quite clear to be heard by everyone.
"Punch the Clock is certainly what I want my music to be at the moment. If people who only like the obscure are disappointed, too bad for them."
Costello said he has "reservations" about "a couple of my earlier albums, really, now that I look back on them. I can honestly say all my albums were made with the best of intentions, but there are things I'd do differently were I to record them again.
"I don't think I should hold any of my albums in reverence simply because I made them. That strikes me as the most incredible kind of arrogance. On the whole I think it's good to be able to criticize yourself."
But he's never put much stock in what professional critics have to say — even though most of them have praised his music to the skies.
"You can't let the reviews affect you," he said. "You certainly can't believe everything positive that's said about you because if you did, then you'd live and die by reviews. You'd place yourself in a very vulnerable position.
"There are certain critics I do respect, and I've learned things from them. But I have a good laugh at most of the critics, with their pretentious and idiotic remarks, whether favorable or unfavorable."
Costello has found it "especially alarming" that many who've reviewed Punch the Clock "have accused my lyrics of being 'too clever.' That's absolute nonsense.
"There's no such thing as being 'too clever' with words. There is such a thing as being afraid of words. I think you should use words, use your imagination, open your mind.
"I think," he added, audibly heating up, "that the problem with these critics is that they're just too stupid themselves to have thought of words as 'clever' as mine. If I can do it and they can't" — he was practically shouting now — "it's not my fault."
Uh, Elvis, I thought you said you're not angry.
A brief silence ended in a laugh. "Well, I did say I feel strongly about things..."
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