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Imperial Bedroom is Elvis Costello's most fully realized album, and also his most compassionate. The fifteen songs here paint a sometimes droll, often sad picture of love eroded by the inevitable procession of time and temptation, and Elvis' voice is at its brittle, emotive best. The music, meanwhile, packs a potent, articulate kick that recalls such Sixties rock masterworks as the Who's Tommy and the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper. Four songs on side one are linked by a frantic segue — amphetamine guitar and wordless screaming from Costello — and the eight songs on side two brim with an effusive vigor that takes some of the sting off Costello's more rancorous lyrics. Due credit must go to Steve Nieve, who orchestrated many of the songs and whose keyboards color the sound, and to Geoff Emerick, who provided Costello with a full-bodied, wide-screen production.
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