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You can find billions of people who were born before 1965 who claim Costello is Britain's greatest songwriter and that for the past 14 years his "fierce wordplay" has shown how intelligent modern music can be etc. etc. Others might suggest that Elvis' talents have been rather over-praised; that "fierce wordplay" doesn't always equal a good song. Take his new LP. A good half is those densely worded, intricately strummed rock songs which go on and on about how, behind the world of frothy pop, acid house parties, the Berlin Wall coming down and so on, people are still basically pretty horrible to one another (i.e. "The Other Side Of Summer"). But just when you're about to dismiss him as a miserable auld "post-punk" has-been, he manages to write a poignant, old-fashioned lover's plea like "Broken" that makes you think, golly, he might be an old glum boots but he's not so bad.