Stereo Review, July 1994

Bibliography   72 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 UK & Ireland weeklies UK & Ireland magazines UK & Ireland newspapers US newspapers US rock magazines US music magazines US magazines US alternative weeklies European magazines European newspapers Canada  •  Mexico  •  Asia Australia  •  New Zealand South America  •  Africa Blogs  •  Fanzines  •  Books Online publications Stereo Review   1978 March 1978 June 1978 July 1978 October 1979 June 1980 February 1980 June 1982 March 1982 November 1983 December 1984 October 1986 June 1989 May 1989 October 1991 August 1993 May 1993 August 1994 July 1995 July 1996 September 1998 December US music magazines  Absolute Sound Acoustic Guitar Alternative Press American Songwriter Amplifier Audio Bass Magazine Bass Player The Beat Billboard Blender BMG Discovery Cash Box CBS Broadcast Newsletter CD Review CMJ New Music Monthly Columbia House Discoveries DownBeat Drum! Elmore Magazine Filter Gavin Report Goldmine Guitar Player Guitar World Harp High Fidelity Hits Hot Wacks Quarterly ICE International Bluegrass Jazziz JazzTimes Keyboard M Music & Musicians Mix Modern Drummer Modern Recording & Music Music Connection Music Market Music World New Music Scene No Depression OffBeat Option Performing Songwriter Playback Pulse! The Quake Radio & Records Ray Gun Record Review Record World R.E.P. Seattle Sound Magazine Songwriter Connection SoundWaves Stereo Review Stereophile Stomp And Stammer The Street Sweet Potato Under The Radar Vibe Vinyl Propaganda — Elvis Costello, 1994's Model Parke Puterbaugh Elvis Costello Brutal Youth Elvis Costello has been laying the groundwork for his latest record, Brutal Youth, for a long time. From the dense, often labored song-craft of albums like the late-Eighties Spike and (especially 1991's Mighty like a Rose through noble failures like last year's The Juliet Letters, Costello was guilty only of trying too hard to maintain his status as the pre-eminent songwriter of his time. Now, with Brutal Youth, he refines and clarifies his art by focusing sharply on what he does best — boring through the thicket of human interactions with lacerating wit and a musical attack to match. Fittingly, the effort reunites him with the musicians who participated in his greatest successes: his old band, the Attractions (Steve Nieve, Pete Thomas, Bruce Thomas), and his erstwhile producer, Nick Lowe, who here shares bass duties. In fact, Brutal Youth, which was co-produced by Costello and Mitchell Froom, winds up sounding like the Great Lost Elvis Costello and the Attractions Album, a worldly neo-punk broadside that could easily be filed between This Year's Model and Armed Forces. Like those classics, it's a big chunk of a record to digest; its fifteen songs are as dense and unrelenting as anything Costello's ever recorded, more like novellas than the average songwriter's short stories. But only one clocks in at over 5 minutes (the moody, keyboard-drenched "Sulky Girl"), and the band runs as clean and hot as a well-tuned engine on such numbers as "20% Amnesia," a blast of rebel rock that features Costello in full-throttle scream throughout. The album's musical standout is "Clown Strike," a breezy soul strut that could easily merit a spot on a beach-music jukebox. Lyrically, Costello taps into a motherlode in "London's Brilliant Parade," a detailed catalog of urban obsessions defining his love/hate relationship with the city whose spirit he interprets with as sure a hand as Lou Reed dissects New York. It's a theme explored in depth on Brutal Youth, as Costello, returning to the scene of the crime, sifts through the evidence of a profligate age and draws up a canny indictment in which even he does not stand unaccused. From start to finish, Brutal Youth reveals an artist fully in control. Amazingly, time hasn't mellowed Costello and the Attractions — it's made them that much more muscular and knowing. Costello even looks more like himself on the cover than he has in years — clean-shaven, horn-rimmed, back in fighting trim, face fixed in a delightfully jaundiced smirk. This Elvis, I'm pleased to note, has not left the building. << >> Stereo Review, July 1994 Parke Puterbaugh reviews Brutal Youth, which is named Best Of The Month. Images Page scan. Photo by Amelia Stein. Cover.

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