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Attention, Attention!! Elvis has been found! Repeat, Elvis has been found!
He’s not dead, he’s not pumping gas at a Shell station in the Ozarks and he’s not a door-to-door insurance salesman now cleanly shaven and re-named Bob Smith.
Actually, he’s a singer with Brodsky Quartet. In his comeback album, The Juliet Letters, Elvis trades in the guitar for violins and the bass for a cello to produce perhaps the most original and unique album in a career that has produced 16 releases.
After such a long layoff, Elvis’ voice is surprisingly strong and energetic, especially on the track “Taking My Life In Your Hands.” He doesn’t use this song to sing about some ugly blue shoes or a dumpy hotel, but instead takes on the serious subject of suicide.
With the string quartet smoothly rolling in the background, Elvis sings: “Hours pass and darkness comes / Soon I will close my eyes / Will you return if you don’t reply / You’ll be taking my life in your hands.”
And it only gets better.
“The Offer Is Unrepeatable” is clearly the album’s most inventive song. There’s no “One for the money, two for the show …” accompanied by a four-step rock beat. Instead, visions of a Broadway musical flow through the mind as Elvis utilizes sudden changes in tempo from the quartet to catch the listener’s ear.
Simply put, there are no bad songs on The Juliet Letters – no “pass overs” that just take up space and will do down as meaningless fillers.
This is undoubtedly Elvis at his best, from singing in “I Almost Had A Weakness” about an aunt getting ripped off by a nephew (“Thank you for the flowers / I threw them on the fire / And I burned the photographs that you had enclosed/ GOD they were ugly children”) to a depressing but powerful message on divorce in “Why” (“Why is daddy not here? / are you crying? / Why? / Does he still love me? / Will you still care for me?”).
Elvis has covered all the bases on The Juliet Letters, recovering the creative edge many believe has been gone for years. And, if at first you think this album sounds more like something Grandpa Ed would enjoy with his shuffleboard buddies in the nursing home, give it a listen or two.
For the first time in his 16-album career, Elvis has come up with an album most accurately described as ‘classy and elegant.’ You can’t shake a pelvis to a stringed quartet, and it’d be odd to see these songs performed on a Las Vegas stage with flashy neon lights.
Of course, that’s never exactly been Elvis Costello’s style.
What’d you think?
Oh, don’t be silly. We all know Elvis Presley owns a strip bar in East Lansing.
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