Elvis Costello Fan Forum

I bought the (I think, first edition of the) book and then had a brief exchange of letters with Dave Gouldstone about a couple of things in the book. That's how we had to do things, pre-internet. When the revised 'God's Comic' edition came out, Dave was kind enough to thank me in the acknowledgement...

Colywn Bay : Clive Langer and the Boxes supporting. yeah supporting the next night in Southport too. Obviously decades ago now, but I think I was a bit disappointed with Clive and his band. I loved Deaf School, so was hoping for more of the same from one of their leading lights. Clearly he went on ...

Not to be pedantic, but Belmont actually ably filled in for Steve Nieve after Steve had a car accident and couldn't make several dates during the tour which followed the release of Get Happy , including the night at the Hope and Anchor in 1980. Bruce did cut his hand a year or two earlier and was s...

sulky lad wrote:Hawksmoor at Colwyn Bay...

Clive Langer and the Boxes supporting. Which, given that that was my first 'proper' gig, makes them the first band I really saw live. I went out and bought their LP, 'Splash' the next day. It's not great, to be honest, but it still holds an affectionate place in my heart.

I knew it - the UK tour is going to mimic the Get Happy! Tour of 1980 and do all the out of the way places, Yeovil, Fishguard, Hastings , Bere Alston ( my Home village ) and even more obscurely Goodison and Orpington :shock: That would be fantastic. The first time I saw EC was at the legendary Dixi...

One thing I think we can rule out is this guy - a man called John Pope born in Prince William county... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Pope_(Kentucky_politician) Ha! That's brilliant. 'One-Arm Pope'. I now have a great image of somebody coming up to him in the pub and saying 'why do they call...

Very eloquent debate. Just a small point Hawksmoor on your comment on the “Prince William” line from Little Palaces, I always took that as a reference to William Prince of Orange. The lyric goes on to reference the Pope, and E.C. would be well aware that different sides of the religious divide in L...

This gets back to the brawl you wandered into. Consider how all this has looked from the outside: "Hey, this guy whose music we all like just got some kind of state honour for his music. Pretty nice, huh?" To which came the reply from some quarters: "ARGH!!! How could this happen?? T...

I think you are greatly overestimating the extent of EC's "social media team". It seems clear to me that this team consists of EC himself and perhaps occasionally some slice of the time of an underpaid functionary at Macklam and Feldman. EC probably planned those song postings ahead of ti...

So you're old and Scottish? 'Every day when I wake up, I thank the Lord I'm Welsh'. And yes, probably 'old', although it's all relative these days. Maybe you're just a guy who wandered into the bar just as the brawl was winding down and got himself pasted for his trouble. On the other hand, you did...

sulky lad wrote:Hawksmoor please see my PM - even more relevant since your first post !

Replied to...I hope. I can't get the knack somehow. It's still appearing in my Outbox rather than my 'Sent' box...PM me again I you haven't received.

I think you have set this up as an either/or thing, but that's just the way you see it. Well...yeah. That is the way I see it, if I'm honest. I've set it up as an either/or thing because - to me - the two things of publicly saying 'I'm going to accept this award because...' and publicly saying 'the...

My dearest Hawksmoor, To put it nicely, you may want to consider the possibility that EC's Facebook and other communications are not intended exclusively for the consumption of the tiny subset of his fans that feel substantially conflicted or negative about his accepting the OBE. Furthermore, to pu...

Reason #837 EC will never, ever move back to England. :roll: I guess. Just can't help seeing some irony here, and some inconsistent behaviour. As noted, I'm fine with him accepting this honour from the UK establishment, and totally sympathise with his reasons for doing that. Equally, I'd have been ...

I'm fine with him accepting the honour for the reasons he explains in the blog. Personally, I'd rather he didn't, but I understand the blog, and I appreciate the reasons for accepting it. What I'm slightly struggling with is the extensive (and endlessly reiterated) 'Some Songs That Must Have Been Ov...

Is it just my ears, or is the vocal melody of the verses of 'Everybody's Playing House' very similar to that of 'Don't Look Now'?

Can anyone remember (with accuracy) what the time-lag was between Record Store Day 2018 and 'Someone Else's Heart' appearing on iTunes? Edited to Add...iTunes has 4th June 2018 for 'Someone Else's Heart', and Record Store Day 2018 was 21st April. So, if all goes to plan, I guess we're looking at ear...

There is also nothing here to indicate that these new tracks won't also show up on all the usual streaming sites. American Tune/Lucky Dog was a pricey 10" vinyl collectible but also popped up on Spotify roughly the same time. Fair point. If the additional tracks turn up on iTunes (or other sit...

I've been a fan since 1978, and have avidly collected Elvis' music since then. I'm primarily interested in the music, although occasionally (resources allowing) I might splash out on a fancy bit of packaging or something that looks nice. I think I have collected every track Elvis has written or rele...

(If assonance is the right word. All I mean is, the way the vowels and consonants are spaced to create a bit of a thrill of pleasure. Not the same as favourite lyric, necessarily.) Er...I think you mean alliteration. Assonance is as memorably described by Rita in Educating Rita as 'getting the ryhm...

1. Get Happy!! By a country mile, and clearly the greatest long-player of popular music ever recorded. Most of Elvis' other LPs are still miles better than anybody else's, but there is clear blue water between this and the rest. An astonishing achievement that thrills me to this day, and probably th...

Only just caught up with this one but I think it's fabulous. Much as I love Look Now and respect its towering achievement, I still have a nostalgic thrill when he uses his 1978/1979 sneer, and I think he does it on the third verse/chorus of this. Lovely stuff, and I hope we hear more snippets from t...

This is a minor quibble, though, about a song that probably stands with 'Isabelle in Tears' as an obviously classic composition on this gorgeous record. I agree with this, except to say that although 'Stripping Paper' is a work of genius which few other songwriters/performers could even get close t...

Final thought. I’ve read a few posts thinking that this is the start of a new era. I’m not so sure. Jimmie confessing his crimes so firmly and dictating his final will? The painting of Jimmie as EC by EC? The enigmatic last song? Who is the overriding Godlike artist giving verses and painting pictu...

Speaking of throwing ashtrays . . . I'm reminded of " And it`s all here and now, she hit him with that paper-weight Eiffel Tower ." from Crimes of Paris. ...and of course 'Isabelle' is followed by 'Adieu Paris'. I guess by the time you've been writing intricate lyrics about disintegrating...