I´m About To Hear 'When I Was Cruel' For The Very First Time

Post by **BlueChair** » Wed Mar 24, 2004 9:12 pm

BLASPHEMY

noiseradio · Post by **noiseradio** » Wed Mar 24, 2004 9:31 pm

I play WIWC more often than IB, too. I think IB is overrated, if only a little.

Post by **BlueChair** » Wed Mar 24, 2004 9:34 pm

I dunno.. I like WIWC, but I find I very seldomly listen to it. For me, it can't compare to Imperial Bedroom, which I consider Elvis' finest effort. But I feel that even All This Useless Beauty and Brutal Youth are better albums than When I Was Cruel.

wehitandrun · Post by **wehitandrun** » Wed Mar 24, 2004 9:43 pm

BlueChair wrote:But I feel that even All This Useless Beauty and Brutal Youth are better albums than When I Was Cruel.

I agree with that.

<3,
s

noiseradio · Post by **noiseradio** » Wed Mar 24, 2004 10:37 pm

It all rotates for me. I agree with Brital Youth, probably. And I listen to it more often than IB as well. I'd say I like ATUB and WIWC about the same right now.

WhipsnSpurs · Post by **WhipsnSpurs** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 12:57 am

I just bought All This Useless Beauty, and will start my listening adventure tomorrow....didn't mean to be blasphemous about IB -- guess it's just "to each his own", but I think I like "Blood & Chocolate" better than IB, and certainly WIWC. Maybe it just takes a few listens. Some songs are truly great on IB, but one sounds like a Billy Joel rip off and another has splashes of Frank Zappa backing vocals in it - not a bad thing mind you - but not seeming very original, which is what EC is usually all about.

Ok, I'm sure I've pissed a few people off now....

noiseradio · Post by **noiseradio** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 1:36 am

I think IB is a great studio piece. But it strikes me as less warm than his others--less immediate. You an imagine with WIWC or Blood & Chocolate that the band is in the room. Imperial Bedroom sounds like they were in Abbey Road with Geoff Emmerick at the boards. There's nothing in the world wrong with that. But I prefer the immediacy of his other records.

ice nine · Post by **ice nine** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 7:53 am

Erasmus Darwin.........Charles' grandfather

miss buenos aires · Post by **miss buenos aires** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 9:31 am

I'm about ten posts late here, but didn't Elvis once say that St. Telmo was the red-light district in some city I can't recall right now?

Post by **BlueChair** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 9:43 am

WhipsnSpurs wrote:I just bought All This Useless Beauty, and will start my listening adventure tomorrow....didn't mean to be blasphemous about IB -- guess it's just "to each his own", but I think I like "Blood & Chocolate" better than IB, and certainly WIWC. Maybe it just takes a few listens. Some songs are truly great on IB, but one sounds like a Billy Joel rip off and another has splashes of Frank Zappa backing vocals in it - not a bad thing mind you - but not seeming very original, which is what EC is usually all about.

Ok, I'm sure I've pissed a few people off now....

Billy freakin' JOEL? I can't believe my eyes here. Oh, ultimately death.

Bob And Charlotte · Post by **Bob And Charlotte** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 9:51 am

well, i listen to WIWC only once, and like i said before, isn´t right to judge an album based on the first listen. That said, even a fool such as i, know that IB is a much better record.

elvisisking63 · Post by **elvisisking63** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 12:18 pm

First and foremost: as I posted previously, I think it's wonderful that younger people (than me) are discovering Elvis C and that his fan base is not just graying, balding people like myself.

But on the other hand, it's kind of hard for me to take when I read that someone listened to Imperial Bedroom once or twice and is forming opinions -- and lukewarm at that, or thinking it is derivative. I know it's annoying to hear "you had to be there" but perhaps there's an amount of truth in that. When Imperial Bedroom came out, it was a revelation -- kind of like my generation's Sgt. Pepper.

I know it sounds snobbish and condescending -- and I don't want to be taking that tone -- but perhaps there is some element of being the fan of someone as important as Elvis that can be shared only by people who discover the music as it is coming out. Kind of like: I also appreciate Dylan and the Beatles, but I was too young to EXPERIENCE them as they occurred. So as great as they are, and they are possibly greater than Elvis, they will never have the same place in my heart that Elvis does (and, for that matter, Talking Heads).

Yes, every album needs to stand on its own, but maybe there's some added value to be gained by investigating an artist like EC chronologically and forming an understanding of his own development: that has a lot to do with what works and what doesn't in any piece of music. (For instance, the incredibly quiet, fade-into-death finale to Mahler's 9th symphony is made only more rich if one is fully familiar with the incredibly bombastic finale of his First.)

noiseradio · Post by **noiseradio** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 12:53 pm

I agree with your post for the most part, but my opinion of IB was formed after having owned and listened to it regularly for well over 10 years. I think it's a great record. I just don't think it's his best, or even top 5.

WhipsnSpurs · Post by **WhipsnSpurs** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 2:10 pm

I knew I'd piss some people off! Elvisisking63, uh, I WAS old enough to experience the Beatles, so I'm assuming that makes me older than you. I played Abbey Road (and others) over and over until my parents were going insane.

And, I do agree that 2-3 listens does not a critique make. It's just my initial opinion, and it's not that I won't listen to IB anymore - I certainly will, and maybe my opinion will change. Certain songs on that CD are gems.

It's just that my first listen to WIWC left me with a much better taste in my mouth...

pophead2k · Post by **pophead2k** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 2:25 pm

I was given Punch the Clock and Imperial Bedroom by a friend who said my voice sounded similar to Elvis' back in 87. I listened to them each once and put them aside as I went back to my beloved Replacements and Pixies albums. Then, when Spike came out in 89, I became a huge fan of that album. I remembered I had the other two albums and dug them out- and couldn't figure out why I hadn't loved them in the first place.

Bob And Charlotte · Post by **Bob And Charlotte** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 2:27 pm

elvisisking: your post was quite snobbish indeed.

wehitandrun · Post by **wehitandrun** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 4:19 pm

Bob And Charlotte wrote:elvisisking: your post was quite snobbish indeed.

Yeah, and completely wrong. Sorry buddy.

<3,
s.

pophead2k · Post by **pophead2k** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 4:22 pm

I think I can understand what he was trying to say, actually. Its not that someone newer to the music can't appreciate it (obviously WHAR has become a HUGE fan in a short period of time), just that it might mean something different if you were there when it came out, whether its the Beatles, EC, Nirvana, Run DMC or whatever. I love listening to Buddy Holly but my dad gets kind of glassy eyed when he hears him because it has a whole different connotation.

Pov · Post by **Pov** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 6:04 pm

WhipsnSpurs wrote:I just bought All This Useless Beauty, and will start my listening adventure tomorrow....didn't mean to be blasphemous about IB -- guess it's just "to each his own", but I think I like "Blood & Chocolate" better than IB, and certainly WIWC. Maybe it just takes a few listens. Some songs are truly great on IB, but one sounds like a Billy Joel rip off and another has splashes of Frank Zappa backing vocals in it - not a bad thing mind you - but not seeming very original, which is what EC is usually all about.

Ok, I'm sure I've pissed a few people off now....

ATUB is one of my favorite EC albums. The songs on it are all just so . . . mature (I guess is the best description I can come up with). FWIW, IB has never been near the top of my list.

pip_52 · Post by **pip_52** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 8:53 pm

miss buenos aires wrote:I'm about ten posts late here, but didn't Elvis once say that St. Telmo was the red-light district in some city I can't recall right now?

"It's an neighbourhood in Buenos Aires where the tango bars are located."

From Ask Elvis, elviscostello.com

wehitandrun · Post by **wehitandrun** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 8:58 pm

Pip!

Never leave us again!

<3,
s.

seanpointblank · Post by **seanpointblank** » Thu Mar 25, 2004 11:22 pm

You didn't "have to be there" for IB. I wasn't, and I think it's certainly better than WIWC. The reason EC is so great is that his music is timeless. No album he has put out through his entire career sounds really dated at all, namely because he didnt' let himself get attached to fads and traveled his own path. Well, even when he was a part of the blossoming new-wave "fad", he still had a pop sense and way with melody that set him apart from absolutely everyone else.

If you did "have to be there", the album simply isn't as good as you want to say it is. Look at all the hardcore bands like Minor Threat or Black Flag, they are considered great bands when taken in the context of the early 80s hardcore scene, but if you take away that history from them, they are just rather boring bands, musically and lyrically speaking. Anything that has to be put into any kind of context for you to think it's great, really isn't that great. True quality will stay forever, the importance or innovative value of the record will fall away, and that's why being dynamic and well-written will always be what we look for most. It's good to note how ahead of the game Elvis has always been, but the bottomline is, it's pretty trivial.

I definitely like WIWC better than All This Useless Beauty or Brutal Youth, though. I'm not a fan of the production job on BY, and All This Useless Beauty just doesn't stick out in my head in terms of having numerous great, great songs and great, great melodies like WIWC does. Though, I have had a growing appreciation for ATUB more so lately. Maybe I'll get pooled in with the indie rock critics and what not who call WIWC a return to form, but I really think it is. Not that Elvis had really fallen off path, but I think WIWC is his best record since IB. WIWC pushed all the boundaries BY did, but just feels more focused, mature, intelligent, and doesn't have a feeling that he's trying to prove he can still rock like he used to after The Juliet Letters.

laughingcrow · Post by **laughingcrow** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 5:00 am

Thanks Pip....how many people on this board have ever been to a tango bar? Or for that matter, been lost whilst looking for a tango bar, and had to pray to St Telmo in order to find the desired bar of tango'ness?

I myself have never tangoed.

Except for the fruity soft-drink (which tastes like the residue of unwanted melted-down clown mannequins).

verbal gymnastics · Post by **verbal gymnastics** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 5:19 am

I think WIWC is a fantastic album except for Oh Well and Soul for Hire which I don't think fit in with the rest of it.

Even though I've owned IB in various guises for over 20 years, WIWC is in my view the better album.

Man Out of Time would have fitted well on WIWC...

seanpointblank · Post by **seanpointblank** » Fri Mar 26, 2004 5:34 am

That's probably why Oh Well was left off the album.