Becoming engaged has improved EC's temper no end. This is his angriest. noisiest, most daemonic album since Get Happy — the audio equivalent of a McEnroe tantrum.
Kings of America, January's solo effort, remains one of the year's landmarks — the artefact of a craftsman honing his talent to a quintessential pitch. America was all the more unexpected having followed Goodbye Cruel World, universally regarded as the creative lowpoint of the Costello catalogue.
Rumours of a split from the Attractions have since persisted, and if Blood & Chocolate represents one last attempt at rekindling the fire of old, its narrow failure owes more to the lustre of America than inherent weaknesses of its own.
Costello remains this island's premier songsmith but Chocolate is the frustrated work of a man in desperate need of another Top 20 hit, yet refusing to moderate the lyrical maelstrom that so restricts his audience. Not for nothing did Elvis revive The Animals' classic "Please Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood." But no one's listening anymore.
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