Best EC Album of the Past 10 years

[Jackson Monk]

Simple Poll.

North for me.

[InvisibleMan]

let's go north.

[John]

Secret Profane & Sugarcane for me at the moment. A lot of the albums on the list have been immediately enjoyable but don't seem to have aged as well as a lot of his earlier records.

North I think will last and is probably going up my list at the moment. Impatience is an Imposters gem hidden away at the end of it, Fallen and Still lovely.

[wordnat]

SP&S by a mile.

I don't get NORTH at all -- too cloying by half....

[Ypsilanti]

As a champion of Older Elvis, it's too difficult. I can't narrow it down to only one. It's like trying to choose between a giant orgasm, a delicious meal, a bag of money and the perfect summer day.

[wardo68]

I'm very interested in the outcome of this poll. I had North on just last night.

[Unexpected No.4]

The Delivery Man, followed closely by Momofuku then When I Was Cruel.

[Otis Westinghouse]

I appear to have nudged TDM into first place over North. I don't seem to ever have the urge to play the latter, though I played it a lot at the time. I particularly enjoyed the songs live. For The Stars gets 1 vote - presumably a joke!

[InvisibleMan]

it's been voted by a von otter.

personally:

1. north
2. the delivery man
3. when i was cruel

[invisible Pole]

I've tried so hard to like The Delivery Man, and finally I can confirm : it is easily in my top 10 .... of the worst EC albums. Did not like it when I first heard it and still don't.
It seems that I'm in the minority on this.

[Jackson Monk]

Not my favourite either.

I love Bedlam, Either side,Scarlet Tide... and Country Darkness. The rest are ok with the exception of the title track, which I really dislike.

Loving just 4 songs on an EC album puts it pretty low on the scale for me.

I love all of North.

[Jack of All Parades]

When prest, would have to say Momofuko- with The Delivery Man or North a close second. I would give an honorable mention to For the Stars-I enjoy listening to the album and take it for the lark I think it was intended to be. I least enjoy Secret, Profane and Sugarcane- 6 or 8 white, middle-aged men standing around in a semi-circle pretending they are Appalachian musicians just fails to hold my interest- the material is weak, as well. I just cannot bring myself to play it since purchasing the CD. In truth, if I stretched the decade by 1 year to 1998- my vote would unequivocably go to Painted from Memory.

[Jackson Monk]

When prest, would have to say Momofuko- with The Delivery Man or North a close second. I would give an honorable mention to For the Stars-I enjoy listening to the album and take it for the lark I think it was intended to be. I least enjoy Secret, Profane and Sugarcane- 6 or 8 white, middle-aged men standing around in a semi-circle pretending they are Appalachian musicians just fails to hold my interest- the material is weak, as well. I just cannot bring myself to play it since purchasing the CD. In truth, if I stretched the decade by 1 year to 1998- my vote would unequivocably go to Painted from Memory.

Wise words. FTS was never as bad as people made out and contained some EC classics like Green Song, No Wonder and the title track.

North pips PFM for me, but it is prettey damning that an EC fan reckons that EC's best last album was 11 years ago

Momofuku was a bit patchy but the best EC rock-out since BY.

[Lester Burnham]

Yeah, I'd probably say Momofuku, followed by Delivery Man, then When I Was Cruel, then North. I likes me some rockin' EC.

[migdd]

Delivery Man for me. It's the one I return to the most. I expected to like SP&SC more than I do although there are a handfull of killer songs on there. North is incredible if I'm in the right mood. Momofuku is just too spotty in the song department to make it to the top of my list although I do play it a lot (or at least parts of it). Seems the next EC album is always the best.

[sheeptotheslaughter]

I have gone for When I Was Cruel,
Momofuku probably would have been second choice. I just prefer Elvis rocking out a bit although I do listen to North when the mood is right. Much as I love Elvis I would have like a bit more Allen Toussaint singing on RIR.

Each of these albums has their high's and lows, but after 7 listens I still am not in love with SPS. Three or four songs just bore me rigid. But thats the great thing with Elvis there will always be another album along in a minute you will like. I think music suffers now from the Ipod shuffle generation and I sort of include myself in this I rarely listen to a whole album in one go.

Cant believe Painted From Memory is over 10 years ago.

[oily slick]

As a champion of Older Elvis, it's too difficult. I can't narrow it down to only one. It's like trying to choose between a giant orgasm, a delicious meal, a bag of money and the perfect summer day.

1. Giant Orgasm
2. Bag of Money
3. Perfect Summer Day
4. Delicious Meal

[alexv]

Jackson, like Board newcomer CS, I too think that PFM is the best EC record in memory. And records like Sulfur, TDM, WIWC, RIR are "bad Elvis" in my mind. Your surprise at an EC fan having to look that far back to find a top record is understandable, but it underscores some points that I think are worth mentioning, particularly here where we the faithful gather to track the doings of our Hero.

RANT ALERT

For me, having followed his doings since the late 70s, the plain fact is that his greatest records, the ones that got him into my own personal Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, were by and large his early records. MAIT, TYM, AF, GH, Trust, and even AB for its audacity, had impacts, that as I've said before here on the Board in other contexts, went beyond the songs themselves. Even PTC, the first of his flawed records, was a fun record in a way that it wouldn't be all these years later, because the freshness of it (the horns, the overtly pop arrangements, the backup singers) was so jarring. I hated lots of the song arrangements, but found myself happily dancing along when he played them at Forest Hills in NYC back in the day. We were young, he was young, this was a new Elvis and, what the heck, it was fun.

These early records are as much about youth, rebellion against a dull musical landscape, style and attitude as they were about pop songcraft. Modern-day Elvis likes to go on about rock vs. rock and roll vs. rowdy rhythm records etc., but to me his early records were great "beat" records that came at just the right time. That's his particular genius, and as is the case with most geniuses the best work comes early, before the fresh becomes, inevitably, "mannered".

IB is to me his supreme achievement, but also marks the point where the freshness departed and the mannered Elvis appeared, never to go away again. He's made some great records since then: KOA and PFM in particular but all his records since the early days are flawed, in comparison to the early work.

Just take a look at the lyric sheets for the early records and compare them to the post IB stuff. The lyric lines get longer and longer, more and more convoluted. And forget the music itself, it went from increasingly baroque to... well these days it's anyone's guess what musical style he'll adopt. Two potentially great records marred by the mannered style are Spike and MLAR. Great songs, potentially great songs, are weakened by an inability to self-edit.

EC likes to reply to this kind of criticism with the usual retort: I'm not stuck in my past, you are, get over it, i will not repeat myself, I am an artist and have license to follow my muse etc.

All well and good, and I'll use this rant to offer my reply.

Alexv reply to EC:

Everything you say, EC, is true for you as an artist. Certain of your hard core fans are indeed stuck in your past, but not because of an inherent conservatism or sheer musical laziness. We are stuck in your past because we consider "your past" work (which happily, and significantly enough, coincides with our youth and your youth) to be your "best" work. If you want to engage us on that debate (oh for the chance!!) many of us will be happy to oblige.

You pick any one of your records in the last 10 years, say, and we'll pick one from your first ten and I'll be damn if you can convince a number of us that they stack up in quality. You may think that you are thus turned into the proverbial one trick pony, and that this is unfair. But for some of your fans you, like a lot of other great artists, are indeed a one trick pony, whose best work came early. That is not rare, by the way, for really talented one trick ponies like you. It's exceedingly rare for great artists to match their early work late in their careers. Not that many Dylans around.

Your special talent was/is not for (a) soul singing, (b) classical stylings, (c) the blues, (d) country (real or Byrd like), (e) blue grass, (f) Sinatra-like crooning, or (g) cajun music. You are free to love all those musical styles. Many of us love them too. But loving them, and having an encyclopedic knowledge of each of them, does not mean you can actually be "good" at any of them. To be a good crooner, you have to have a better voice; to sing good soul songs you have to be a soul singer...etc.

Your great talent is in writing literate, witty, Beatles influenced rock and roll songs that work well within your vocal limitations. You should, by the way, take a look a footage of George Jones, Tony Bennett and Smokey Robinson, just to name a few, literally cringing as you sing along with them to understand what I mean about your vocal limitations. Your great perseverence and ambition allowed you to take your talents and through sheer will and hutzpah make a great record like IB. The same traits, plus some allowances on the part of BB when it came to your vocal limitations, allowed you to make a great pop record like PFM. The same traits plus inevitable, long-standing patterns of behavior common to many other great artists have led you in your interminable musical journeys, with the inevitable results.

End of Alexv reply.

Having said all that, I own all of EC's later work, and find something I enjoy in every record (leaving Il Sogno aside), with no illusions about how they stack up against the great early work. Some of the later records (PFM, North, Brutal Youth, parts of ATUB, and even Momofuku) I quite like, with at least 4 or 5 songs that I think are really good later Elvis on each record.

And so, Jackson (you still with me?), I stay on as an EC fan, something I fear I will be right to the bitter end despite my rather harsh assessments. He is my favorite musician, who grabbed me as a kid in ways that other favorites, who I think are far superior musicians (the Beatles, Dylan, Van to name a few) never did. But my allegiance is not blind, and I am highly critical of his work, precisely because every new EC record remains an exciting event, even in dull late middle age.

END OF RANT

[InvisibleMan]

You should, by the way, take a look a footage of George Jones, Tony Bennett and Smokey Robinson, just to name a few, literally cringing as you sing along with them to understand what I mean about your vocal limitations.

where can i see that...

[alexv]

IM, this is Elvis croaking along on You Really Got a Hold of Me, while Smokey soldiers on like a true professional. It's from the Spectacle show and if you can't see it here (i'm at work) you can access it on page 16 of the Spectacle thread.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XH5TTnUh ... re=channel

I think the Tony Bennet example I was thinking of (there are more than one) comes from an MTV appearance, probably on YouTube also, but I think the Spectacle show may have had another.

George Jones is from the long ago past. As Elvis sang, there was this expression of beffudlement on the part of the great Jones. I will say that the song EC wrote for Jones to record, the one on TL, is a terrific country song, best EC ever wrote.

[InvisibleMan]

stranger in the house? better than anything on secret, profane and sugarcake.

thank you for the video. i'll let you know.

[InvisibleMan]

watched it: well, he doesn't sing badly, in my opinion.

certainly his interpretations have changed through the years: they lack the bity bit, the mordent, something controversial and cynical: the awareness that sentiments are a joke in a world characterized by mindless violence, after all. now he's seems always too busy singing trying to put more fake sentimental intensity that he can in his performances - as a work, as a job. he's instutionalized, cleaned, cured. he's professional. being too professional is musically suicidal in rock, i think. his interpretations are plagued by a series of recitative mannerisms - his own mannerisms, that now seem mechanical, trite.

but the voice is only one side of the situation.

there are the songs to consider too: inspiration has dried down. but his talent is still there. as mccartney, he's able to compose a song almost anytime - and he's one of the most prolific.

all in all, his albums are still of good quality, but they're not special and exciting anymore. this increases with time. it's ordinary. it's what happens to almost all singers and songwriters.
it's just impossible to avoid it, like ageing. his latest albums didn't grab me, excluding north for a while, and painted from memory (but now i listen only to in the darkest place and i still have that other girl).

still, he's one of my favourite, so i keep coming back to his old albums and old songs, and i always give a chance to the new ones, and sometimes i find a couple of songs i like.

i've written in some imaginary english, probably.

[Jack of All Parades]

Invisible Man- I think you properly voice and back up the concerns of Alex V and other long time attentive fans of Elvis. The consistency has long evaporated and each subsequent album gives a few nuggets but no total pleasure as a listening experience like the majority of the material through the mid '80s. One can conjecture why this is- fat and satisfied artist, nothing more to prove, middle-aged non angry man happily married with the rewards of a back catalog that allows him to afford an easy life style. I do not really care why- I agree with Alex this is the normal arc of too many artists- not all can be Phillip Roth, John Updike, WB Yeats or Thomas Hardy-vibrant long into their senior years. The closest we have in music is Dylan-he is still vibrant and strong. Someday an overview album will be created which will collect the nuggets of the last 25 years- you can even create your own album with today's technology although I refuse to use an I Pod- either way, I, as well, continue to listen for those occasional nuggets- they are better than the entire output of many other artists.

[taramasalata]

alexv, man you really seem to take it personally, with the distinct lives of our hero, which is absolutely the right attitude , taking it personally is the most important when it comes to music, it's about our love for it and its counterpart, being disappointed if the love doesn't stand every test...but that again might be the very proof for our love!
I consider myself also of being a fan not too blind to see that even Elvis hasn't only recorded milestones. but I still don't favour this "the early Elvis was the ONE"-attitude, besides that I really think of it of being reactionary the more important is that I think that it doesn't justice to the quality of his music. Every time while listening to the classic GH again for instance, I am once more irritated (and also a bit mad) about the song order and the quality of some songs on the second half...how could he possibly chose "outtake"-songs like "5 gears in reverse", "human touch" or "beaten to the punch" when there was so much better stuff around ("girls talk", "so young", "ghost train" to mention a few...). and on a record like AF there are also omissible ones, like "moods for moderns" or "big boys"....
in my opinion, besides Trust, IB and KOA, there's BY or PFM to be ranked among them and Momofuku isn't far behind...and I like SPS a lot, how much time will tell then...
I think it is the great thing of the ongoing discussion in this forum, that all of us Costello lovers have their very personal selections, a song like "Battered old bird" to some being among his best and to others one to skip...in what an enviable position are we and I can't think of any other musician with such a history and still so much of a future to look forward to on our way.

[scielle]

Il Sogno
That's right, hands down my favourite of them all. Followed closely by When I Was Cruel.
Curiously, never warmed up to either North or For the Stars despite the 'classical'/ lieder elements.