Chicago Tribune, September 16, 2001: Difference between revisions
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Which turned out to be appropriate: After his first three albums became virtually synonymous with the punk rock/new wave movement, Elvis Costello has gone on to build a career out of musical daring, fearlessly exploring the worlds of pop, soul, country, jazz and classical, collaborating with everyone from Paul McCartney to Burt Bacharach to the Chieftains. | Which turned out to be appropriate: After his first three albums became virtually synonymous with the punk rock/new wave movement, Elvis Costello has gone on to build a career out of musical daring, fearlessly exploring the worlds of pop, soul, country, jazz and classical, collaborating with everyone from Paul McCartney to Burt Bacharach to the Chieftains. | ||
"He is the Beatles for me," says | "He is the Beatles for me," says Gary Stewart, a vice president for Rhino Records. "I've followed him on every twist and turn and liked all of it — and had my musical tastes expanded in the process." | ||
Those twists and turns are at the heart of Rhino's ambitious plan to commemorate the first 20 years of Costello's career by reissuing 18 of his albums, thematically rather than chronologically. Hearing the first three reissues together — the 1977 debut ''My Aim Is True'', 1989's ''Spike'' and 1996's ''All This Useless Beauty'' — one can see a man getting more and more comfortable with traversing the musical globe. | Those twists and turns are at the heart of Rhino's ambitious plan to commemorate the first 20 years of Costello's career by reissuing 18 of his albums, thematically rather than chronologically. Hearing the first three reissues together — the 1977 debut ''My Aim Is True'', 1989's ''Spike'' and 1996's ''All This Useless Beauty'' — one can see a man getting more and more comfortable with traversing the musical globe. | ||
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To put the years in perspective: Between ''Spike'' and ''Beauty'', Costello had recorded with string quartets, gospel singers, jazz combos, Burt Bacharach and his beloved Attractions, while singing on tribute albums to Kurt Weill, Charles Mingus and ''The X-Files''. He'd written songs for Johnny Cash, Aaron Neville and "Soul Man" Sam Moore. (Some of these songs turn up on the ''Beauty'' bonus disc, which Stewart acknowledges "would make a great record in its own right.") | To put the years in perspective: Between ''Spike'' and ''Beauty'', Costello had recorded with string quartets, gospel singers, jazz combos, Burt Bacharach and his beloved Attractions, while singing on tribute albums to Kurt Weill, Charles Mingus and ''The X-Files''. He'd written songs for Johnny Cash, Aaron Neville and "Soul Man" Sam Moore. (Some of these songs turn up on the ''Beauty'' bonus disc, which Stewart acknowledges "would make a great record in its own right.") | ||
While all this was going on, Costello recalls in ''Beauty'''s liner notes, "Record companies were being devoured like cold shrimp on a lukewarm buffet." Creative forces and market forces were on a collision course; the result, Stewart suggests, "was a record that showed him at the peak of his powers, released into a market that was apathetic for no reason other than timing." | While all this was going on, Costello recalls in ''Beauty'''s [[All This Useless Beauty (2001) liner notes|liner notes]], "Record companies were being devoured like cold shrimp on a lukewarm buffet." Creative forces and market forces were on a collision course; the result, Stewart suggests, "was a record that showed him at the peak of his powers, released into a market that was apathetic for no reason other than timing." | ||
Which offers another reason behind Stewart's decision to re-issue the Costello catalog out of sequence. "I want people to have a chance with great albums that were unjustly — or in a fan's term, criminally — ignored. | Which offers another reason behind Stewart's decision to re-issue the Costello catalog out of sequence. "I want people to have a chance with great albums that were unjustly — or in a fan's term, criminally — ignored. | ||
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'''Chicago Tribune, September 16, 2001 | '''Chicago Tribune, September 16, 2001 | ||
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[[Steve Darnall]] | [[Steve Darnall]] interviews [[Gary Stewart]] on the Rhino reissues. | ||
{{Bibliography images}} | {{Bibliography images}} |
Revision as of 08:30, 13 April 2019
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