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With his continued songwriting collaboration with Paul McCartney and echoes of "Don't Let Me Down" and "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" in his music, Elvis Costello's psychic connection with John Lennon is strong.
Yet Costello punctures it with one shattering line: "Was it a millionaire who said, 'Imagine no possessions?'"
That's the Costello of Mighty Like a Rose (his new Warner Brothers album) vintage: angry, questioning and even nasty.
The combination makes for some of his best music, but you're going to have to tough it out.
Mighty Like a Rose is not an album that rewards easy listeners.
Rose is a musical marriage of the offbeat, stellar instrumentation of Spike with the weary tunefulness of Blood & Chocolate.
Guitarist Marc Ribot, the Dirty Dozen Brass Band and a trio of keyboardists tackle complex melodies with all their offbeat creativity.
Costello shows his mastery at combining bitter stones with smooth melodies McCartney would feel comfortable with on such songs as "The Other Side of Summer" and "Georgie and her Rival." The latter, in fact, is prototypical Costello - a woman victim in a manipulative relationship gets revenge by calling her ex-lover on a speaker phone "whenever she has company".
"How to Be Dumb" and "Invasion Hit Parade" match paranoid lyrics with more appropriately ominous music. The anthem "Dumb" is one of Costello's best outright rockers in years, while the latter seems to dissect the inhumanity of the Gulf War. "Seems" is a necessary qualifier since Costello's anger is more like a random, drive-by shooting than a mob hit. In other words, look out for "mushrooms."
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