My Aim Is True - Elvis Costello

Elvis Costello from the top! Blimey can this record really be over 30 years old! Well, a quick primer in why this LP is so great. In true punk fashion Costello used American country-rock band Clover (at the time led by Huey Lewis, though he's not present here), as his backing musicians, on this, his striking debut album. Costello also toned down his pre-punk singer-songwriter shtick in order to deliver a clutch of bitterly intelligent, new wave pop songs derived from a mixture of genres from the 50's (dig the Buddy Holly specs appeal of the cover) to the 70's. The quick turnaround and shoestring budget of Stiff Records really helped make the album, ...

Tattooed knuckles. You know, the beefy, dirty ones normally sported by the leader of the local chapter of the Hell's Angels, the one hand bearing the legend LOVE and the other, the opposite extreme, HATE. If everyone had to announce their world view and personal obsessions in this way, then Elvis Costello would have three large and misshapen fists - one stating REVENGE, one daubed with BITTERNESS and the third, at the same time the most normal but also the most ugly and twisted, carrying the legend GUILT. Alternatively, he could be the subject of the old adage about a particularly well balanced individual - the one with enormous, unwieldy chips on ...