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Elvis Costello.
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Costello, Elvis (1955—)
Born Declan Patrick Aloysius McManus, British singer, guitar-ist, and composer Elvis Costello has been a mainstay of the popular music scene since his 1977 debut disc, M...
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Critical Essay by Kit Rachlis
"I'll do anything to confuse the enemy." If Elvis Costello had a business card, those words (from "The Beat") would be on it, the equiv...
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Critical Essay by Janet Maslin
Costello writes songs that are elusive at times, bursting with bright phrases you can't always catch…. He sings about violence with a vibrant romanticism, ...
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Critical Essay by Ira Robbins
When Bob Dylan broke up with his wife … a few years ago, the world was treated to the introspective and bitter Blood on the Tracks. Although Elvis's persona...
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Critical Essay by Pete Silverton
Right now, commenting on Costello or the Clash, you're not talking about just another artist, you're confronting rock'n'roll as a whole for...
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Critical Essay by Ira Robbins
The one factor that most strongly separates Elvis Costello from 99 per cent of the other artists that find their way onto this country's airwaves is his intensity....
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Critical Essay by Allan Jones
The movie director Sam Fuller once famously defined the cinema as a battleground. That's exactly what rock 'n' roll becomes in Costello's ragi...
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Critical Essay by Paul Rambali
We all know boys don't make passes at girls who wear glasses and vice versa, so bespectacled rockers should theoretically have an even harder time in the adulatio...
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Critical Essay by Simon Frith
Costello is a craftsman…. [His songs] are, indeed, impressive. A master of ambiguity and cliche, pun and precision, Costello is an astonishingly adept writer. He h...
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Critical Essay by Patrick Goldstein
First off, Elvis—no matter how vehemently he attacks his rock elders—is just as much a product of his influences as any other garage band veteran. He ...
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Critical Essay by Allan Jones
[Costello], clearly, was not the kind of talent that came every morning free with a packet of crackers….
[The proposition that Elvis was reminiscent of Bob Dylan b...
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Costello, Elvis (1955—)
Critical Essay by Kit Rachlis
