1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die: 573. Elvis Costello & The Attractions – Blood & Chocolate (1986)

 

I’m not quite sure why Costello is getting so many entries on the list. Like CSNY, not everything is solid all the time. But here we are. Dimery, or one of his contributors, obviously loves him. 

This album has something of a Dylanesque feel to it, especially Tokyo Storm Warning with its lengthy series of vignettes backed by Steve Nieve doing a bit of a Garth Hudson impression on the organ. Battered Old Bird is a similar parade of characters, figures based on the occupants of a boarding house where Costello used to live, with a moody and dramatic tune. 

I Want You isn’t the same as the Dylan song of the same name (from Blonde on Blonde), but is a slow and oppressive track that starts off sounding like the narrator is hankering after a lost love, and becomes darker and more obsessive as it goes. Costello gives a deeply emotive vocal performance here while he often (to my ears) feels a bit affected with his Buddy Holly-esque hiccupping delivery). 

Yes, as usual, most of the tracks are about the dark side of relationships – thwarted love, betrayals, obsessions, mutual cruelty. In Home Is Where You Hang Your Head we get one of the most Elvis Costello lyrics possible - “He’s contemplating murder again; he must be in love” (although that could equally be a Morrissey lyric). 

Nieve isn’t as prominent in the mix as on Imperial Bedrooms, and the songs sound a little more mundane. Perhaps this is because the band are experiencing the same kind of implosion, and so there’s more of a perfunctory feel to the songs and less one of people enjoying making the music together. 

And yes, that cover image (by Costello) is called Napoleon Dynamite.