Dave Woodhall sees a gig of three thirds at Symphony Hall.
Elvis Costello is one of those artists who inspire devotion beyond all reason from his more committed followers. As someone who had never seen him live I did wonder how I’d fit in at a sold-out Symphony Hall, whether the lesser-known of his songs might be a bit self-indulgent to these Philistine ears.
It seems as though every time I’m at this venue I hear Squeeze songs being played and with their joint frontman Chris Difford supporting Elvis, a repeat was always going to happen. We got a few of them, some solo stuff and a lot of anecdote about working with some of the doyens of a time when pub rockers were becoming new wave stars. The audience loved it and the affection the old stuff is clearly held in shows yet again that Squeeze might not have been the biggest British band to emerge from the past fifty years but they might be the best-loved.
Having a support who gets your audience singing along could in some quarters be considered unwise but not tonight. Billed as the songs of the early Elvis Costello (“It’s better than the songs of the late Elvis Costello,” he justifiably points out) he strolled onto the stage wearing a natty straw trilby and accompanied by a band that included a couple of Attractions plus former Dylan guitarist Charlie Sexton. And…
CRASH! This Year’s Girl. BANG! You Belong to Me. WALLOP! Mystery Dance. Three rapid-fire early smashes, followed up by a blistering Watching the Detectives, featuring a bit of Willie Dixon’s I Can’t Quit You Baby and some blues harp. Close your eyes and you could have been a couple of hundred yards down Broad Street in Barbarelea’s 49 years ago. Carry on like this and we were in for a special night indeed. But.
There was something not right, something that in this venue seems almost blasphemous to even contemplate, but it wasn’t long until confirmation came from downstairs; “Elvis, the sound’s shit.” The old Elvis might have got angry, this one reacted calmly but the man in row 23, or wherever he was, wasn’t far wrong. The vocals were being drowned in the wave of noise coming from his musicians.
Fortunately the sound crew didn’t have so much to deal with as the show moves into it next phase with the band stripped down to acoustics, taking up a fraction of the stage with the minimalist set and antique mics adding to the retro feel. This was a selection from Elvis’s later early years Honey, Are You Straight or Are You Blind? a particular highpoint but there were still problems that seemed to be sorted by the ‘turn it off and back on again’ approach that’s the limit of my own technical abilities.
As the brushed drum and double bass emphasised the jazz influences, Clubland had a bossa nova feel that included a bit of Ghost Town. Then it was time for the full-on electric band again, although there was one more of his slower output, with the addition of Shipbuilding. Here Elvis’s voice was shown to be not exactly what it onne was, which is understandable for a man in his seventies but this added to the poignancy of such a sadly timeless classic.
Then came a re-worked Oliver’s Army – the enemies are still the same, only the names have changed. The band were introduced, the audience clapped along and as everyone took a bow it semeed as though the set proper was coking to an end, but Elvis doesn’t do encores so on we went. Alison and Big Boys brought the mood up even further and then…
“One, two, three, four” CRASH! BANG! WALLOP!!! Pump It Up, as vicious and hard-hitting as it ever was. We were back in 1978 again, with Elvis spitting out lyrics like trace bullets. There was a brief snatch of Subterranean Homesick Blues, perhaps as a homage to Sexton’s former boss, but such was the venom in the words that they blended perfectly. It was an impossible song to follow, except that the show’s finale managed the task and then some.
Peace, Love & Understanding, Nick Lowe’s finest hour and the one which finally brought him the riches he deserved. More explosive vocals, more sharper than a knife musicianship and a wonderful ending that had the crowd buzzing as the filtered out of Symphony Hall.
I’d hoped this would be a show to remember and at times it might have been, albeit for the wrong reasons. But despite the technical hitches and the sometimes-uneven running order, we had the best ending to a gig I’ve seen for many a year. I’ll settle for that, and be back next time.
