— Ro Newton
This fortnight's singles were reviewed by Ro Newton, a Hits critic I don't know a great deal about. Very brief bios online say she now goes by the name of Rosemary Barrett but either way she doesn't have a huge social media presence, if she at all. But two things of note about her back in the day: (1) she was a presenter on The Old Grey Whistle Test alongside fellow music journalists Mark Ellen and David Hepworth and (2) she made that most unlikely of jumps from Number One to Smash Hits.
As a boy it would sometimes puzzle me when competing sides would act like their main rival didn't exist. There was no trace of Superman in the world of Marvel Comics and the Avengers were nowhere to be found in DC. A newcomer hero or villain at one wrestling promotion would never be acknowledged as having previously been a part of another. Newton's arrival at ver Hits wasn't trumpeted with a 'she's joining us after a successful stint at rival pop mag Number One', nor was her departure from Numero Uno given a 'she's off to improve the fortunes of Hash Smits and jolly good luck to her!' One can only imagine the hurt leaving her old job caused as well as the suspicion with which her new co-workers held her. Being a Whistle Test presenter, she might not have given a toss which teen pop mag she was toiling for since her heart may have been in indie rock. And who better to give props to in her first singles review at bat than Elvis Costello?
1984 saw the release of Goodbye Cruel World, Costello's disastrous post-divorce ninth album that almost no one likes. He has subsequently gone into spin mode on it, declaring that it's his worst album of good songs or best album of crap songs or something but in any event, the entire experience was enough to get him to try something new. With that in mind, he ditched the eighties production and sythns and did a roots country work called King of America. He even ditched his longtime band The Attractions in favour of some crack American sessioners. It's a big improvement on Goodbye... but still flawed. After a while the clever yarns, funny lyrics ("She said that she was working for the ABC news, it was as much of the alphabet as she knew how to use" is still one of the best lines he's ever come up with) and rootsy tunes get a bit on the wick and I'm never able to make it much past the tenth track "Eisenhower Blues". Again, a different approach was in order.
Getting back with fellow Attractions Steve Nieve, Bruce Thomas and Pete Thomas with King... in the can, Costello discovered that there wasn't much left for him musically. No one in the group liked each other anymore and so they made the best of a bad situation by thrashing away at their instruments. As if to compensate, Costello put his pen in overdrive, writing lengthy verses for at least two tracks of their latest release Blood & Chocolate. A big favourite among his still-loyal following, it's a good marking for just how much Declan MacManus one can take. Turns out, I can only take so much but it's his most avowedly rock album since This Year's Model so there are people out there who reckon it's one of the best things His Nibs ever did.
Newton praises his melodies but in this respect Blood... is probably his weakest album to date. His bandmates often sound like an especially glum bar band so perhaps he just didn't have much to work with. Lyrically it's all over the shop with the twice rejected "I Hope You're Happy Now" ("...it almost sounded like pop music," admits its author, doing his best to justify an uncharacteristically bland song) making the cut along with the unnecessarily long "I Want You". But this approach wasn't for naught as it did get a piece like "Tokyo Storm Warning" out of his system.
They say that a day in Bangkok is too much but a week isn't enough. Apparently that's Costello's take on the Japanese capital too. You arrive and there are neon signs with chicken scratch hiragana and katakana characters, grotesque cosplay youths and oddball mascots and, bloody hell!, where am I?!? Culture shock is bad enough just crossing the Atlantic but here in the Far East? At least they speak some form of English in Vegas! Of course, you eventually come down and discover that the people are friendly, the food's great (if a little too salty) and all that crap that bugged you out at first is actually pretty cool. You love Japan — until you come back.
The above has never been my experience visiting Japan (aside from all the good stuff) but I know what it's like to be alienated by a massive Asian city. Bangkok, Jakarta, Singapore, Seoul: they've all irritated and freaked me out at various times for different reasons. What I never did was equate any of them with conflicts in Afghanistan or Kosovo. I don't know where Costello gets the idea that his aggrieved and jet lagged self is somehow looking at Tokyo through the prism of the Falklands, Palestine and South Africa but at least he got a good song out of it. Verses come at you in waves with loads of impressive imagery ("Between the Disney abattoir and the chemical refinery", "Japanese God, Jesus robots telling teenage fortunes") that either means everything or nothing. Indeed, the chorus shrugs its shoulders ("what do we care?") but I'd much rather sing along with whatever the hell Costello's going on about.
The downside, however, is that it's best consumed just the once. Just as albums like Dark Side of the Moon and OK Computer never sound as good on repeated listens so,too, does "Tokyo Storm Warning". There aren't any hidden elements or musical touches to rediscover and the endless verses can become heavy-handed rather quickly. That doesn't mean it can't be appreciated further, just that weaknesses do creep in after a few plays. Newton is reminded of The Rolling Stones' classic "Satisfaction" but for me it's more like Dylan's brilliant "Highway 61 Revisited", albeit without the humour, playfulness and siren whistle. The Bard is very much at the heart of what Costello is doing here and the comparison almost works. If it is his "Desolation Row" then it's only because nothing else qualifies.
Newton's recommendation didn't do much for its chart prospects as it stalled just inside the Top 75. In addition to its stream-of-consciousness lyrics, radio programmers and listeners may have been turned off by having to flip the single over just to hear the second half of the song. In any case, it never had much commercial potential but it retains a special place in the Elvis Costello canon, despite it being a bunch of codswallop. Or, and here's a thought, perhaps precisely because it is.
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Also Review This Fortnight
New Order: "State of the Nation"
Nowadays everyone sings with their eyes closed and likes New Order but that wasn't always the case. They made a string of good but not great LP's and had a run of singles that was pretty damn impressive but they seldom put out anything that people went bananas for and were kind of taken for granted by the pop world — and I can certainly see why with "State of the Nation". Another six minute-plus single, it's helped rather than hindered by Factory having the good sense to edit it down for the 7" mix. A supposed protest song, the lyrics are really just a textbook example of how Barney Sumner would telegraph his rhymes. The tune a is vaguely jangly throwback to "Everything's Gone Green" but which seems out of date next to follow-up single "Bizarre Love Triangle". Nothing special and they did much better — even if they also did worse.
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