name	Gillian Welch
alt	A slender, middle-aged woman with long brown hair plays guitar and sings into a microphone. She wears a cowboy hat and a red dress.
background	solo_singer
born	October 02, 1967 New York City, New York, U.S.
origin	New York, U.S. (born in); moved to LA, California with family; Nashville, Tennessee (currently resides)
instrument	singing, guitar, banjo, drums
genre	Bluegrass, Americana, rock
associated acts	Dave Rawlings Machine
website	gillianwelch.com
notable instruments	1956 Gibson J-50 }}

Gillian Welch (; born October 2, 1967) is an American singer-songwriter. She performs with her musical partner, guitarist David Rawlings. Their sparse and dark musical style, which combines elements of Appalachian music, Bluegrass, and Americana, is described by ''The New Yorker'' as "at once innovative and obliquely reminiscent of past rural forms".

Welch and Rawlings have released five critically acclaimed albums. Their 1996 debut, ''Revival'', and the 2001 release ''Time (The Revelator)'', received nominations for the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album. Their 2003 album, ''Soul Journey'', introduced electric guitar, drums and a more upbeat sound to their body of work. After a gap of eight years, they released their fifth studio album, ''The Harrow & The Harvest'', in 2011.

Welch was an associate producer and performed on two songs of the ''O Brother, Where Art Thou?'' soundtrack, a platinum album that won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 2002. Welch has collaborated and recorded with distinguished musicians such as Alison Krauss, Ryan Adams, Jay Farrar, Emmylou Harris, The Decemberists, and Ani DiFranco. Welch and Rawlings perform at many music festivals.

Early life

Gillian Howard Welch was born on October 2, 1967 in New York City, and was adopted by Ken and Mitzie Welch, comedy and music entertainers. Her biological mother was a freshman in college, and her father was a musician visiting New York City. Welch has speculated that her biological father could have been one of her favorite musicians, and she later discovered from her adoptive parents that he was a drummer. Alec Wilkinson of ''The New Yorker'' stated that "from an address they had been given, it appeared that her mother ... may have grown up in the mountains of North Carolina". When Welch was three, her adoptive parents moved to Los Angeles to write music for ''The Carol Burnett Show''. They also appeared on ''The Tonight Show''. As a youngster, Welch was introduced to the music of American folk singers Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie, and the Carter Family. She performed folk songs with her peers at the Westland Elementary School in Los Angeles. Welch later attended Crossroads School, a high school in Santa Monica, California. While in high school, a local television program featured her as a student who "excelled at everything she did".

When a student at the University of California, Santa Cruz, Welch played bass in a goth band, and drums in a psychedelic surf band. In college, a roommate played an album by the bluegrass band The Stanley Brothers, and she had an epiphany:

The first song came on and I just stood up and I kind of walked into the other room as if I was in a tractor beam and stood there in front of the stereo. It was just as powerful as the electric stuff, and it was songs I'd grown up singing. All of a sudden I'd found my music.

After graduating from UC Santa Cruz with a degree in photography, Welch attended the Berklee College of Music in Boston, where she majored in songwriting. During her two years studying at Berklee, Welch gained confidence as a performer. Welch met her music partner David Rawlings at a successful audition for Berklee's only country band.

Career

Upon finishing college in 1992, Welch and Rawlings moved to Nashville, Tennessee. She recalled, "I looked at my record collection and saw that all the music I loved had been made in Nashville—Bill Monroe, Dylan, the Stanley Brothers, Neil Young—so I moved there. Not ever thinking I was thirty years too late." Rawlings soon followed. In Nashville, after singing "Long Black Veil", the two first realized that their voices harmonized well and they started to perform as a duo. They never considered using a working name, so the duo were simply billed as "Gillian Welch". A year after moving to Nashville, Welch found a manager, Denise Stiff, who already managed Alison Krauss. Both Welch and Stiff ignored frequent advice that Welch should stop playing with Rawlings and join a band. They eventually signed a recording contract with Almo Sounds. Following a performance opening for Peter Rowan at the Station Inn, producer T-Bone Burnett expressed interest in recording an album. Burnett did not plan to disturb Welch's and Rawlings' preference for minimal instrumentation, and Welch agreed to take him on as a producer.

''Revival''

For the recording sessions of Welch's debut, ''Revival'', Burnett wanted to recapture the bare sound of Welch's live performance. Welch recalled, "That first week was really intense. It was just T-Bone, the engineer, and Dave and myself. We got so inside our little world. There was very little distance between our singing and playing. The sound was very immediate. It was so light and small." Later, they recorded several more songs and played with an expanded group of musicians; guitarist and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee James Burton, bassist Roy Huskey, Jr., and veteran session drummers Jim Keltner, and Buddy Harman.

The album was released in April 1996 to positive reviews. Mark Deming of Allmusic called it a "superb debut" and wrote, "Welch's debts to artists of the past are obvious and clearly acknowledged, but there's a maturity, intelligence, and keen eye for detail in her songs you wouldn't expect from someone simply trying to ape the Carter Family." Bill Friskics-Warren of ''No Depression'' praised the album as "breathtakingly austere evocations of rural culture". The ''Chicago Daily Herald''s Mark Guarino observed that ''Revival'' was "cheered and scrutinized as a staunch revivalist of Depression-era music only because her originals sounded so much like that era." He attributed this to the biblical imagery of the lyrics, Burnett's threadbare production, and the plainly-sung bleakness in Welch's vocals. Ann Powers of ''Rolling Stone'' gave ''Revival'' a lukewarm review and criticized Welch for not singing of her own experiences, and "manufacturing emotion." Robert Christgau echoed Powers: Welch "just doesn't have the voice, eye, or way with words to bring her simulation off." ''Revival'' was nominated for the 1997 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album, but lost to Bruce Springsteen's ''The Ghost of Tom Joad''.

''Hell Among The Yearlings''

The duo's 1998 ''Hell Among the Yearlings'' continued the rustic and dark themes; the songs' subject matter varies from a female character killing a rapist, a mining accident, a murder ballad, and an ode to morphine before death. Like ''Revival'', ''Hell Among The Yearlings'' featured a sparse style that focused on Rawlings and Welch's voices and guitars.

The album also received favorable reviews. Robert Wilonsky of the ''Dallas Observer'' observed that Welch "inhabits a role so completely, the fiction separating character and audience disappears". Thom Owens (Allmusic) stated that the album "lacks some of the focus" of ''Revival'', but is "a thoroughly satisfying second album" and proof that her debut was not a fluke. ''No Depression'''s Farnum Brown commended the live and "immediate feel" of the album, Welch's clawhammer banjo, and Rawlings' harmonies. Similar to ''Revival'', Welch was praised for reflecting influences such as the Stanley Brothers, but still managing to create an original sound, while Chris Herrington from Minneapolis's ''City Pages'' criticized the songs' lack of authenticity. He wrote "Welch doesn't write folk songs; she writes folk songs about writing folk songs."

''O Brother, Where Art Thou?''

Welch sang two songs and served as an associate producer for the Burnett-produced soundtrack to the 2000 film of the ''same name''. She shared vocals with Alison Krauss on a rendition of the gospel song "I'll Fly Away." Dave McKenna of ''The Washington Post'' praised their version: the singers "soar together." Burnett and Welch wrote additional lyrics for the song "Didn't Leave Nobody but the Baby," sung by Welch, Emmylou Harris, and Krauss. The song is an elaboration of an old Mississippi tune discovered by Alan Lomax, and was nominated for the 2002 Grammy Award for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals. The platinum album won the 2002 Grammy Award for Album of the Year. The surprise success of the soundtrack gave Welch a career boost. Welch also made a cameo appearance in the film.

''Time (The Revelator)''

When Universal Music Group purchased Almo Sounds, Welch began her own independent label, Acony Records (named for the Appalachian wildflower, Acony Bell, subject of the song "Acony Bell" on ''Revival''). Rawlings produced the first release on Welch's new label, the 2001 album ''Time (The Revelator)''. All but one song on the album was recorded in the historic RCA Studio B in Nashville. "I Want To Sing That Rock and Roll" was recorded live at the Ryman Auditorium in the recording sessions for the concert film ''Down from the Mountain''. Welch has said the album is about American history, rock 'n' roll, and country music. There are songs about the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, the Titanic Disaster, John Henry, and Elvis Presley. ''Time'' continues Welch and Rawlings' style of mellow and sparse arrangements. Welch explained, "As opposed to being little tiny folk songs or traditional songs, they're really tiny rock songs. They're just performed in this acoustic setting. In our heads we went electric without changing instruments."

''Time (The Revelator)'' received extensive critical praise, most of which focused on the evolution of lyrics from mountain ballads. For Michael Shannon Friedman of ''The Charleston Gazette'', "Welch's soul-piercing, backwoods quaver has always been a treasure, but on this record her songwriting is absolutely stunning." Critics compare the last track, the 15-minute "I Dream a Highway", to classics by Bob Dylan and Neil Young. Zac Johnson of Allmusic described ''I Dream...'' as akin to "sweetly dozing in the [river] current like Huck and Jim's Mississippi River afternoons". ''No Depression''s Grant Alden wrote, "Welch and Rawlings have gathered ... fragments from across the rich history of American music and reset them as small, subtle jewels adorning their own keenly observed, carefully constructed language." ''Time'' finished thirteenth in the 2001 ''Village Voice'' Pazz & Jop music critic poll. ''Time (The Revelator)'' appeared in best of decade lists of ''Rolling Stone'', ''Paste'', ''Uncut'', ''The Irish Times'', and the ''Ottawa Citizen''. The album was nominated for the 2002 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album, but lost to Bob Dylan's ''Love and Theft''. ''Time'' peaked at #7 on the Billboard Independent Album chart.

''The Revelator Collection'' DVD was released in 2002. It featured live performances and music videos of songs from ''Time'', and some covers. The concert footage was filmed in 2001, and the music videos included Welch and Rawlings performing three songs at RCA Studio B. ''No Depression''s Barry Mazor praised the DVD as an accompaniment for ''Time'', calling it "one last exclamation point on that memorable and important project".

''Soul Journey''

For the 2003 release, ''Soul Journey'', Welch and Rawlings explored new territory. Welch said: "I wanted to make it a happier record. Out of our four records, I thought this might be the one where you're driving down the road listening to it on a sunny summer day." Rawlings again produced the record. The album also reflected a change in the typically sparse instrumentation: Welch and Rawlings introduced a dobro, violin, electric bass and drums, and Welch later said, "Everything's not supposed to sound the same, you want it to reflect change and growth."

In three songs of ''Soul Journey'', for the first time Welch and Rawlings recorded their own versions of traditional folk songs. On the original compositions, Welch's lyrics are more autobiographical than previous albums.

The album received mixed reviews. Allmusic's Zac Johnson wrote that it was "too casual and off-the-cuff", but called it a "wonderful, dusty summertime front-porch album, full of whiskey drawls and sly smiles, floorboard stomps and screen-door creaks". Jon Caramanica of ''Rolling Stone'' criticized the slower songs as stagnant, but complimented the upbeat songs. ''Soul Journey'' also garnered significant acclaim. John Harris of ''Mojo'' magazine described the album as "pretty much perfect", and ''Uncut''s Barney Hoskyns favorably compared it to Bob Dylan and The Band's ''The Basement Tapes''. Will Hermes of ''Entertainment Weekly'' wrote that Welch has "never sounded deeper, realer, or sexier." ''Soul Journey'' peaked at #107 on the Billboard charts, and reached #3 for Independent Albums.

Dave Rawlings Machine

Welch and Rawlings continued their partnership in the band Dave Rawlings Machine. Welch co-wrote five of the songs with Rawlings, and provided guitar and harmony vocals. Andy Gill of ''The Independent'' described the 2009 debut album ''A Friend of a Friend'' as "akin to one of Welch's albums, but with the balance of their harmonies swapped to favour Rawlings' voice". Although ostensibly Rawlings' first solo album, Alex Ramon of PopMatters noted the similarities to Welch albums. ''Paste Magazine''s Stephen Deusner praised ''A Friend of a Friend'' for incorporating "a wide swath of traditional American music," comments echoed by ''Rolling Stone''s Will Hermes and in the ''PopMatters'' piece.

The Harrow & The Harvest

In a 2007 feature in ''The Guardian'', critic John Harris expressed frustration that there had not been a Gillian Welch release in four years. Creation Records founder Alan McGee showed optimism about Welch and Rawlings testing out some new songs while opening some concerts for Rilo Kiley, and wrote in a 2009 blog entry "the long gestation period signals nothing less than a perfect album". In 2009, Rawlings said that recording for the next Gillian Welch album has started, but did not give a release date.

''The Harrow & The Harvest'' was released on June 28, 2011. Welch attributed the long time period between releases to writer's block and dissatisfaction with initial recording attempts. She explained: "Our songcraft slipped and I really don't know why. It's not uncommon. It's something that happens to writers. It's the deepest frustration we have come through, hence the album title." The writing process involved "this endless back and forth between the two of us," Welch said, stating that "It’s our most intertwined, co-authored, jointly-composed album."

The album received praise from publications such as ''The Los Angeles Times'', ''Uncut'', and'' Rolling Stone''. Thom Jurek of Allmusic wrote that the album "is stunning for its intimacy, its lack of studio artifice, its warmth and its timeless, if hard won, songcraft"..

The album peaked at #20 on the US Billboard 200 and #25 on the UK Albums Chart.

Musical style

Welch and Rawlings incorporate elements of early twentieth century music such as old time, classic country, gospel and traditional bluegrass with modern elements of rhythm and blues, rock 'n' roll, jazz, and punk rock. ''The New Yorker''s Alec Wilkinson maintained their musical style is "not easily classified—it is at once innovative and obliquely reminiscent of past rural forms". The instrumentation on their songs is usually a simple arrangement, with Welch and Rawlings accompanying their own vocals with acoustic guitars, banjos, or a mandolin. Welch plays rhythm guitar with a 1956 Gibson J-50 (or banjo), while Rawlings plays lead on a 1935 Epiphone Olympic Guitar. ''The New Yorker''s Wilkinson described Rawlings as a "strikingly inventive guitarist" who plays solos that are "daring melodic leaps". A review in ''No Depression'' by Andy Moore observed that "he [Rawlings] doesn't play his big, coffee-colored, hollow body Gibson so much as he squeezes, strokes, chokes and does just about everything but blow into it". Jamie Cowperthwait of ''Rolling Stone'' wrote that Rawlings' guitar playing "makes the music swell and vibrate at all the right moments."

Themes

Many songs performed by Welch and Rawlings contain dark themes about social outcasts struggling against such elements as poverty, drug addiction, death, a disconnection from their family, and an unresponsive God. Despite Welch being the lead singer, several of these characters are male. Welch has commented, "To be commercial, everybody wants happy love songs. People would flat-out ask me, 'Don't you have any happy love songs?' Well, as a matter of fact, I don't. I've got songs about orphans and morphine addicts." To reflect these themes, Welch and Rawlings often employ a slow pace to their songs. Their tempo is compared to a "slow heartbeat", and Cowperthwait of ''Rolling Stone'' observed that their songs "can lull you into near-hypnosis and then make your jaw drop with one final revelation".

Reception

Welch has received broad critical praise. Geoffrey Himes of ''The Washington Post'' described Welch as "one of the most interesting singer-songwriters of her generation". In 2003, Tom Kielty of ''The Boston Globe'' observed that she was "quietly establishing one of the most impressive catalogs in contemporary roots music", and a 2007 piece in ''The Guardian'' by John Harris called Welch "one of the decade's greatest talents". Critic Robert Hilburn of the ''Los Angeles Times'' wrote, "At every turn, she demonstrates a spark and commitment that should endear her to anyone from country and folk to pop and rock fans who appreciate imagination and heart."

When Welch's first two albums came out, critics questioned the authenticity of her music, as she was raised in Southern California, but performed Appalachian themed songs. For ''Revival'', Welch was criticized for "manufacturing emotion", and a review of ''Hell Among the Yearlings'' by Chris Herrington of ''City Pages'' stated, "Welch is someone who discovered old-time music in college and decided that her own sheltered life could never be worth writing about", and that she is "completely devoid of individuality". Other critics rejected the notion that her background affects the authenticity of her music. Music critic Mark Kemp defended Welch in a ''The New York Times'' piece:

The first-person protagonist of Ms. Welch’s song ("Caleb Meyer") may be a young girl from a time and place that Ms. Welch will never fully understand, but the feelings the singer expresses about rape, and the respect she displays for her chosen musical genre, are nothing if not poignantly authentic. Likewise, it matters not whether Ms. Welch has ever walked the streets of "the black dust towns of East Tennessee" about which she sings in "Miner's Refrain" because the sense of foreboding that she expresses for the men who once labored in coal mines with futile hopes of a better life comes through loud and clear.

''The Wall Street Journal'''s Taylor Holliday echoed this: "Stingy critics give Ms. Welch a hard time because she's a California city girl, not an Appalachian coal miner's daughter. But as Lucinda or Emmylou might attest, love of the music is not a birthright, but an earned right. Listen to Ms. Welch yodel, in a tune about that no-good "gal" Morphine, and you know she's as mountain as they come."

Influences and collaborations

Welch emphasizes music from a previous era as her major influence. She said that "by and large I listen to people who are dead. I'm really of the tried-and-true school. I let 50 years go by and see what's really relevant." Welch has acknowledged inspiration from several traditional country artists, including the Stanley Brothers, the Carter Family, the Louvin Brothers, and the Blue Sky Boys. She explained her relationship with traditional music by saying, "I've never tried to be traditional. It's been a springboard for me and I love it and revere it and would not be doing what I do without the music of the Monroe Brothers, the Stanley Brothers and the Carter Family. However, it was clear I was never going to be able to do exactly that; I'm a songwriter."

In addition to the strong country influence, Welch also draws on a repertoire of such Rock 'n' Roll artists as Bob Dylan, Chuck Berry, Neil Young, the Grateful Dead and the Velvet Underground. She has noted alternative rock bands Throwing Muses, Pixies and Camper Van Beethoven "don't directly inform my music, but they're in there."

Welch has recorded songs with a variety of notable artists, including Ryan Adams, Ani DiFranco, Emmylou Harris, Jay Farrar, Alison Krauss, Old Crow Medicine Show, Bright Eyes, Robyn Hitchcock, Steve Earle, Ralph Stanley, The Decemberists, Solomon Burke and Mark Knopfler. Welch and Rawlings' contributions on Hitchcock's album ''Spooked'' was described by Christopher Bahn of ''The A.V. Club'' as "subtle but vital". Mark Deming of Allmusic wrote that their work on Ryan Adams' album ''Heartbreaker'' "brought out the best in Adams".

Artists who have recorded songs written by Welch include Jimmy Buffett, Alison Krauss and Union Station, Trisha Yearwood, Joan Baez, Allison Moorer, Emmylou Harris, and Kathy Mattea.

Performances

Welch and Rawlings have played many music festivals, including The Newport Folk Festival, Coachella Festival, The Telluride Bluegrass Festival, The Cambridge Folk Festival, MerleFest, The Austin City Limits Festival, and Farm Aid. They have toured North America extensively, and have played in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. Concert reviews have praised the chemistry between Welch and Rawlings on stage. Tizzy Asher of the ''Seattle Post-Intelligencer'' wrote "there was a startling unspoken intimacy between them. They anticipated each other's movements and shifted when necessary to fit each other."

The Dave Rawlings Machine have toured North America, with the band composed of Rawlings, Welch and three members of Old Crow Medicine Show. Welch and Rawlings also participate in group tours with notable musicians. In 2004, they were part of the Sweet Harmony Traveling Revue, a three-week US tour with Patty Griffin, Buddy Miller and Emmylou Harris. In 2009, The Dave Rawlings Machine joined Old Crow Medicine Show, The Felice Brothers and Justin Townes Earle for The Big Surprise Tour, a US tour described as a "roots-music extravaganza". In 2011, it was announced that Welch would be opening a short tour for the newly reformed Buffalo Springfield.

Discography

1996 – ''Revival''

1998 – ''Hell Among the Yearlings''

2001 – ''Time (The Revelator)''

2003 – ''Soul Journey''

2011 - ''The Harrow & The Harvest''

Footnotes

References

External links

Official website

Category:1967 births Category:Living people Category:American female singers Category:American folk singers Category:American singer-songwriters Category:Berklee College of Music alumni Category:American bluegrass musicians Category:Grammy Award winners Category:People from Nashville, Tennessee Category:People from New York City Category:University of California, Santa Cruz alumni Category:American adoptees Category:American female guitarists Category:People from Santa Monica, California

de:Gillian Welch fr:Gillian Welch he:גיליאן ולץ' simple:Gillian Welch sv:Gillian Welch

name	Elvis Costello
background	solo_singer
birth name	Declan Patrick MacManus
alias	D.P. CostelloThe ImposterLittle Hands of ConcreteNapoleon DynamiteD.P.A. MacManusDeclan Patrick Aloysius MacManus
born	August 25, 1954Paddington, London, England
instrument	Vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass, drums
genre	Singer-songwriterPunk rockPub rockNew Wave
occupation	Musician, singer-songwriter, record producer
years active	1970–present
label	Stiff, Radar, F-Beat, Demon, Columbia, Warner Bros., Mercury, Island, Deutsche Grammophon, Lost Highway, Verve, HearMusic, Rykodisc, Rhino, Hip-O
associated acts	The Attractions, The Imposters, Diana Krall, Burt Bacharach, Brodsky Quartet, Nick Lowe, Madness
website	Elvis Costello.com
notable instruments	Fender JazzmasterFender Telecaster }}

Declan Patrick MacManus (born 25 August 1954), known as Elvis Costello, is an English singer-songwriter. He came to prominence as an early participant in London's pub rock scene in the mid-1970s and later became associated with the punk/New Wave genre. Steeped in word play, the vocabulary of Costello's lyrics is broader than that of most popular songs. His music has drawn on many diverse genres; one critic described him as a "pop encyclopedia," able to "reinvent the past in his own image".

Early life

Costello was born Declan Patrick MacManus in St Mary's Hospital, London, the son of Lillian Ablett and Ross MacManus, a musician and bandleader. He is of Irish heritage. Costello lived in Twickenham, attending Hounslow Secondary Modern School, which is now St Mark's Catholic Secondary School, in neighbouring Hounslow. With a musically inclined father (who was a jazz trumpeter and sang with The Joe Loss Orchestra), Costello's first broadcast recording was alongside his dad in a television commercial for R. White's Lemonade (''I'm a Secret Lemonade Drinker''). His father wrote and sang the song; Costello provided backing vocals. The advertisement won a silver award at the 1974 International Advertising Festival.

Costello moved with his Liverpool-born mother to Birkenhead in 1971. There, he formed his first band, a folk duo called Rusty, with Allan Mayes. After completing secondary school at St. Francis Xavier's College, he moved back to London where he next formed a band called Flip City, which had a style in the pub rock vein. They were active from 1974 through to early 1976. Around this time, Costello adopted the stage name D.P. Costello. His father had performed under the name Day Costello, and Elvis has said in interviews that he took this name as a tribute to his father.

To support himself, he worked at a number of office jobs, most famously at Elizabeth Arden – immortalised in the lyrics of "I'm Not Angry" as the "vanity factory" – where he worked as a data entry clerk. He worked for a short period as a computer operator at the Midland Bank computer centre in Bootle. He continued to write songs, and began actively looking for a solo recording contract. On the basis of a demo tape, he was signed to independent label Stiff Records. His manager at Stiff, Jake Riviera, suggested a name change, combining Elvis Presley's first name and Costello, his father's stage name.

Career

1970s

Costello's first single for Stiff was "Less Than Zero," released on 25 March 1977. Two months later, his debut album, ''My Aim Is True'' (1977), was released to moderate commercial success (No. 14 in the UK and, later, Top 40 in the US) with Costello appearing on the cover in what became his trademark oversize glasses, bearing some resemblance to Buddy Holly. Stiff's records were initially distributed only in the UK, which meant that Costello's first album and singles were initially available in the US as imports only. In an attempt to change this, Costello was arrested for busking outside a London convention of CBS Records executives, protesting that no US record company had yet seen fit to release his records in the United States. Costello signed to CBS's Columbia Records label in the US a few months later.

The backing for Costello's debut album was provided by American West Coast band Clover, a country outfit living in England whose members would later go on to join Huey Lewis and the News and The Doobie Brothers. Later in 1977, Costello formed his own permanent backing band, The Attractions, consisting of Steve Nieve (born Steve Nason; piano), Bruce Thomas (bass guitar), and Pete Thomas (drums; unrelated to Bruce Thomas). Growing antipathy between Costello and Bruce Thomas contributed to the Attractions' first split in 1986, and the rift was exacerbated by what Costello felt was his unflattering portrayal in Thomas' 1990 book ''The Big Wheel''. Despite this, the original group reunited for the 1994 album ''Brutal Youth'' and toured together over the next two years, but split for good in 1996, although Nieve and Pete Thomas continued to back Costello through various touring and recording lineups and as of 2011 are still members of his current backing group The Imposters. The split between Costello and Bruce Thomas appears permanent, however; Bruce made a brief appearance with his former bandmates when the group was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2003, but when Costello was asked why Bruce did not play with them at the event, he reportedly replied, "I only work with professional musicians."

Costello released his first major hit single, "Watching the Detectives," which was recorded with Nieve and the pair of Steve Goulding (drums) and Andrew Bodnar (bass), both members of Graham Parker's backing band The Rumour (whom he had used to audition for The Attractions).

On 17 December 1977, Costello and The Attractions appeared as the musical guest act on the episode of ''Saturday Night Live'' as a last minute fill-in for the Sex Pistols. Scheduled to play "Less Than Zero," he surprised the SNL crew by abruptly stopping the song mid-intro, and launching into "Radio Radio." Following a whirlwind tour with other Stiff artists – captured on the ''Live Stiffs'' album, notable for Costello's recording of the Burt Bacharach/Hal David standard "I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself" – the band recorded ''This Year's Model'' (1978). Some of the more popular tracks include the British hit "(I Don't Want to Go To) Chelsea" and "Pump It Up." His U.S. record company saw Costello as such a priority that his last name replaced the word Columbia on the label of the disc's original pressing. The Attractions' first tour of Australia in December 1978 was notable for controversial performance at Sydney's Regent Theatre when, angered by the group's failure to perform an encore after their brief 35-minute set, audience members destroyed some of the seating.

A tour of the U.S. and Canada also saw the release of the much-bootlegged Canadian promo-only ''Live at the El Mocambo'', recorded at a Toronto rock club, which finally saw an official release as part of the ''2½ Years'' box set in 1993. It was during the ensuing United States tour that Costello met and developed a relationship with former ''Playboy'' model Bebe Buell (mother of Liv Tyler and later the partner of Todd Rundgren). Their on-again-off-again courtship would last until 1984 and would allegedly become a deep well of inspiration for Costello's songwriting.

In 1979, he released his third LP ''Armed Forces'' (originally to have been titled ''Emotional Fascism'', a phrase that appeared on the LP's inner sleeve). Both the album and the single "Oliver's Army" went to #2 in the UK, and the opening track "Accidents Will Happen" gained wide television exposure thanks to its innovative animated music video, directed by Annabel Jankel and Rocky Morton. Costello also found time in 1979 to produce the debut album for 2 Tone ska revival band, The Specials.

Costello's standing in the U.S. was bruised for a time when in March 1979, during a drunken argument with Stephen Stills and Bonnie Bramlett in a Columbus, Ohio Holiday Inn bar, the singer referred to James Brown as a "jive-ass nigger", then upped the ante by pronouncing Ray Charles a "blind, ignorant, nigger". Costello apologised at a New York City press conference a few days later, claiming that he had been drunk and had been attempting to be obnoxious in order to bring the conversation to a swift conclusion, not anticipating that Bramlett would bring his comments to the press. According to Costello, "it became necessary for me to outrage these people with about the most obnoxious and offensive remarks that I could muster." In his liner notes for the expanded version of ''Get Happy!!'', Costello writes that some time after the incident he had declined an offer to meet Charles out of guilt and embarrassment, though Charles himself had forgiven Costello saying "Drunken talk isn't meant to be printed in the paper." Costello worked extensively in Britain's Rock Against Racism campaign both before and after the incident. The incident inspired his ''Get Happy!!'' song "Riot Act."

Costello is also an avid country music fan and has cited George Jones as his favourite country singer. In 1977, he appeared in Jones' duet album ''My Very Special Guests'', contributing "Stranger in the House," which they later performed together on an HBO special dedicated to Jones.

1980s

The soul-infused ''Get Happy!!'' would be the first, and—along with ''King of America'' – possibly most successful, of Costello's many experiments with genres beyond those he is normally associated with. The single, "I Can't Stand Up for Falling Down" was an old Sam and Dave song (though Costello increased the tempo considerably). Lyrically, the songs are full of Costello's signature word play, to the point that he later felt he had become something of a self-parody and toned it down on later releases; he has mockingly described himself in interviews as "rock and roll's Scrabble champion." His only 1980 appearance in North America was at the Heatwave festival in August near Toronto.

In 1981, the band released ''Trust'' amidst growing tensions within the band, particularly between Bruce and Pete Thomas. In the U.S., the single "Watch Your Step" was released and played live on Tom Snyder's ''Tomorrow'' show, and received airplay on FM rock radio. In the UK, the single "Clubland" scraped the lower reaches of the charts; follow-up single "From a Whisper to a Scream" (a duet with Glenn Tilbrook of Squeeze) became the first Costello single in over four years to completely miss the charts. Costello also co-produced Squeeze's popular 1981 album ''East Side Story'' (with Roger Bechirian) and also performed backing vocals on the group's hit single "Tempted".

Following ''Trust'', Costello released ''Almost Blue'', an album of country music cover songs written by the likes of Hank Williams ("Why Don't You Love Me (Like You Used to Do?)"), Merle Haggard ("Tonight the Bottle Let Me Down") and Gram Parsons ("How Much I Lied"). The album was a tribute to the country music he had grown up listening to, especially George Jones. It received mixed reviews. The first pressings of the record in the UK bore a sticker with the message: "WARNING: This album contains country & western music and may cause a radical reaction in narrow minded listeners." ''Almost Blue'' did spawn a surprise UK hit single in a version of George Jones' "Good Year for the Roses" (written by Jerry Chesnut), which reached #6.

''Imperial Bedroom'' (1982) marked a much darker sound, due in part to the production of Geoff Emerick, famed for engineering several Beatles records. ''Imperial Bedroom'' remains one of his most critically acclaimed records, but again failed to produce any hit singles. Costello has said he disliked the marketing pitch for the album. The album also featured Costello's song "Almost Blue"; jazz singer and trumpeter Chet Baker would later perform and record a version of this song.

In 1983, he released ''Punch the Clock'', featuring female backing vocal duo (Afrodiziak) and a four-piece horn section (The TKO Horns), alongside The Attractions. Clive Langer (who co-produced with Alan Winstanley), provided Costello with a melody which eventually became "Shipbuilding," which featured a trumpet solo by Chet Baker. Prior to the release of Costello's own version, a version of the song was a minor UK hit for former Soft Machine drummer Robert Wyatt.

Under the pseudonym The Imposter, Costello released "Pills and Soap," an attack on the changes in British society brought on by Thatcherism, released to coincide with the run-up to the 1983 UK general election. ''Punch the Clock'' also generated an international hit in the single "Everyday I Write the Book," aided by a music video featuring lookalikes of the Prince and Princess of Wales undergoing domestic strife in a suburban home. The song became Costello's first Top 40 hit single in the U.S. Also in the same year, Costello provided vocals on a version of the Madness song "Tomorrow's Just Another Day" released as a B-side on the single of the same name.

Tensions within the band - notably between Costello and bassist Bruce Thomas—were beginning to tell, and Costello announced his retirement and the break-up of the group shortly before they were to record ''Goodbye Cruel World'' (1984). Costello would later say of this record that they had "got it as wrong as you can in terms of the execution". The record was poorly received upon its initial release; the liner notes to the 1995 Rykodisc re-release, penned by Costello, begin with the words "Congratulations!, you've just purchased our worst album". Costello's retirement, although short-lived, was accompanied by two compilations, ''Elvis Costello: The Man'' in the UK, Europe and Australia, and ''The Best of Elvis Costello & The Attractions'' in the U.S.

In 1985, he appeared in the Live Aid benefit concert in England, singing the Beatles' "All You Need Is Love" as a solo artist. (The event was overrunning and Costello was asked to "ditch the band".) Costello introduced the song as an "old northern English folk song," and the audience was invited to sing the chorus. In the same year Costello teamed up with friend T-Bone Burnett for the single "The People's Limousine" under the moniker of The Coward Brothers. That year, Costello also produced ''Rum Sodomy & the Lash'' for the Irish punk/folk band The Pogues.

By 1986, Costello was preparing to make a comeback. Working in the U.S. with Burnett, a band containing a number of Elvis Presley's sidemen (including James Burton and Jerry Scheff), and minor input from the Attractions, he produced ''King of America'', an acoustic guitar-driven album with a country sound. Around this time he legally changed his name back to Declan MacManus, adding Aloysius as an extra middle name. Costello retooled his upcoming tour to allow for multiple nights in each city, playing one night with The Confederates (James Burton et al.), one night with The Attractions, and one night solo acoustic. In May 1986, Costello performed at Self Aid, a benefit concert held in Dublin that focused on the chronic unemployment which was widespread in Ireland at that time.

Later that year, Costello returned to the studio with the Attractions and recorded ''Blood and Chocolate'', which was lauded for a post-punk fervour not heard since 1978's ''This Year's Model''. It also marked the return of producer Nick Lowe, who had produced Costello's first five albums. While ''Blood and Chocolate'' failed to chart a hit single of any significance, it did produce what has since become one of Costello's signature concert songs, "I Want You." On this album, Costello adopted the alias Napoleon Dynamite, the name he later attributed to the character of the emcee that he played during the vaudeville-style tour to support ''Blood and Chocolate''. (The pseudonym had previously been used in 1982, when the B-side single "Imperial Bedroom" was credited to Napoleon Dynamite & The Royal Guard, and was later appropriated by the 2004 film ''Napoleon Dynamite''). In 1989, Costello, with a new contract with Warner Bros., released ''Spike'', which spawned his biggest single in America, the Top 20 hit "Veronica," one of several songs Costello co-wrote with Paul McCartney in that period (see Collaborations).

1990s

In 1991, having grown a long beard, Costello released ''Mighty Like a Rose'', which featured the single "The Other Side of Summer." He also found time to co-compose and co-produce, with Richard Harvey, the title and incidental music for the mini-series ''G.B.H.'' by Alan Bleasdale. This entirely instrumental, and largely orchestral, soundtrack garnered a BAFTA, for Best Music for a TV Series for the pair.

In 1993, Costello experimented with classical music with a critically acclaimed collaboration with the Brodsky Quartet on ''The Juliet Letters''. During this period, Costello wrote a full album's worth of material for Wendy James, and these songs became the tracks on her 1993 solo album ''Now Ain't the Time for Your Tears''. Costello returned to rock and roll the following year with a project that reunited him with The Attractions, ''Brutal Youth''. In 1995, Costello released ''Kojak Variety'', an album of cover songs recorded five years earlier, and followed in 1996 with an album of songs originally written for other artists, ''All This Useless Beauty''. This was the final album of original material that he issued under his Warner Bros. contract. In the spring of 1996, Costello played a series of intimate club dates, backed only by Nieve on the piano, in support of ''All This Useless Beauty''. An ensuing summer and fall tour with the Attractions proved to be the death knell for the band. With relations between Costello and bassist Bruce Thomas at a breaking point, Costello announced that the current tour would be the Attractions' last. The quartet performed their final U.S. show in Seattle, Washington on 1 September 1996, before wrapping up their tour in Japan. To fulfill his contractual obligations to Warner Bros., Costello released a greatest hits album titled ''Extreme Honey'' (1997). It contained an original track titled "The Bridge I Burned," featuring Costello's son, Matt, on bass. In the intervening period, Costello had served as artistic chair for the 1995 Meltdown Festival, which gave him the opportunity to explore his increasingly eclectic musical interests. His involvement in the festival yielded a one-off live EP with jazz guitarist Bill Frisell, which featured both cover material and a few of his own songs.

In 1998, Costello signed a multi-label contract with Polygram Records, sold by its parent company the same year to become part of the Universal Music Group. Costello released his new work on what he deemed the suitable imprimatur within the family of labels. His first new release as part of this contract involved a collaboration with Burt Bacharach. Their work had commenced earlier, in 1996, on a song called "God Give Me Strength" for the movie ''Grace of My Heart''. This led the pair to write and record the critically acclaimed album ''Painted From Memory'', released under his new contract in 1998, on the Mercury Records label, featuring songs that were largely inspired by the dissolution of his marriage to Cait O'Riordan. Costello and Bacharach performed several concerts with a full orchestral backing, and also recorded an updated version of Bacharach's "I'll Never Fall in Love Again" for the soundtrack to ''Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me'', with both appearing in the film to perform the song. He also wrote "I Throw My Toys Around" for ''The Rugrats Movie'' and performed it with No Doubt. The same year, he collaborated with Paddy Moloney of The Chieftains on "The Long Journey Home" on the soundtrack of the PBS/Disney mini-series of the same name. The soundtrack won a Grammy that year.

In 1999, Costello contributed a version of "She," released in 1974 by Charles Aznavour and Herbert Kretzmer, for the soundtrack of the film ''Notting Hill'', with Trevor Jones producing. For the 25th anniversary of ''Saturday Night Live'', Costello was invited to the program, where he re-enacted his abrupt song-switch: This time, however, he interrupted the Beastie Boys' "Sabotage," and they acted as his backing group for "Radio Radio".

2000 to present

In 2000, Costello appeared at the Town Hall Theatre, New York, in Steve Nieve's opera ''Welcome to the Voice'', alongside Ron Sexsmith and John Flansburgh of They Might Be Giants.In 2001, Costello was artist in residence at UCLA and wrote the music for a new ballet. He produced and appeared on an album of pop songs for opera singer, Anne Sofie von Otter. He released the album ''When I Was Cruel'' in 2002 on Island Records, and toured with a new band, the Imposters (essentially the Attractions but with a different bass player, Davey Faragher, formerly of Cracker). He appeared as himself in the "How I Spent My Strummer Vacation" episode of ''The Simpsons''. On 23 February 2003, Costello, along with Bruce Springsteen, Steve Van Zandt, and Dave Grohl, performed a version of The Clash's "London Calling" at the 45th Grammy Awards ceremony, in honour of Clash frontman Joe Strummer, who had died the previous December. In March, Elvis Costello & The Attractions were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He announced his engagement in May to Canadian jazz singer and pianist Diana Krall, whom he had seen in concert and then met backstage at the Sydney Opera House in Australia. That September, he released ''North'', an album of piano-based ballads concerning the breakdown of his former marriage, and his falling in love with Krall. Also that year, Costello made an appearance in the television show ''Frasier'' as a folk singer in the Cafe Nervosa, sending Frasier and Niles on a search for a new coffee bar.

The song "Scarlet Tide" (co-written by Costello and T-Bone Burnett and used in the film ''Cold Mountain'') was nominated for a 2004 Academy Award; he performed it at the awards ceremony with Alison Krauss, who sang the song on the official soundtrack. Costello co-wrote many songs on Krall's 2004 CD, ''The Girl in the Other Room'', the first of hers to feature several original compositions. In July 2004 Costello's first full-scale orchestral work, ''Il Sogno'', was performed in New York. The work, a ballet after Shakespeare's ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'', was commissioned by Italian dance troupe Aterballeto, and received critical acclaim from the classical music critics. Performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, the recording was released on CD in September by Deutsche Grammophon. Costello released the album ''The Delivery Man'', recorded in Oxford, Mississippi and released on Lost Highway Records, in September of the same year, and it was hailed as one of his best albums.

A CD recording of a collaboration with Marian McPartland on her show ''Piano Jazz'' was released in 2005. It featured Costello singing six jazz standards and two of his own songs, accompanied by McPartland on piano. In November, Costello started recording a new album with Allen Toussaint and producer Joe Henry. ''The River in Reverse'' was released in the UK on the Verve label the following year in May.

A 2005 tour included a gig at Glastonbury that Costello considered to be so dreadful that he said "I don't care if I ever play England again. That gig made up my mind I wouldn't come back. I don't get along with it. We lost touch. It's 25 years since I lived there. I don't dig it, they don't dig me....British music fans don't have the same attitude to age as they do in America, where young people come to check out, say Willie Nelson. They feel some connection with him and find a role for that music in their lives."

In a studio recording of Nieve's opera ''Welcome to the Voice'' (2006, Deutsche Grammophon), Costello interpreted the character of Chief of Police, with Barbara Bonney, Robert Wyatt, Sting and Amanda Roocroft, and the album reached #2 in the ''Billboard'' classical charts. Costello later reprised the piece on the stage of the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris in 2008, with Sting, Joe Sumner of Fiction Plane (Sting's son) and Sylvia Schwartz. Also released in 2006 was a live recording of a concert with the Metropole Orkest at the North Sea Jazz Festival, entitled ''My Flame Burns Blue''. The soundtrack for ''House M.D.'' featured Costello's interpretation of "Beautiful" by Christina Aguilera, with the song appearing in the second episode of Series 2.

Costello was commissioned to write a chamber opera by the Danish Royal Opera, Copenhagen, on the subject of Hans Christian Andersen's infatuation with Swedish soprano Jenny Lind. Called ''The Secret Songs'' it was unfinished. In a performance in 2007 directed by Kasper Bech Holten at the Opera's studio theatre (Takelloftet), finished songs were interspersed with pieces from Costello's 1993 collaborative classical album ''The Juliet Letters'', featuring Danish soprano Sine Bundgaard as Lind. The 2009 album ''Secret, Profane & Sugarcane'' includes material from ''Secret Songs''.

On 22 April 2008, ''Momofuku'' was released on Lost Highway Records, the same imprint that released ''The Delivery Man'', his previous studio album. The album was, at least initially, released exclusively on vinyl (with a code to download a digital copy). That summer, in support of the album, Costello toured with The Police on the final leg of their 2007/2008 Reunion Tour. Costello played a homecoming gig at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall on 25 June 2006. and, that month, gave his first performance in Poland, appearing with The Imposters for the closing gig of the Malta theatre festival in Poznań.

In July 2008, Costello (as Declan McManus) was awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of Music from the University of Liverpool.

From late 2008 into 2010, Costello hosted Channel 4/CTV's series ''Spectacle'' in which Costello talked and performed with stars in various fields, styled similarly to ''Inside the Actors Studio''. Between its two seasons, the show compiled 20 episodes, including one where Costello was interviewed by actress Mary-Louise Parker.

Costello was featured on Fall Out Boy's 2008 album ''Folie à Deux'', providing vocals on the track "What a Catch, Donnie", along with other artists who are friends with the band.

Costello appeared in Stephen Colbert's television special ''A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift of All''. In the program, he was eaten by a bear, but later saved by Santa Claus; he also sang a duet with Colbert. The special was first aired on 23 November 2008. Costello released ''Secret, Profane & Sugarcane'', a collaboration with T-Bone Burnett, on 9 June 2009. Burnett previously worked with Costello on ''King of America'' and ''Spike''. It was his first on the Starbucks Hear Music label and a return to country music in the manner of ''Good Year for the Roses''.

Costello appeared as himself in the finale of the third season of ''30 Rock'' and sang in the episode's celebrity telethon, ''Kidney Now!''. The episode references Costello's given name when Jack Donaghy accuses him of concealing his true identity: "Declan McManus, international art thief."

In May 2009, Costello made a surprise cameo appearance on-stage at the Beacon Theater in New York as part of Spinal Tap's ''Unwigged and Unplugged'' show, singing their fictional 1965 hit "Gimme Some Money" with the band backing him up.

On 15 May 2010, Costello announced he would withdraw from a concert performed in Israel in opposition to Israel's treatment of Palestinians. In a statement on his website, Costello wrote, "It has been necessary to dial out the falsehoods of propaganda, the double game and hysterical language of politics, the vanity and self-righteousness of public communiqués from cranks in order to eventually sift through my own conflicted thoughts."

Also in 2010 Elvis Costello appeared as himself in David Simon's television series, ''Treme''. Costello released the album ''National Ransom'' in autumn of 2010.

Personal life

Costello has been married three times, the first time to Mary Burgoyne in 1974, with whom he had a son.

In 1985, Costello became involved with Cait O'Riordan, former bassist for the English/Irish group The Pogues, while he was producing The Pogues' album ''Rum Sodomy and the Lash''. They married in 1986 and split up by the end of 2002.

Costello became engaged to singer Diana Krall in May 2003, and married her at the home of Elton John on December 6 that year. Krall gave birth to twin sons, Dexter Henry Lorcan and Frank Harlan James, on 6 December 2006 in New York City.

A vegetarian since the early 1980s, Costello says he was moved to reject meat after seeing the documentary ''The Animals Film'' (1982), which also helped inspire his song "Pills and Soap" (from ''Punch the Clock'', 1983).

Humanitarian causes

Costello sits on the Advisory Board of the Board of Directors of the Jazz Foundation of America. Costello began working with the Jazz Foundation in 2001, and has been a featured performer in their annual benefit A Great Night in Harlem since 2006. Costello has donated his time working with the Jazz Foundation of America to save the homes and the lives of America's elderly jazz and blues musicians, including musicians who survived Hurricane Katrina.

Collaborations

In addition to his major recorded collaborations with Bacharach, the Brodsky Quartet, and von Otter, Costello has frequently been involved in other collaborations.

In 1987, Costello began a long-running songwriting collaboration with Paul McCartney. They wrote a number of songs together, including:

"Back On My Feet", the B-side of McCartney's 1987 single "Once Upon A Long Ago", later added as a bonus track on the 1993 re-issue of McCartney's ''Flowers in the Dirt''

Costello's "Veronica" and "Pads, Paws and Claws" from ''Spike'' (1989) (Also, McCartney plays Hofner bass but does not have a writing credit for "This Town" - the opening song for the album.)

"So Like Candy" and "Playboy to a Man" from ''Mighty Like a Rose'' (1991)

McCartney's "My Brave Face", "Don't Be Careless Love", "That Day Is Done" and "You Want Her Too" from ''Flowers in the Dirt'' (1989)

"The Lovers That Never Were" and "Mistress and Maid" from ''Off the Ground'' (1993).

"Shallow Grave" from ''All This Useless Beauty'' (1996).

Costello talked about their collaboration:

}}

In 1987, he appeared on the HBO special ''Roy Orbison and Friends, A Black and White Night'', which featured his long-time idol Roy Orbison, and was invited back to ''Saturday Night Live'' for the first time since 1977.

In 1988, Costello co-wrote "At the Other End (of the Telescope)" with Aimee Mann; this song appears on the Til Tuesday album ''Everything's Different Now''.

In 2000, Costello wrote lyrics to "Green Song", a solo cello piece by Svante Henryson; this song appears on the Anne Sofie von Otter album ''For the Stars''.

In 2005, Costello performed with Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong. They played both Costello and Green Day songs together, including "Alison", "No Action", "Basket Case" and "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)".

In 2007, Costello collaborated with the Argentinean/Uruguay an electro-tango band Bajofondo on the song "Fairly Right" from the album ''Mar Dulce''.

In 2008, Costello collaborated with Fall Out Boy on the track "What A Catch, Donnie" from their album ''Folie a Deux''.

In Jenny Lewis' 2008 release, ''Acid Tongue'', Costello provided vocals for the song "Carpetbaggers".

In November 2009, Costello appeared live with Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band at Madison Square Garden and performed the Jackie Wilson song, Higher and Higher.

In December 2009, it was announced that Costello would be portraying The Shape in the upcoming album ''Ghost Brothers of Darkland County'', a collaboration between rock singer John Mellencamp and novelist Stephen King.

In February 2010, Costello appeared in the live cinecast of Garrison Keillor's ''Prairie Home Companion'', singing some of his own songs, and participating in many of the show's other musical and acting performances.

In March 2011, played with Phil Lesh, and Bob Weir and Furthur in New York City.

In April 2011, played the song "Taken For A Fool" with The Strokes in Madison Square Garden.

On April 30, 2011, played the song "Pump it Up" with The Odds before the start of a Vancouver Canucks playoff game at Rogers Arena in Vancouver BC.

Artistic significance

Costello has worked with Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett, Lucinda Williams, Kid Rock, Lee Konitz, Brian Eno, and Rubén Blades.

Costello is also a music fan, and often champions the works of others in print. He has written several pieces for the magazine ''Vanity Fair'', including the summary of what a perfect weekend of music would be. He has contributed to two Grateful Dead tribute albums and covered Jerry Garcia/Robert Hunter tunes such as Ship of Fools, Friend of the Devil, It Must Have Been the Roses, Ripple and Tennessee Jed in concert. His collaboration with Bacharach honoured Bacharach's place in pop music history. Costello also appeared in documentaries about singers Dusty Springfield, Brian Wilson, Wanda Jackson, and Memphis, Tennessee-based Stax Records. He has also interviewed one of his own influences, Joni Mitchell.

In 2004, ''Rolling Stone Magazine'' ranked him #80 on their list of the ''100 Greatest Artists of All Time''.

==Discography==

Costello has released over 30 studio albums on his own and with the Attractions, the Imposters, or others. He has also released five live albums: ''Live at the El Mocambo'', ''Deep Dead Blue'', ''Costello & Nieve'', ''My Flame Burns Blue'', and ''Live at Hollywood High''. There have also been numerous compilations, box sets, and reissues by labels such as Rykodisc, Demon, Rhino, and Universal Music Enterprises.

Filmography

Actor

1979 film debut as "The Earl of Manchester" in ''Americathon''

1984 as "Henry Scully" in the UK TV series, ''Scully''

1984 as "Stone Deaf A&R; Man" in "The Bullshitters", a Comic Strip film first aired on Channel 4.

1985 as inept magician "Rosco de Ville" in the Alan Bleasdale film, ''No Surrender''

1987 as "Hives the Butler" in the Alex Cox film, ''Straight to Hell'', starring Joe Strummer and Courtney Love

1994 as himself on ''The Larry Sanders Show'' in the episode "People's Choice"

1997 as a barman in ''Spice World''.

1999 as himself performing "I'll Never Fall In Love Again" with Burt Bacharach in ''Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me''

1999 as a younger version of himself in ''200 Cigarettes''

2001 as himself performing "Fly me to the Moon" on the series finale of ''3rd Rock From the Sun''

2002 as himself on the episode "How I Spent My Strummer Vacation" of ''The Simpsons''

2003 as Ben on ''Frasier'', one episode

2004 as himself in the UK TV ''Dead Ringers'' New Year Special, apparently and reportedly having serendipitously entered a filming venue 2004 as himself in ''Two and a Half Men'' - Season 2, Episode 1

2006 as himself in ''Delirious''

2006 as himself in ''Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby''

2008 as himself in "A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift of All!"

2009 as himself on the episode of ''30 Rock'', "Kidney Now!"

2010 as himself on ''Treme''

Soundtrack

2003 Academy Award nomination for best original song, "The Scarlet Tide", in ''Cold Mountain''

Bibliography

Costello, Elvis. ''A Singing Dictionary''. London: Plangent Visions Music; New York, N.Y.: Exclusive selling agent for the United States and Canada, Warner Bros. Publications, 1980. ISBN 0-7692-1505-X. Sheet music, chords, and lyrics for works 1977–1980.

References

External links

ElvisCostello.com

Official Elvis Costello Lost Highway Records Artist Page

The Elvis Costello Home Page Wiki

Category:1954 births Category:Living people Category:Columbia Records artists Category:Elvis Costello & the Attractions members Category:English buskers Category:English expatriates in the United States Category:English male singers Category:English New Wave musicians Category:English rock guitarists Category:English rock keyboardists Category:English rock singers Category:English singer-songwriters Category:English people of Irish descent Category:English vegetarians Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Lost Highway Records artists Category:Musicians from London Category:People from Paddington Category:Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees‎ Category:Warner Bros. Records artists

br:Elvis Costello ca:Elvis Costello cs:Elvis Costello da:Elvis Costello de:Elvis Costello et:Elvis Costello es:Elvis Costello fa:الویس کاستلو fr:Elvis Costello ga:Elvis Costello gv:Elvis Costello gl:Elvis Costello id:Elvis Costello it:Elvis Costello he:אלביס קוסטלו la:Elvis Costello nl:Elvis Costello ja:エルヴィス・コステロ no:Elvis Costello pl:Elvis Costello pt:Elvis Costello ru:Элвис Костелло simple:Elvis Costello sl:Elvis Costello fi:Elvis Costello sv:Elvis Costello tr:Elvis Costello

background	solo_singer
birth name	Nicholas Drain Lowe
born	March 24, 1949Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, England
instrument	Vocals, guitar, piano/keyboards, bass
genre	Rock, pub rock, New Wave, Power Pop
occupation	Musician, singer-songwriter
years active	1966–present
label	Columbia Records, Demon Records, F-Beat Records, Radar Records, Reprise Records, Upstart Records, Yep Roc Records, Stiff Records, Proper Records (current).
associated acts	Brinsley Schwarz, Rockpile, Elvis Costello, The Attractions, The Imposters, Huey Lewis and the News, Noise To Go, The Cowboy Outfit, Johnny Cash, Little Village
website	nicklowe.net
notable instruments	}}

Nicholas Drain Lowe (born 24 March 1949, Walton-on-Thames), better known as Nick Lowe, is an English singer-songwriter, musician and producer.

A pivotal figure in UK pub rock, punk rock and new wave, Lowe has recorded a string of well-reviewed solo albums. Along with vocals, Lowe plays guitar, bass guitar, piano and harmonica. He is best known for his songs "Cruel to Be Kind" (a U.S. Top 40 single), and "I Love the Sound of Breaking Glass" (a top 10 UK hit), as well as his production work with Elvis Costello, Graham Parker, and others. Lowe also wrote "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding", a hit for Costello.

He currently lives in Brentford, London, England.

Biography

Lowe began his musical career in 1967, when he joined the band Kippington Lodge, with his friend Brinsley Schwarz. They released a few singles on the Parlophone record label as Kippington Lodge before they re-named the band Brinsley Schwarz in late 1969, and began performing country and blues-rock. Lowe wrote some of his best-known compositions while a member of Brinsley Schwarz, including "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding", a hit for Elvis Costello in 1979, and "Cruel to Be Kind", a solo hit for Lowe in 1979.

After leaving Brinsley Schwarz in 1975, Lowe began playing in Rockpile with Dave Edmunds. In August 1976, Lowe released "So It Goes" b/w "Heart of the City", the first single on the Stiff Records label where he was an in-house producer. The single and thus the label was funded by a loan of £400 from Dr. Feelgood's Lee Brilleaux. The label's first EP was Lowe's 1977 four-track release ''Bowi'', apparently named in response to David Bowie's contemporaneous LP ''Low''. (The joke was repeated when Lowe produced The Rumour's album ''Max'' as an 'answer' to Fleetwood Mac's ''Rumours''). Lowe continued producing albums on Stiff and other labels. In 1977 he produced Dr. Feelgood's album, ''Be Seeing You'', which included his own song, "That's It, I Quit". The following year's Dr. Feelgood album, ''Private Practice'', contained a song Lowe jointly penned with Gypie Mayo – "Milk and Alcohol". Along with "I Love The Sound of Breaking Glass", "Milk and Alcohol" is one of only two Lowe compositions to ever reach the Top 10 of the UK Singles Chart.

Lowe produced Elvis Costello's first five albums, including ''My Aim Is True'', ''This Year's Model'', and ''Armed Forces''. He also produced The Damned's first single, "New Rose", considered the first English punk single, as well as the group's debut album, ''Damned Damned Damned''.

His early 'rough and ready' production style earned him the nickname Basher (as in 'bash it out now, tart it up later'). Upon moving from Stiff to Jake Riviera's Radar and F-Beat labels, Lowe became selective in his choice of production tasks.

Because the two main singers in Rockpile had recording contracts with different record labels and managers, albums were always credited to either Lowe or Edmunds, so there is only one official Rockpile album, which was not released until the waning days of the collaboration: 1980's ''Seconds of Pleasure'', featuring the Lowe songs "When I Write The Book" and "Heart". However, two of the pair's most significant solo albums from the period; Lowe's ''Labour of Lust'' and Edmunds' ''Repeat When Necessary'', were effectively Rockpile albums (as was Carlene Carter's Lowe-produced ''Musical Shapes'' album).

Lowe was quoted as saying that he had "escaped from the tyranny of the snare drum" in ''No Depression'', (September–October 2001) when explaining his move away from regular pop music that would get played on mainstream radio.

Other well-known Lowe songs include "I Love The Sound of Breaking Glass," "All Men Are Liars," and Cruel to Be Kind, co-written with Ian Gomm and originally recorded with Brinsley Schwarz, a re-recording of which was his only U.S. Top 40 hit, reaching #12 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1979.

In 1979, Lowe married country singer Carlene Carter, daughter of fellow country singers Carl Smith and June Carter Cash and stepdaughter of Johnny Cash. He adopted her daughter, Tiffany Anastasia Lowe. The marriage ended in 1990, but they remained friends, and Lowe remained close to the Carter/Cash family. He played and recorded with Johnny Cash, and Cash recorded several of Lowe's songs. Lowe's first son, Roy Lowe, was born in 2005.

After the demise of Rockpile, Lowe toured for a period with his band Noise To Go and later with The Cowboy Outfit, which also included the noted keyboard player Paul Carrack. Lowe was also a member of the short-lived mainly studio project Little Village with John Hiatt, Ry Cooder and Jim Keltner, who originally got together to record Hiatt's 1987 album ''Bring the Family''.

In 1992, "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding" was covered by Curtis Stigers on the soundtrack album to ''The Bodyguard'', an album that sold over 15 million copies.

A New York ''Daily News'' article quoted Lowe as saying his greatest fear in recent years was "sticking with what you did when you were famous". "I didn't want to become one of those thinning-haired, jowly old geezers who still does the same shtick they did when they were young, slim and beautiful," he said. "That's revolting and rather tragic." Rock critic Jim Farber observed: "Lowe's recent albums, epitomised by the new ''At My Age'', moved him out of the realms of ironic pop and animated rock and into the role of a worldly balladeer, specialising in grave vocals and graceful tunes. Lowe's four most recent solo albums mine the wealth of American roots music, drawing on vintage country, soul and R&B; to create an elegant mix of his own."

In 2008, Yep Roc and Proper Records released a thirtieth anniversary edition of Lowe's first solo album ''Jesus of Cool'' (entitled ''Pure Pop for Now People'' in the U.S. with a slightly different track listing). The re-issue includes tracks from the British and American releases in addition to several bonus tracks. In March 2009, he released a 49 track CD/DVD compilation of songs which spanned his entire career. Proper Records released it in the UK and Europe, entitled ''Quiet Please... The New Best of Nick Lowe''.

In September 2010 Yep Roc issued ''The Impossible Bird'', ''Dig My Mood'' and ''The Convincer'' on vinyl for the first time, and after a one-night reunion concert with Elvis Costello in October in San Francisco, Lowe embarked on his first non-solo United States tour "this millennium." His backing band comprised Geraint Watkins (keyboards), Robert Treherne (drums), Johnny Scott (guitar) and Matt Radford (bass). In March 2011, Yep Roc reissued Lowe's 1979 solo album ''Labour of Lust''.

Lowe played Glastonbury 2011, performing a short solo set of Brinsley Schwarz tracks on The Spirit Of 71 stage, where they played back in 1971, before heading to the Acoustic Stage for a full band show.

Discography

Studio albums

''Jesus of Cool'' (1978, UK) (released in the U.S. as ''Pure Pop for Now People'')

''Labour of Lust'' (1979)

''Nick the Knife'' (1982)

''The Abominable Showman'' (1983)

''Nick Lowe & His Cowboy Outfit'' (1984)

''The Rose of England'' (1985)

''Pinker and Prouder than Previous'' (1988)

''Party of One'' (1990)

''The Impossible Bird'' (1994)

''Dig My Mood'' (1998)

''The Convincer'' (2001)

''At My Age'' (2007)

The Old Magic (2011) UK webpage

Live albums

''Untouched Takeaway'' (2004)

Singles

Release date	Title	Chart Positions	Notes
! UK Singles Chart	! Australia	! Canada	Hot 100>U.S. Hot 100
1976
1976	"Keep It Out of Sight"					Holland-only release.
1977	"The Bowi EP"					7" EP. Tracks: "Born a Woman" / "Shake that Rat" / "Marie Provost" / "Endless Sleep"
1977	"Halfway to Paradise"
1978	"I Love the Sound of Breaking Glass"					The first ever Radar Records label single
1978	"Little Hitler"
1978	"American Squirm"					B-side featured the Elvis Costello and the Attractions version of "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding"
1979	"Crackin' Up"
1979	"Cruel to Be Kind"					This is not a typo – "Cruel to Be Kind" coincidentally peaked at #12 in all four countries.
1979	"Switch Board Susan"					North American-only release.
1980	Rockpile:"Teacher Teacher"
1982	"Stick It Where the Sun Don't Shine"
1982	"Burning"
1982	"My Heart Hurts"
1983	"Ragin' Eyes"
1983	"Wish You Were Here"					US-only release.
1984	"Half a Boy and Half a Man"
1984	"L.A.F.S"
1985	"I Knew the Bride (When She Used to Rock 'n' Roll)"
1987	"Lovers Jamboree"					US-only release.
1990	"All Men Are Liars"
1994	"True Love Travels on a Gravel Road"
1993	"I Live on a Battlefield"
1997	"You Inspire Me"
2001	"She's Got Soul"

EPs

''Bowi'', 7" 45 rpm (Stiff 1977)

''Nick Lowe & Dave Edmunds Sing the Everly Brothers'', 7" 33⅓ rpm (F-Beat/Columbia 1980)

Compilation albums

''A Bunch of Stiff Records (One track, "I Love My Label")

''Live Stiffs Live'' (1978) (Nick Lowe's Last Chicken In The Shop got two tracks, "I Knew the Bride (When She Used to Rock 'n' Roll)" and "Let's Eat", on this live compilation of the first Stiff Records' tour.)

''16 All Time Lowes'' (1984)

''Nick's Knack'' (1986)

''Basher: The Best of Nick Lowe'' (1989)

''The Wilderness Years'' (1991)

''The Doings'' (1999)

''Quiet Please... The New Best of Nick Lowe'' (2009)

Tributes

''Labour of Love: The Music of Nick Lowe'' (Telarc, 2001) (features Dar Williams, Tom Petty, and Elvis Costello, among others).

''Lowe Profile: A Tribute To Nick Lowe'' (Brewery, 2005) (two-disc, 30 song collection featuring Dave Alvin, Foster & Lloyd, Ian Gomm, among others).

Uses in media

The music video for "All Men Are Liars" was featured in ''The Brothers Grunt'' episode "The Ugly Gruntling."

His recording of "The Beast in Me" was used in the pilot episode of ''The Sopranos''.

The song "All Men Are Liars" was featured in the Australian film ''All Men Are Liars'' written and directed by Gerard Lee and starring Toni Pearen, David Price and John Jarratt.

References

External links

The Old Magic UK page

''Batty for Music'' podcast

[ Allmusic]

Electronic press kit for "Quiet Please..."

Category:1949 births Category:Living people Category:English record producers Category:English songwriters Category:People from Walton-on-Thames Category:English rock singers Category:English male singers Category:Pre-punk groups Category:Protopunk musicians Category:English New Wave musicians

de:Nick Lowe fr:Nick Lowe it:Nick Lowe nl:Nick Lowe ja:ニック・ロウ pt:Nick Lowe ru:Лоу, Ник fi:Nick Lowe sv:Nick Lowe

name	Mavis Staples
landscape	yes
background	solo_singer
birth name	Mavis Staples
born	July 10, 1939
origin	Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
genre	Rhythm and blues, soul, gospel
occupation	Singer
years active	1950–present
label	Epic, Stax/Volt, Curtom, Paisley Park, Alligator, Anti-, Warner Bros., Verve
associated acts	The Staple Singers
website	www.mavisstaples.com
notable instruments	}}

Mavis Staples (born July 10, 1939 in Chicago, Illinois) is an American rhythm and blues and gospel singer and civil rights activist who recorded with The Staple Singers, her family's band.

Biography

Mavis Staples began her career with her family group in 1950. Initially singing locally at churches and appearing on a weekly radio show, the Staples scored a hit in 1956 with "Uncloudy Day" for the Vee-Jay label. When Mavis graduated from what is now Paul Robeson High School in 1957, The Staple Singers took their music on the road. Led by family patriarch Roebuck "Pops" Staples on guitar and including the voices of Mavis and her siblings Cleo, Yvonne, and Pervis, the Staples were called "God's Greatest Hitmakers."

With Mavis' voice and Pops' songs, singing, and guitar playing, the Staples evolved from enormously popular gospel singers (with recordings on United and Riverside as well as Vee-Jay) to become the most spectacular and influential spirituality-based group in America. By the mid-1960s The Staple Singers, inspired by Pops' close friendship with Martin Luther King, Jr., became the spiritual and musical voices of the civil rights movement. They covered contemporary pop hits with positive messages, including Bob Dylan's "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall" and a version of Stephen Stills' "For What It's Worth."

During a December 20, 2008 appearance on National Public Radio's news show "Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me," when Staples was asked about her past personal relationship with Dylan, she admitted they "were good friends, yes indeed" and that he had asked her father for her hand in marriage.

The Staples sang "message" songs like "Long Walk to D.C." and "When Will We Be Paid?," bringing their moving and articulate music to a huge number of young people. The group signed to Stax Records in 1968, joining their gospel harmonies and deep faith with musical accompaniment from members of Booker T. and the MGs. The Staple Singers hit the Top 40 eight times between 1971 and 1975, including two No. 1 singles, "I'll Take You There" and "Let's Do It Again," and a No. 2 single "Who Took the Merry Out of Christmas?"

Staples made her first solo foray while at Epic Records with The Staple Singers releasing a lone single "Crying in the Chapel" to little fanfare in the late 1960s. The single was finally re-released on the 1994 Sony Music collection ''Lost Soul''. Her first solo album would not come until a 1969 self-titled release for the Stax label. After another Stax release, ''Only for the Lonely'', in 1970, she released a soundtrack album, ''A Piece of the Action'', on Curtis Mayfield's Curtom label. A 1984 album (also self-titled) preceded two albums under the direction of rock star Prince; 1989's ''Time Waits for No One,'' followed by 1993's ''The Voice'', which ''People'' magazine named one of the Top Ten Albums of 1993. Her recent 1996 release, ''Spirituals & Gospels: A Tribute to Mahalia Jackson'' was recorded with keyboardist Lucky Peterson. The recording honours Mahalia Jackson, a close family friend and a significant influence on Mavis Staples' life. Staples made a major national return with the release of the album ''Have a Little Faith'' on Chicago's Alligator Records, produced by Jim Tullio, in 2004. The album featured spiritual music, some of it semi-acoustic.

In 2004, Staples contributed to a Verve release by legendary jazz/rock guitarist, John Scofield. The album entitled, ''That's What I Say'', was a tribute to the great Ray Charles, and led to a live tour featuring Mavis, John Scofield, pianist Gary Versace, drummer Steve Hass, and bassist Rueben Rodriguez. A new album for Anti- Records entitled ''We'll Never Turn Back'' was released on April 24, 2007. The Ry Cooder-produced concept album focuses on Gospel songs of the civil rights movement and also included two new original songs by Cooder.

Her voice has been sampled by some of the biggest selling hip-hop artists, including Salt 'N' Pepa, Ice Cube and Ludacris. Mavis Staples has recorded with a wide variety of musicians, from her friend Bob Dylan (with whom she was nominated for a 2003 Grammy Award in the "Best Pop Collaboration With Vocals" category for their duet on "Gotta Change My Way of Thinking" from the album ''Gotta Serve Somebody: The Gospel Songs of Bob Dylan'') to The Band, Ray Charles, Nona Hendryx, George Jones, Natalie Merchant, Ann Peebles, and Delbert McClinton. She has provided vocals on current albums by Los Lobos and Dr. John, and she appears on tribute albums to such artists as Johnny Paycheck, Stephen Foster and Bob Dylan.

In 2003, Staples performed in Memphis at the Orpheum Theater alongside a cadre of her fellow former Stax Records stars during "Soul Comes Home," a concert held in conjunction with the grand opening of the Stax Museum of American Soul Music at the original site of Stax Records, and appears on the CD and DVD that were recorded and filmed during the event. In 2004, she returned as guest artist for the Stax Music Academy's SNAP! Summer Music Camp and performed, again at the Orpheum and to rave reviews, with 225 of the academy's students. In June 2007, she again returned to the venue to perform at the Stax 50th Anniversary Concert to Benefit the Stax Museum of American Soul Music, produced by Concord Records, who now owns and has revived the Stax Records label.

Staples was a judge for the 3rd and 7th annual Independent Music Awards to support independent artists.

In 2009, Mavis Staples, along with Patty Griffin and The Tri-City Singers released a version of the song “Waiting For My Child To Come Home” on the compilation album Oh Happy Day: An All-Star Music Celebration.

On October 30, 2010, Staples performed at the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear alongside singer Jeff Tweedy.

Staples also performed at the 33rd Kennedy Center Honors, singing in a tribute to Paul McCartney, an honoree

On February 13, 2011, Mavis Staples won her first Grammy award in the category for Best Americana Album for ''You Are Not Alone''. In her acceptance speech, a shocked and crying Staples said "This has been a long time coming."

On May 7, 2011, Mavis was awarded an honorary doctorate from Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts.

Film and television

During her career Staples has appeared in many films and television shows, including ''The Last Waltz'', ''Graffiti Bridge'', ''Wattstax'', ''New York Undercover'', ''Soul Train'', ''Soul to Soul'', The Psychiatrist, and ''The Cosby Show''.

Discography

Albums

''Mavis Staples'' (Volt, 1969)

''Only for the Lonely'' (Stax, 1970)

''A Piece of the Action'' (Curtom, 1977)

''Oh What a Feeling'' (Warner, 1979)

''Mavis Staples'' (HDH, 1984)

''Don't Change Me Now'' (Volt/Ace, 1988)

''Time Waits for No One'' (Paisley Park, 1989)

''The Voice'' (Paisley Park, 1993)

''Spirituals & Gospel: Dedicated to Mahalia Jackson'' with Lucky Peterson (Verve, 1996)

''Have a Little Faith'' (Alligator, 2004)

''We'll Never Turn Back'' (Anti-, 2007) produced by Ry Cooder

''Live: Hope at the Hideout'' (Anti-, 2008)

''You Are Not Alone'' (Anti-, 2010) produced by Jeff Tweedy

Singles

"Crying in the Chapel" b/w "Nothing Lasts Forever" (Epic)

"I Have Learned to Do Without You" b/w "Since I Fell For You"

"Endlessly" b/w "Don't Change Me Now" (Volt)

"A House Is Not a Home" (Volt)

"A Piece of the Action" b/w "Til Blossoms Bloom" (Curtom)

The Weight on the The Last Waltz (1976)

"Oh What a Feeling" (Warner Bros., 1979)

"Tonight I Feel Like Dancing" (Warner Bros., 1979)

"Love Gone Bad" (1984)

"Show Me How It Works" (from Wildcats) (Warner Bros., 1986)

"20th Century Express" b/w "All The Discomforts Of Home" (Paisley Park, 1989)

"Time Waits for No One" (Paisley Park, 1989)

"Jaguar" (Paisley Park, 1989)

"Melody Cool" (Paisley Park, 1991)

"The Voice" (Paisley Park, 1993)

"Blood Is Thicker Than Time" (Paisley Park, 1993)

Other

"Christmas Vacation" (Theme song from ''National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation'') (1989)

''Johnny's Blues: A Tribute To Johnny Cash'' (Northern Blues, 2003)

"Waiting For My Child To Come Home" with Patty Griffin and The Tri-City Singers, on ''Oh Happy Day: An All-Star Music Celebration'' (2009)

Footnotes

References

Official website

Mavis Staples Singles Chart History

External links

Mavis Staples at NPR Music

River Front Times: Mavis Staples

Mavis Staples Interview

Mavis Staples on NPR's "Wait, Wait... Don't Tell Me!"'s "Not My Job" segment

An Evening with Mavis Staples hosted by the Chicago Freedom School

Category:1939 births Category:Living people Category:Musicians from Chicago, Illinois Category:People from Chicago, Illinois Category:African American singers Category:African Americans' rights activists Category:American female singers Category:National Heritage Fellowship winners

de:Mavis Staples es:Mavis Staples fr:Mavis Staples nl:Mavis Staples