Elvis Costello

Imperial Bedroom was a masterpiece without any standout radio hits. So Elvis Costello hired the trendy English new wave production team of Langer & Winstanley (Madness, Teardrop Explodes) and tried to produce a set of big, flashy hits. He succeeded without embarrassing himself: it's hard to get better 1980s radio songs than "Everyday I Write the Book, "Let Them All Talk" and "The World and His Wife." Some great songs don't make a great album though -- even if this was a major hit in Britain, Punch the Clock is still Costello's first non-essential collection of original songs. The set's shining star is the searing protest number, "Shipbuilding," which has Liverpool's unemployed and defeated hoping a war will bring their jobs back. The song features a trumpet solo by jazz legend Chet Baker, who went on perform Costello's "Almost Blue" for the rest of his life.

Without the sustained melodicism of Imperial Bedroom (first side, anyway) to impart the illusion of meaningful wholeness, this is adjudged a major letdown by Elvis's acolytes. But "Boxing Day" is hardly the first time one of his punderous constructions has failed not just to signify but to communicate. Most of this disparate collection (first side, anyway) does what he's always done--convey an elusive feeling that's half pinned down by the words because that's all the grasp he's got on it. And though the alternate versions of "Shipbuilding" (Robert Wyatt) and "Pills and Soap" (the Imposter) are indeed more gripping, their literalness does place his personal contortions in useful perspective. (Grade - B+)