Music > Album Reviews

Elvis Costello & The Imposters – The Boy Named If

02/02/22

Wow! Oh Wow! Elvis is back with an absolute belter of an album. The Boy Named If is a stonking thirteen tracks long and was released in mid-January while he is on the ‘Hello Again’ tour in America.

Costello say’s that, “IF,’ is a nickname for your imaginary friend; your secret self, the one who knows everything you deny, the one you blame for the shattered crockery and the hearts you break, even your own. You can hear more about this ‘Boy’ in a song of the same name”.

It takes you from the last days of a bewildered boyhood to that mortifying moment when you are told to stop acting like a child! And those sometimes dauntingly anxious teenage years as you then move into adulthood.

His vocals are well intact and as ever on point whether he is belting it out on the opener Farewell, OK or in full crooner mode on Paint The Red Rose Blue (my personal favourite track). The latter could easily have been crafted from the 1998 Painted From Memory album sessions that was recorded with the legendary Burch Bacharach, its absolute class, a real thing of beauty and will rank very highly in many years to come alongside such greats as Good Year For The Roses and Shipbuilding! Yes folks it really is that good.

The title track is quite exhilarating too as he and the band smash it out of the park with those distinctive vocals of his along with those trademark Steve Nieve keyboards. Wow! Those two opening tracks really do set the tone for the entire album, it’s a very dynamic start to proceedings.    

Mistook Me For A Friend will also sound just amazing alongside Costello classics such as Pump It Up when he hits the road again in June to tour the UK and I for one cannot wait to see him in the flesh later that month as it draws to its conclusion. This latest recording will be a real thrill for his many devoted followers. It is bright and packed full of enthusiasm, passion and energy that those of us of a certain vintage remember very fondly from when he first burst onto the music scene in the late Seventies, not at all bad for a man that is in his 67thyear now when many of his contemporaries from that era are still just flogging their best of collection, year on year with no new material to be seen in decades! There are certainly not many musicians from that period that are making music anywhere near as good as this.

So if Costello is in fine fettle, what of his long term band mates who according to him are the icing on the cake, the cherry and then the little silver balls.Both Pete Thomas drums and, Davey Faragher’s guitar helped him to initially bring it all to life while they were recording it remotely and then Steve Nieve added in his parts and the great news is that they too are on it too, it’s fair to say that as a band they are absolutely smashing it out of the park. They still make a very formidable team.

So if you’re looking for some exciting new music to listen too when pay day arrives, look no further than The Boy Named If. The cake is baked, it looks good and once you take a bite the taste is a real taste sensation. There is some wonderful story telling going on in the lyrics across the entire album. This is classic Costello
Steve Plunkett

9 / 10