Recently I had the opportunity to see Elvis Costello and the Sugarcanes at Ravinia. (Highland Park, IL). This tour is to support his recent release Secret, Profane & Sugarcane, June 2009.
His group of seven musicians did a bunch of songs off the King of America release, some off of his first, My Aim is True, and lots of others. Of note was the slow rendition of What’s so Funny about Peace, Love and Understanding off the Armed Forces album. At the end he covered a Grateful Dead tune and Femme Fatal from Velvet Undergound as well as other some other artists which I forget.
Surprises: No drummer. Guess the band is pretty tight when they don’t need a drummer to keep it together. Other surprises: Dobro, electric autoharp, mandolin, accordian, fiddle, banjo, stand up double base and pennywhistle besides the usual compliment of guitars. VERY talented musicians all. One note: I didn’t see the backup guitarist and vocalist on the album release notes. Perhaps they picked him up just for the tour but as my friend Andy said, “he’s the perfect backup” musician. He must be one of these legendary studio guys. Now I have to see if I can hunt down his name.
If people have had a chance to listen to the “Almost Blue” release they wouldn’t have been surprised to hear all those Hank Williams influenced arrangements at the show. Pretty impressive performance and no warmup band. Three encores and Elvis sported a stylin’ purple porkpie hat. “He’s the Mozart of our time” was a comment heard before the concert.
Happy Birthday Elvis Costello.
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