Elvis Costell O

54 ............... Friday, November 6, 2015 1SM NEW By SIMON COSYNS MUSIC IN 1977, there was a By Jim Gellatly real buzz around the sharp-dressed singer with ANDREW WASYLYK the black horn-rims and WHERE: Dundee. a head full of attitude. FOR FANS OF: Richard Haw- Punk had come kicking and ley, Elbow, Adele. screaming on to the scene but JIM SAYS: Andrew Wasylyk single-minded Elvis Costello didn’t may not yet be a familiar consider himself part of any name — he’s better known as movement. Andrew Mitchell — but he’s “Only the really bad groups been involved in nine albums aligned themselves,” he says in the past decade. today. “They did it instead of As well as his debut solo having an idea. album out today, he fronts “All the original people had Dundee band The Hazey (book) singular ideals . The Clash for Janes. He’s also part of the & sure, even The Jam. duo Art Of The Memory Pal- “Joe Strummer was great and, ace, and since last year he’s whenever our paths crossed, I knew been playing bass with Scots he was made of the right stuff. favourites Idlewild. Ink “The first time I saw Paul Along the way he’s also Weller, I thought, ‘He’s completely appeared with The Electric one of a kind’.” Soft Parade, Michael Marra Costello, of course, is another and School of Language. true one-off and thanks to his dad Wasylyk is actually the fam- and grandad, both singers, all ily name. He explained: “Dur- Music kinds of music are embedded in ing the writing of the album I his DNA. Back then, however, it felt like began toying with the idea the arrival of a classic “angry that these songs would be young man” armed with pithy sung from a character’s point lyrics and an uncompromising of view, or an alias. sound. “After my parents parted ways I switched to my ‘Saying inflammatory mother’s maiden name, Mitchell, but started contem- things got me attention’ plating dusting down Even his bitter love song I’m Wasylyk. Not Angry from debut album My “My grandfather, Iwan Aim Is True was actually pretty, Wasylyk, was born in Soroky, ahem, angry. in Ukraine’s wild west. It “I was angry about everything,” Disappearing seemed like a nice way to cel- Unfaithful he admits. “I was emphatic about ebrate the past.” what I was saying and I still am.” In a further tribute to his Beneath the surface, the man grandfather, his album is born Declan Patrick MacManus called Soroky. was a thoughtful, multidimensional Recorded over just five artist. days on the Isle Of Mull, it’s a O Now he’s happy to shed light on sublime record, referencing his younger self: “They were not baroque pop of the 60s. Also all just ‘I’m angry about this or weaving between soaring that’ songs. They have a lot more tenderness or a lot more complexity. “Read the lyrics, read them,” he implores me before rattling off lines from This Ye ar’s Girl, a song from his second album, 1978’s This Ye ar’s Model, the first with The Attractions. “See her picture in a thousand places, ’cause she’s this year’s girl.’ He pauses before continuing: “Forget your fancy manners, forget orchestral landscapes, folk your English grammar, ’cause you and indie rock, the constant is don’t really give a damn.” Andrew’s stunning vocals. Costello says: “That’s not hatred. They’ve been likened to That’s pointing at someone and Scott Walker, Randy Newman saying to them, ‘You’re looking at and fellow Dundonian, the her like that, the problem’s just in late, great Billy Mackenzie. your head. “But you want to hear angry? He said: “Someone said Listen to Mighty Like A Rose (his the record had elements of dark 13th studio album from 1991), Mercury Rev and Aztec Cam- that’s an angry record. It’s all in era recently. I’ll take that.” the lyrics though.” Like myself, Andrew follows I’m sitting with 61-year-old Dundee FC, but he takes the Costello in a small coffee shop not songs on tour for the first time far from the main drag of this month with a famous Knightsbridge in West London. really like a Paul Whitehouse My Aim Is True and there’s a accommodation in Olympia and Dundee United fan, Deacon We’re thousands of miles from character,” says Costello. “I was couple that require me to have then at a more salubrious Blue’s Ricky Ross. COSTELL his home in Vancouver, Canada, fairly naive and, at 22, hadn’t been an audience who are prepared maisonette in Hounslow under the He said: “Ricky’s very kindly where he lives with his wife, the out in the world enough to have to listen.” Heathrow flight path. let me tag along. The Hazey jazz pianist and singer Diana these lurid experiences. It was just Over the decades, music His beloved dad Ross Janes opened for Deacon Krall, and their twin sons Dexter farcical to ask me that stuff. chameleon Costello has gone way MacManus, vocalist and trumpet Blue across the UK in 2013. and Frank. “I learned quickly though. I beyond the constraints of bog player with the Joe Loss Orchestra They’re great people and a lot The trademark hat and glasses started saying a bunch of standard pop and rock. in the Fifties and Sixties, of fun. As we’re from different are present and correct. Up close, inflammatory things. I thought, A mere four years after his would practise in front of the sides of Tannadice Street across a small table, it feels as if ‘Wow! That works. What, they debut album, he wrote a country young Declan. though, when it comes to the years have been kind to this really bought that? That’s music album, Almost Blue. In his book, Costello vividly football there’s plenty for us music titan. unbelievable! Let’s do some more ‘I’d jump around with a describes how he was more to discuss backstage.” The purpose of our rendezvous of that. Maybe this could be the likely to hear emotionally wrought is to discuss his rollicking The tour starts on Sunday smokescreen behind which I can songs by Ella Fitzgerald or Frank autobiography, a weighty tome of work’. cardboard guitar’ Sinatra than Bill Haley’s Rock at the Queen’s Hall in Edin- 670 pages, called Unfaithful Music “Though I had perfectly good In the late Nineties, he made a Around The Clock, which left burgh before taking in Aber- VIS & Disappearing Ink. songs, I realised I needed to fine record with the great him “cold”. deen, Dundee and Glasgow, For an hour, I get the chance to speak up a bit more and not American songwriter Burt He tells me: “My folks weren’t followed by gigs south of the peel away the layers of an artist assume I’d get people’s attention. Bacharach called Painted From that well-off but my dad made a border. with one of the longest and most “Most of the musicians I liked Memory, and there’s more to come decent income. The records my Andrew Wasylyk’s Soroky is varied careers in music. had won themselves an audience. from that partnership. parents listened to for pleasure out now to download, or as We get on to the subject of his Randy Newman would do these Then there’s his work with were just on in the house and limited edition vinyl. “angry” early image because funny little asides and people classical ensemble The Brodsky became as familiar as a chair or MORE: wasylyk.co.uk there’s a hilarious description in were there hanging on his every Quartet, his ballet score Il Sogno, a pattern on the curtains. lJim presents a weekly the book of Costello’s word. and his album with New Orleans “I didn’t ponder them or showcase of New Music on EL encounter with a seedy Red Top “I hadn’t won the right to jazz pianist Allen Toussaint. understand them when I was a Amazing Radio Sundays reporter (not from The Sun, I expect that yet, even if all the His latest offering even finds child but they stuck inside me. 2-4pm. amazingradio.com hasten to add). songs I wrote were imagining his him collaborating with Questlove “I was familiar with The Wee jimgellatly.com All the writer cares about is kind of audience. of hip-hop outfit The Roots. Small Hours Of The Morning but “the girrrls” that might be “Some songs I sing now in my A key reason for such wide only when you’ve lived the life throwing themselves in front of concerts are the ones I wrote variation springs from Costello’s that’s in the song, you go, ‘Oh Watch video the budding pop star. “He was immediately before (debut album) upbringing, first in humble rented that’s what it’s about.’ Maybe I of Andrew at: 5 thescottishsun.co.uk.

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