Delivery Man [Import]

Editorial Reviews
Album Description
After releasing numerous albums since 1977's My Aim Is True, Elvis Costello returns this time backed by The Imposters. Written as a musical theatre piece, the album features guest appearances from Lucinda Williams and Emmylou Harris. The single 'Monkey To Man' is included, plus the UK bonus track 'She's Pulling Out The Pin' & the Japanese bonus track 'The Monkey'. Mercury Japan. 2004.

Tracks:

Button My Lip
Country Darkness
There's A Story In Your Voice
Either Side Of The Same Town
Bedlam
The Delivery Man
Monkey To Man
Nothing Clings Like Ivy
The Name Of This Thing Is Not Love
Heart Shaped Bruise
Needle Time
Judgement
Scarlet Tide

Amazon.com

Take one part This Year's Model, mix with a bit of Almost Blue, and top off with a healthy sprinkling of King of America. Voilà, The Delivery Man! Elvis Costello's first album for Lost Highway finds the musician deftly exploring American roots music, from rock 'n' roll to country to soul, with assistance from the Imposters (stalwart Attractions Steve Nieve and Pete Thomas plus ace bassist Davey Faragher) and thrushes Emmylou Harris and Lucinda Williams. It also finds him back digging around in the ashes of a failed relationship. One of the collection's most affecting songs is "The Judgement," a reflective collaboration with Costello's second wife, Cait O'Riordan. Meanwhile, the album is dedicated to his third wife, jazz star Diana Krall. Hmmm. Romantic upheaval may color these songs, but no more than Costello's musical restlessness. For every elegant, wistful ballad ("Nothing Clings Like Ivy," "The Scarlet Tide") there's a raucous rave-up ("Button My Lip," "Bedlam"). The Delivery Man won't make anyone forget his best work; it'll help them recall what they loved about it. --Steven Stolder

Album Description

With The Delivery Man--Elvis Costello and the Imposters' first release for Lost Highway--one of modern music's most admired and prolific talents has delivered a remarkable album that draws on deep American musical roots more than any of his releases since King of America in 1986. It is a collection that ranges from the ferocious, bass-driven opening track, "Button My Lip," which speaks in the voice of a desperate man on the verge of committing a terrible crime, to a tender and timely closing rendition of "The Scarlet Tide," referred to by Costello's co-composer and fellow Oscar nominee T-Bone Burnett as an "anti-fear song."

Like a lot of great things in music history, The Delivery Man can be said to have started with the late great Johnny Cash. "The Delivery Man is actually a character imported from a song I wrote in 1986 for Johnny Cash," Costello explains. "He's based on a real character. I read this story in the paper about a man who confessed to murdering his childhood friend thirty years later, having been in prison for a number of other things. I thought this story was very interesting because he'd carried this burden of guilt of this childhood crime."