Wednesday, October 14, 2009

TSSnSF: I Want You



Elvis Costello is possibly my favorite artist. He seems to switch between Talking Heads in the number 1 spot. The lanky body, giant framed glasses and gap teeth hide a musical mastermind. A lyrical monster, letting prose glide off his fingertips, Costello seems most at home writing and singing of two things: political injustice and heartbreak. This one falls under the latter category.

Ignoring the lyrics is a bad idea with Costello's songs and this is no exception. What seemingly starts out as a sad Elvis lamenting the loss of a former flame slowly transforms into something worse. It soon becomes apparent that this woman is being obsessively followed by him. Hell, they may not even have ever dated.

It's like masochism incarnate, Elvis tortures himself over this woman who may or may not have cheated on him. By the end of the song, he's almost dead. He sounds hopeless, drained of life, close to killing...someone. Himself, her, anyone, but someone.

Enjoy the video, but probably just listen to the music because this is a fan video for "William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet" (which is a stupid name) and the person who made completely misses the point of the song.

1 comment:

  1. You know how I feel about this song. Totally creepy and amazingly sexy at the same time. Something about his voice is just too much.

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