No Love From Me To You

What a difference 16 years makes on Merseyside:

If there's anything that you want
If there's anything I can do
Just call on me and I'll send it along
With love, from me to you

If there's anything that you want
If there's anything that you need
There's no need to be evasive
Money talks and it's persuasive

Gimme mope tops over mop tops any given day of the week, welcome to Elvis Costello & The Attractions Get Happy!!

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I first became aware of EC via Karen in school who was, in retrospect, far far cooler than I or any of my friends could ever contemplate*. I am sure she would be impressed that I live a street away from where Elvis’ mum had her bungalow and that he opened the door one year when my mate Steve was carol singing in the area.

I devoured Elvis’ first two LPs, that combo of smarts and snark is still unbeatable in places, My Aim Is True is one of my very fave albums ever. I’m less keen on Armed Forces and by the time the Attractions were contemplating their fourth LP, they were looking for something new. Inspired by ska**, Motown and Stax, Elvis and the band saw a way out of the punk cul-de-sac and Get Happy!! was born.

Get Happy!! socks it to us with 20 tracks, only three of which even reach the 3-minute mark. It’s a crowded, kinetic, frenetic offering, occasionally lacking in melody, sporadically perfect but often exasperating. I find it is an LP that is so concerned with movement that it never quite gets where it should.

I love the fact that the LP title really comes over as a command, rather than a statement – something emphasised by the poster in the sleeve. So do we obey?

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Whether by design or fuck up the tracks are not as listed on the cover of Get Happy!! the sides have been reversed and so we get spat out straight into ‘Love For Tender’s wordplay without much warning, or tune.

Better by far is ‘Opportunity’, a slower ode to, what? regrets, missing out on ‘the one’, replete with all manner of wartime imagery. Get Happy!! hits a high when this accelerates into ‘The Imposter’^ a battle of the sexes led by Steve Nieve’s bristling organ playing and cuts into ‘Secondary Modern’, where the band get that beat just right and tight. I absolutely love Elvis’ voice on the latter too, pitched vulnerable.

Again the band hit it perfectly on ‘Possession’, that heady mix of love money and smart-arsed wordery that I find pretty seductive.

Now you're sending me your best wishes
Signed with love and vicious kisses
You lack lust, you're so lacklustre

The spite dredged up on ‘Man Called Uncle’ is another winner for me, love as commerce and commodity, position and success ‘buying’ a younger girl for an older man. The (self)righteous disgust is palpable. Costello always was sublime when angry. ‘New Amsterdam’ is a sweet interlude, there’s a touch of McCartney in this third person narrative and tune, which is not quite as clever as he thought it was.

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The cover of Sam & Dave’s ‘I Can’t Stand Up For Falling Down’ is the best thing on Get Happy!!, which is not to denigrate the originals here but just to hold this up for high praise. There is something about that melody and the sheer performance of the Attractions on this one, that it is all done in 2:06 adds even more to it.

I have a lot of time for ‘Black & White World’, tunefully stroppy as it is and the muscular groove of ‘5ive Gears In Reverse’ where the band do touch upon that Southern soul toughness. Another highlight for me is the filmic ‘Motel Matches’, the band excelling with the sheer feeling of it all.

In the run in things get really frenetic, I can hear a hard-charging Merseybeat quality in the likes of ‘I Stand Accused’ and ‘Beaten To The Punch’ and a few tricks are definitely borrowed from the Specials here and there to great effect before the swoonsome ‘Riot Act’ brings down the velvet curtain.

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The messiness and untidiness of Get Happy!! used to put me off it, however it is exactly those unkempt, untamed, unedited qualities that attract me to it most.

Get Happy!! get Lost, get punched, get smart, get touched, get over and get lucky, just as the poster tells us to, all at once. Most of all though, just get it.

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The design of Get Happy!! by the incredible Barney Bubbles, is as always perfecto. The cover was designed to look like a worn out cheap soul compilation, geometric shapes and bright colours a-go-go. Some excellent fake ring wear on both covers just add to the ambiance^^.

1198 Down.

*I once tried, unsuccessfully, to convince her that Fish was a better lyricist, she made polite noises about ‘Cinderella Search’ but I could tell she felt she was backing the winner; correctly.

**Elvis produced The Specials around this time.

^an oft-used pseudonym used by EC.

^^missing from US copies of the LP, did they really think Americans wouldn’t understand? probably.