Born in St Mary's Hospital, Paddington in London, Costello is the son of trumpeter, vocalist and band-leader Ronald (“Ross”) MacManus and record store manager Lillian Costello. His family had roots in Merseyside and he moved to Birkenhead at age 16, with his mother, when his parents separated. While he is better known as 'Elvis Costello', a stage name referring to the legendary Elvis Presley suggested by Stiff Records manager Jake Riviera, he has used many other aliases, including 'The Imposter' and 'Napoleon Dynamite'.
In the early 1970s Costello was a participant in London's pub rock scene with the group Flip City. Then in 1977 along with fellow Pub-Rockers Nick Lowe and Ian Dury he made his first releases on the independent label Stiff, tailoring his work towards the burgeoning punk, power pop, and new wave scenes. From 1980's Armed Forces onwards, however, other influences including soul, country, 1960s pop, and classical music began to re-emerge, and he soon became established as a unique and original voice. His output has been wildly diverse: one critic has written that "Costello, the pop encyclopedia, can reinvent the past in his own image".
His prolific and varied 30-year career has been marked by two constants: sharp songwriting and musical restlessness. The latter has seen him dabble in almost every musical form, from country to jazz to orchestral. This stems from the fact that, at heart, Costello is a fan. His desire to work with his musical heroes has attracted collaborators as diverse as Burt Bacharach and Paul McCartney, Anne Sofie von Otter, Allen Toussaint, Aimee Mann, Bill Frisell, and Brian Eno.
But his most successful partners were his long-term band The Attractions. They comprised Steve Nieve (keyboards), Pete Thomas (drums) and Bruce Thomas (bass). Between 1978 and 1983, this outfit produced a peerless series of albums: This Year's Model; Armed Forces; Get Happy!!; Almost Blue; Trust; Imperial Bedroom and Punch the Clock.
These recordings drew on styles spanning soul, country and western and commercial pop. It was only with 1984's Goodbye Cruel World that Costello started to stumble. An album he concedes was one of his worst, it ushered in a period which produced interesting music but lacked the consistent quality of his halcyon days. Interestingly, although he enlisted the other Elvis's band for King of America in 1986, it was a reunion with The Attractions and former producer Nick Lowe that produced his best album of the late 1980s in the form of the scabrous Blood and Chocolate.
The following albums, Spike and Mighty Like a Rose were uncompromising and difficult solo works, as was the string quartet collaboration The Juliet Letters in 1993. It was only reconvening the Attractions for Brutal Youth the following year that gave his fans another glimpse of what first attracted them to him: punchy, angry pop songs, tightly played by an impeccably taut ensemble.
Since then, Costello has become a career dilettante, true to his inner musical quest, but never again returning to heights he scaled in the early 1980s. Maybe the best work of this latter period was 1998's Painted from Memory. This joint effort with Burt Bacharach matched restrained writing from Costello with stately Bacharach arrangements.
Subsequent career nadirs such as the tune-free North (2003), and instrumental orchestral works such as Il Sogno (2004) led many long-term admirers to conclude that Costello had retained his integrity at the expense of his real musical strengths. However, he has given occasional evidence of his former fire. The ballsy bar-room atmosphere of the collaborative The Delivery Man (2004), suggests that he is still capable of giving his fans what they want, in between his more esoteric experiments.
Elvis is married to jazz vocalist Diana Krall and they have twin sons.
*Upon the film's release, it was noted that the name "Napoleon Dynamite" had originally been used by musician Elvis Costello, most visibly on his 1986 album Blood and Chocolate, although he had used the pseudonym on a single B-side as early as 1982. Filmmaker Jared Hess claims that he was not aware of Costello's use of the name until two days before the end of shooting, when he was informed by a teenage extra. He later said, "Had I known that name was used by anybody else prior to shooting the whole film, it definitely would have been changed ... I listen to hip-hop, dude. It's a pretty embarrassing coincidence." Hess claims that "Napoleon Dynamite" was the name of a man he met around the year 2000 on the streets of Cicero, Illinois while doing missionary work for the Mormon Church.
Costello believes that Hess stole the name: "The guy just denies completely that I made the name up... but I invented it. Maybe somebody told him the name and he truly feels that he came about it by chance. But it's two words that you're never going to hear together." To date, Costello has taken no legal action against the film.
Elvis Costello and Elton John to Make a Television 'Spectacle'
Two of the most respected musicians in the world will collaborate on an extraordinary new television series.
"Spectacle: Elvis Costello with..." is hosted by its namesake and produced in conjunction with Sir Elton John's Rocket Pictures. Elton John will be one of the program's Executive Producers.
The series begain airing in 2008 on CTV in Canada, Channel 4 in the UK and Sundance Channel in the US. FremantleMedia Enterprises, will handle sales of the show to the rest of the world.
Conceived to provide a forum for in-depth discussion and performance with the most interesting and influential artists and personalities of our time, the show fuses the best of talk and music television.
"Spectacle: Elvis Costello with..." is an unpredictable and unprecedented television experience. The series of 13 one-hour programs features everything from intimate one-on-ones with legendary performers and notable newcomers to thematic panel discussions, with a variety of performance elements including unique collaborations, acoustic and impromptu "illustrative" demonstrations of the creative process, and some original interpretations of others' songs by Costello.
Poisoned Rose
Elvis Costello Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
That you gave to me
It left me half alive, and
Half in ecstasy
But if half of your love
Is all I can win
Give me just a fraction
The poisoned rose
On a Valentine card
That you take straight to the heart, that
You call my junkyard
But if all I can do
Is save pieces of you
The piece of your mind
The piece of your heart
Didn't tear me apart
Like the poisoned rose
I received from you
I don't know
How we came to grow
Into this very sad affair
Every time we do the decent thing
Somebody spikes the drink
And a single becomes a pair
The poisoned rose
That you wear at your best
That I keep pressed between the white sheets
Where you lie half undressed
I threw away my shirt and shoes
You looked and I dived in
It's just you and me now
'Cause I threw away the gin
I threw away your alibis, and
All your worn-out clothes
Threw myself upon the floor, but
I couldn't throw away
This poisoned rose
This poisoned rose
This poisoned rose
Elvis Costello's "Poisoned Rose" is a song about a toxic and tumultuous relationship. The "poisoned rose" in the title and throughout the song represents the love that is both intoxicating and harmful. The singer is torn between being half-alive and half-ecstatic from the love he receives and his desire to be free from the pain that comes with it. He recognizes that he can only have a fraction of love from his partner, and he's willing to settle for it because he can't take any more medicine.
The lyrics also convey a sense of desperation and resignation. The singer accepts that he is in a sad affair, where every attempt to do the decent thing leads to disappointment. The idea that somebody spikes their drink to make them a couple shows that their love is manipulated and controlled by external forces. The song's final lines suggest that the singer has given up everything for his partner, including his dignity, but he can't let go of the poisoned rose that keeps hurting him.
Line by Line Meaning
The poisoned rose
Referring to the destructive nature of the love affair
That you gave to me
Talking about how the other person is responsible for causing the destruction
It left me half alive, and
The love affair left one feeling only partially present and whole
Half in ecstasy
But the exhilaration of the relationship was undeniably intense
But if half of your love
Even if the other person only loves one half as much
Is all I can win
That's still better than nothing
Give me just a fraction
Even the smallest amount of love is desired
But no more medicine
Despite the pain and heartbreak, no more numbing the pain with substances
The poisoned rose
Referring to the toxic love again
On a Valentine card
Comparing the love affair to a holiday centered around love and romance
That you take straight to the heart, that
The other person is deeply invested in the relationship as well
You call my junkyard
But they also see the ugliness and mess that the relationship has brought into their lives
But if all I can do
If the only thing they are capable of doing is saving small pieces of the other person
Is save pieces of you
Then they will do so
The piece of your mind
Even a piece of the other person's intellect
The piece of your heart
And a piece of their emotional capacity
Didn't tear me apart
Although there is still heartbreak, it was not unmanageable
Like the poisoned rose
Contrasting the complexity of the relationship to the danger of the flower
I received from you
Continuing to blame the other person for introducing the toxic emotions
I don't know
Admitting a lack of understanding about how the two of them came to fall for each other
How we came to grow
Noting the organic nature of the relationship
Into this very sad affair
Acknowledging the somber tone of the relationship
Every time we do the decent thing
Whenever they try to end the relationship for the better
Somebody spikes the drink
Something or someone intervenes to keep them together
And a single becomes a pair
They keep getting sucked back into the toxic cycle of their relationship
The poisoned rose
Yet again referring to the destructive nature of the love affair
That you wear at your best
The other person is still showing off the relationship in the best way they can
That I keep pressed between the white sheets
Even though the other person is no longer there, they still have memories of the relationship
Where you lie half undressed
The sheets are a metaphor for the other person's memory, and they still feel attached to the relationship
I threw away my shirt and shoes
Showing how the singer is willing to change everything about themselves for this relationship
You looked and I dived in
The other person has a hypnotic power over them
It's just you and me now
Acknowledging that the destructive cycle of the relationship is continuing
'Cause I threw away the gin
No more substances to numb the pain of the relationship
I threw away your alibis, and
The artist is disregarding any excuses the other person may have made
All your worn-out clothes
Even the other person's physical items are no longer welcome
Threw myself upon the floor, but
Feeling defeated despite trying to break the toxic cycle of the relationship
I couldn't throw away
Admitting that the singer is still attached to the relationship, like an addiction
This poisoned rose
The toxic cycle is continuing despite the singer's best efforts
This poisoned rose
Repeating to emphasize the damaging nature of the relationship
This poisoned rose
A final repetition to drive home the idea of the relationship as a dangerous entity
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Universal Music Publishing Group
Written by: ELVIS COSTELLO
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind