A music-obsessed, retired San Francisco lawyer, and author of the rock & roll memoir Jittery White Guy Music (available on Amazon)... picking a random album or song in his collection every day or so and sharing a few thoughts.
In which our Elvis borrows the Beatles' audio engineer and comes up with his most Beatlesque work to date. Even among the lush sonic palette of 1982's Imperial Bedroom, its opening track is a clear stand-out. The hushed opening with its subtle bass & hi-hat combo, Elvis barely above a whisper, builds to a whirlwind of aural thrills, swirling keyboards and explosions, stop & start dynamics. But the vast headphone-filling landscape sticks the landing due to Elvis' mad rush of lyrics, some impenetrable, some unforgettable. For me, it's the couplet "Charged with insults and flattery, her body moves with malice. Do you have to be so cruel to be callous?" that has been embedded in my imagination since the first time a friend of mine slapped this cassette into the boombox at a high school party 40 years ago.Live in 2003:Jon Auer of the Posies did a nice job stripping it down to its acoustic roots:
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