Elvis Costello: This Year's Model (deluxe edition)

Copy at Case Memorial Library
Rob Sheffield wrote in Rolling Stone: "'No Action,' 'Hand in Hand,' 'Lip Service' — these are some of the snarliest love-is-hell songs ever written. The pain in these songs is as clearly visible as the wedding ring Costello wears on the album cover. He might play the jaded rake in '(I Don't Want to Go to) Chelsea,' but these are the plaints of a kid who fell too hard too fast, who took romantic promises way too seriously and believed more fiercely as he kept getting burned. The music is surprisingly lush and pretty. … Yet it's all punk rage, thanks to Pete Thomas' drums and Steve Nieve's cranky organ. (Funny how the most popular song, 'Pump It Up,' is the one where the vocal is a blur and the drum hook takes the spotlight.) … With rants against the media ('Radio Radio'), the church ('The Beat') and the right wing ('Night Rally'), This Year's Model is the angriest album Costello ever made, yet the songs remain brutally funny, sung with moments of unexpected tenderness … that taught a host of tortured-Irish-guy vocal tropes to the Hold Steady and LCD Soundsystem — and those moments make the album unforgettable" (3/6/08).