Costello-Roots LP

THIS YEAR’S MODEL: Elvis Costello continues to jump genres and labels in the present chapter of his 36-year career. In his latest surprise move, the Hall of Famer has hooked up with The Roots on the collaborative album Wise Up Ghost, hitting Sept. 17 on Don Was’ Blue Note. Costello playfully describes the record as “the shortest distance between here and there,” containing “both rhythm and what is read.” In the view of ?uestlove, “It's a moody, brooding affair, cathartic rhythms and dissonant lullabies. I went stark and dark on the music, Elvis went HAM on some ole Ezra Pound shit.” (HAM, according to various online urban dictionaries, is short for either “hard as a motherfucker” or “half-assed mustache”—take your pick.) The album was produced by longtime Roots associate Steven Mandel in conjunction with Costello and ?uestlove. The press release was accompanied by the following unattributed lines of verse: The solitary star announcing vacancy burnt out as we arrived/They'd throw us back across the border if they knew that we survived. Myserious, no? (5/29a)