Today’s slow drag is with “That Bridge I Burned” from “Extreme Honey: The Very Best of the Warner Bros. Years,” released in 1997, and then again on the “All This Useless Beauty” Rhino re-issue, released in 2001. The songwriting is credited to Elvis Costello. This piece might sound hopeful, and it might sound melancholy, or journalist, or personal. It might sound completely upbeat or even downtrodden. Regardless of its true intent, it’s an unusual Elvis Costello piece, as it sounds, at least in the beginning, to be a first-person account without much mitigation. Rather than offbeat and compelling characters who typically inhabit his melodic worlds, he’s speaking in the first person about events that seem to unfold before him personally. As opposed to the misdirection of, say, “New Amsterdam,” which was written in the actual Netherlands, “That Bridge I Burned” is inescapably set in New York City. I'm walking in Times Square in the Electric Daylight The sailors on shore leave stand out in their perfect white I'm up here with my spying glass at the window up above (at the Windows on the World) For better or for worse - it's a perverse universe, my love With an aa/bb structure that might be thrown into doubt by virtue of a mondegreen, this first verse places the action, without obfuscation, in the heart of New York City’s midtown. This first-person narration is unusual enough that it makes the listener instantly take notice. What exactly is being revealed in this piece? The words, as put down on the invaluable Elvis Costello wiki page, after “I’m up here with my spying glass” are “at the window up above.” My ears, however, have always heard, “at the Windows on the World,” a reference to the doomed restaurant atop the North Tower of the World Trade Center. The rhyme structure as mentioned, aa/bb as in daylight/white and above/love, suggests I’m in the wrong and I stand very much corrected. Nevertheless, the sentimentality of it dictates that I continue to sing the words I’ve heard, regardless of initial intent. Now I know, I should have never walked over the bridge I burned Now I know, somehow I don't feel so alone Can it be as simple as infidelity, a fling, or a bout of falling off some sort of wagon that has charged this lament in this spectacular mixed metaphor? There’s no going back from a burnt bridge, of course, so why then, would someone feel less alone? I love the thought of mutually agreed upon debauchery, if in fact, that’s what’s going on here. As I’ve mentioned many times before, I’m here to dance among the fields of beautiful words, not proclaim the meaning behind each sentiment. Then again, it might be as simple as letting off a little stream whilst leaving a record label, one record short. "And remember to flee far away from the unbridled, and the impudent, the malicious, and the unlucky. For these being full of bad demons or rays are maleficent, and like lepers and people stricken with plague, they harm not only by touch but even by proximity and by sight." (Dig it!) This quote is credited to the fifteenth century Italian Philosopher Marsilio Ficino on the Elvis Costello Wiki page, as well as many other sources. Mr. Google, however, only returns results of this quote directly to Mr. Costello himself. Ficino was a Neo-Platonic and early contributor to the discipline of modern philosophy. It is said that he was a huge proponent of ensuring the dignity of souls found between two planes. I’m not sure if this exactly reconciles the quote itself. I’m more inclined to believe it’s an Elvis Costello original. The exhilarating “dig it” heard at the end of the quote inspires me to this day. As Pablo Picasso, or someone equally as insightful once said, “good artists borrow, great artists steal.” It’s not just the garbled repeated line at the end of each verse. It’s been transformed into a vaunted exclamation that seems to take incredible self-confidence to shout at any moment, let alone in a non-sequitur way immediately following a profound excoriation of lurking evil. That’s why I’ve borrowed it twice in every episode of “Slow Drag with Remedy.” It helps to bookend the confidence I want to project while looking into Mr. Costello’s genius words and phrases. You mutter underneath your breath – It echoes round the world Everybody comes from nowhere There is hope, it loops up in the air The rhyme intertwined in a lovely lose manner in this three-line bridge is staggering: world/where, where/air. The sentiment itself sounds like a familiar lament of the famous who can so often be taken out of context. Not wanting to linger in this fashion, perhaps, a more perplexed world view emerges, “everybody comes from nowhere,” a hallmark of New Yorkers, before settling back into something objectively optimistic, hope that loops up in the air. You said I used to be handsome if you screwed up your eyes Professors and vampires drank up all the tears I cried Now there's a bird at my window, he beats upon the pane And sometimes he sings to me - a mocking bird in the twilight of infamy Mr. Costello’s use of the word “pane” is always an inspiring move in the few pieces they appear, namely “come by and smash my pane…,” from “My Blue Window,” on “When I Was Cruel.” The mention of the pane in this piece, immediately following the exploitation of a mental pain after a personal insult, brings many different emotions to the forefront all at once. As with the bridge, the narrator touches upon the negative, then quickly brings it back around to the more hopeful, depending on how you might qualify what “the twilight of infamy” actually means. Now I know, I should have never walked over the bridge I burned Now I know, somehow I don't feel so alone Now I know, I should have never walked over the bridge I burned Now I know, they've burned one sinner and the others are selling firewood —Dig it Again, this has been a slow drag with “That Bridge I Burned” from 2001’s “All This Useless Beauty” Rhino reissue, as well as the earlier “Extreme Honey: The Very Best of the Warner Bros Years.” I’d say Prince’s refusal is certainly his loss and every Elvis Costello fan’s gain. It’s a well-known fact that there isn’t a cover that Mr. Costello hasn’t made exponentially better. Well, I say fact, but I’m sure I mean “opinion.” “That Bridge I Burned” is a piece that situates itself at cultural and emotional crossroads. It uses the first-person present tense to capture a moment in history. All there’s left to say, perhaps is, “dig it.” And that’s it for today’s slow drag, my friend. Thank you for listening. Other gems from “All This Useless Beauty” you’ll enjoy a slow drag with is episode 9, “Grace and Virtue,” a slow drag with “All This Useless Beauty,” episode 23, “False and Lovely Modesty,” a slow drag with “Little Atoms,” episode 56, “Pure Illuminated Sweetness,” a slow drag with “Distorted Angel,” episode 61, “A Pirate’s Cutlass,” a slow drag with “Poor Fractured Atlas,” and episode “76, “Sweet Smoldering Scent,” that’s a slow drag with “Starting to Come to Me.” So, until next time, adieu, my little ballyhoo. Show Notes: ---------------------- Appreciation written, produced, and narrated by Remedy Robinson, MA/MFA Twitter: https://twitter.com/slowdragremedy Email: [email protected] Podcast music by https://www.fesliyanstudios.com Rate this Podcast: https://ratethispodcast.com/slowdrag ---------------------- References: Elvis Costello Wiki Resource, “That Bridge I Burned” http://www.elviscostello.info/wiki/index.php/The_Bridge_I_Burned “That Bridge I Burned” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPdCavy9z_s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGhlUBtY8_I Marsilio Ficino: https://iep.utm.edu/ficino/ Prince’s “Pop Life”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56Hvoqgdlfk Purchase “The Most Terrible Time in My Life…Ends Thursday” Comments are closed.
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AboutSlow Drag with Remedy is an Elvis Costello podcast appreciation. It's an exploration of linguistics, language, poetry, and clever wordplay as framed by the peerless poetry of the modern-day master, Elvis Costello. Slow Drag by Song
Poor Napoleon Alibi Church Underground The Big Light Georgie and Her Rival Joe Porterhouse No Hiding Place 20% Amnesia All This Useless Beauty Let Him Dangle King of Thieves Damnation's Cellar Stripping Paper Pidgin English Riot Act Bedlam The Quickening Art Luxembourg Chemistry Class Living in Paradise My Mood Swings Waiting for the End of the World Little Atoms Two Little Hitlers Crimes of Paris You Tripped at Every Step Needle Time Men Called Uncle Peace in Our Time The Loved Ones I Almost Had a Weakness Our Little Angel Invasion Hit Parade Turpentine Miracle Man A Voice in the Dark The Greatest Thing Satellite Hand in Hand Clubland Tart Glitter Gulch Stations of the Cross Science Fiction Twin Possession This Sad Burlesque Flutter and Wow Soul for Hire After the Fall Blue Chair Monkey to Man Mouth Almighty Watch Your Step ...This Town... Distorted Angel Worthless Thing No Dancing Miss Macbeth Charm School Poor Fractured Atlas Brilliant Mistake My Little Blue Window Suspect My Tears Coal Train Robberies Fish 'n' Chip Papers I Hope You're Happy Now Man Out of Time 13 Steps Lead Down Go Away Sweet Pear The Name of This Thing is Not Love Jimmie Standing in the Rain The Deportees Club The Birds Will Still Be Singing Starting to Come to Me Pay It Back Five Small Words Pretty Words Radio Silence Human Hands Night Rally I'll Wear It Proudly Motel Matches Drum and Bone Harpies Bizarre Nothing Clings Like Ivy Why Won't Heaven Help Me Next Time 'Round The River in Reverse A Room with No Number Clown Strike The Invisible Man My Most Beautiful Mistake All the Rage The Town Where Time Stood Still Episode of Blonde e of Blonde No Flag A Slow Drag with Josephine That Bridge I Burned Sour Milk Cow Blues You Little Fool Spooky Girlfriend Suit of Lights There's a Story in Your Voice Dishonor The Stars The Other Side of Summer Mischievous Ghost They're Not Laughing at Me Now White Knuckles Honey, Are You Straight or Are You Blind? Black and White World The World and His Wife
God's Comic The First to Leave Green Shirt The Man You Love to Hate Lip Service American Gangster Time Blame It on Cain The Spell That You Cast Lipstick Vogue The Difference Stella Hurt Tears before Bedtime |