…but that was Mista Chuck talking about Presley, and Costello would hopefully not incur Chuck D’s wrath so much (apart from that stupid remark about Ray Charles, but if Charles forgave him, then so should the rest of us).

I guess at this point in history Costello’s always going to be best known for ‘Oliver’s Army’ though I reckon he’s done many better. So why not post a handful of great if lesser known Costello tracks?

This track was a minor hit in 1980, and whilst I’ve never really loved parent album Trust, this shows just how important Steve Nieve was to the Costello sound:

1982’s Imperial Bedroom is probably my favourite Costello album. This was another single that didn’t make the Top 40 (yes, it was a single, I have it on 12″!) and if there’s an official video I cannot find it on YouTube. But this rules -and one of my favourite Costello songs:

As with any artist who’s been going over thirty years, there are highs and lows – I reckon he’s made many great albums, though some like Goodbye Cruel World are poor. Mind you, I loved the Juliet Letters collaboration with the Brodsky Quartet in 1993, though I don’t tend to play the collaboration with Burt Bacharach Painted From Memory very much.

But one album that is chockablock full of great songs (in some other people’s hands it would be a greatest hits comp) is 1994’s Brutal Youth. Another song that should have been a bigger hit…