Elvis Costello Says Young Bands Have No Excuse To Be Dull

Costello also said that newer younger bands have no reason to make dull albums because they have access to decades of music history from all over the world. "Look at the Good, the Bad and the Queen: you've got Damon Albarn from Blur bringing in that sort of pop-song sense that he has from that group, and it's got Paul Simonon [of The Clash] on bass playing a punky reggae, and he's got Tony Allen on drums and got an Afrobeat thing going on in the rhythm. That's a truly modern band," he said. "Not saying that's better than everything else; it just shows you the way you can construct things now. It isn't the way I do it, necessarily, but I do dig it when people do that.

"You get stuck in any one church for too long, it's probably not gonna be healthy for the way you move music forward. [But] you constantly see bands make success and then five minutes after they've made that success they want to change it in some way, which is legitimate to them, but it takes a little trust on the part of the listener. Radiohead, there's a good example: They had some big hits and then they made records that are very crushed and use a lot of sonics that come from dance music, and people were horrified when those records came out first. Now you listen to them and they sound great." - more on this story

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