New wave legend Elvis Costello will be joining up with the Imposters for Look Now, the group’s first studio album together in over a decade. Look Now is also Costello’s latest studio album since the release of 2013’s Wise Up Ghost; a collaborative album between Costello and hip-hop band The Roots.
Look Now is scheduled to be released on Oct.12 on Imposter Records. Two-tracks for the album, “Unwanted Number,” and “Under Lime,” have been officially released as of press time. A lyric video for the track “Unwanted Number,” was released on July 26.
The album is set to feature 12 new tracks, two of which “Don’t Look Now,” and “Photographs Can Lie,” are co-written written by orchestral-pop composer Burt Bacharach. Both tracks will also feature the Grammy and Academy Award winning Bacharach on piano.
“I knew if we could make an album with the scope of Imperial Bedroom, and some of the beauty and emotion of Painted From Memory, we would really have something,” Costello stated.
Both Imperial Bedroom and Painted From Memory are examples of Costello’s ventures into the baroque pop territory, featuring lush and grand musical orchestrations to create pop overtones. During the summer of 2017 Costello and The Imposters went on the “Imperial Bedroom & Other Chambers,” tour, which hinted that the artist was going to return to a baroque-pop style for the latest album.
Another track off the new album, “Burnt Sugar Is So Bitter,” is written by prolific singer-songwriter Carole King, while the other nine-tracks are written solely by Costello. Argentine-born producer Sebastian Krys will be co-producing the album with Costello.
“Sebastian was there to make sure only the essential notes got onto the record, whether it was a fuzz-tone guitar or jazz bassoon,” Costello explained regarding Krys’ co-production. “In the final mixing, Sebastian did a beautiful job of keeping everything present but always lead by emotion or narrative, although when balancing the band, my voice and the quartet of woodwinds and horns that I’d written for ‘Stripping Paper’, I told him to ‘Just trust the blur.”
A total of four tracks are going to be included on the deluxe edition of the album. “Under Lime,” and “Unwanted Number,” are immediately available for instant download for those who pre-order the regular or deluxe edition of Look Now off a digital retailer.
Earlier this month it was announced that the singer-songwriter cancelled his tour due to a cancer diagnosis. His doctors stated that he needed about three to four weeks to recover, yet they advised him to cancel any upcoming tour dates so he could properly recover.
“Gentlemen, do talk to your friends—you’l find you are not alone—seek your doctor’s advice if you are in doubt or when it is timely and act as swiftly as you may in these matters. It may save your life. Believe me, it is better than playing roulette,” Costello stated to his fans in light of the diagnosis.
Track List:
1. Under Lime
2. Don’t Look Now
3. Burnt Sugar Is So Bitter
4. Stripping Paper
5. Unwanted Number
6. I Let The Sun Go Down
7. Mr. & Mrs. Hush
8. Photographs Can Lie
9. Dishonor The Stars
10. Suspect My Tears
11. Why Won’t Heaven Help Me?
12. He’s Given Me Things
Deluxe Special Edition Tracks:
13. Isabelle In Tears
14. Adieu Paris (L’Envie Des Étoiles)
15. The Final Mrs. Curtain
16. You Shouldn’t Look At Me That Way