One More?
One of EC's worst habits (just after telling the same damn story night after night for a year or two) is the fake encores. Today the Washington Post points this out:
"It all seems so unrock-and-roll, doesn't it? Yes, a concert is a type of showbiz, and the soul of showbiz is pageantry and artifice, but rock is supposed to have an aversion to fakery. At minimum, it should have a discomfort with fakery, and there's something pretty fraudulent about "ending" a show early so that a crowd can egg and re-egg you back to the stage for music you were planning to play anyway. At Elvis Costello's Wolf Trap stop last year, he feigned his first exit an hour into the night, turning the next 60 minutes into a series of bonus trips to the microphone that weren't bonuses at all."
There's also a picture of EC on the cover of the Style section. (We don't have a copy yet.) (Submitted by Mike Carter)
Comments
Okay, not only does nearly every performer do this, it's mostly just a chance for him to take a breather so that he can maintain the same level of energy for the rest of the show -- not a ploy to soak up extra applause and inflate his ego.
Posted by: Brennan Purtzer, CSU Chico Music Journalist | January 7, 2004 2:10 PM