Everything's Gone A Little Hazy

That Fatal Mailing List #55: Inspired - Georgie Fame

Add Georgie Fame to the list of artists I discovered thanks to Elvis Costello. 

“Yeh Yeh” was a regular staple on Magic 104, the Chicago oldies station that was on my presets throughout high school. So I knew the name, tenuously attached it to the song…and then smash-cut to decades later, when EC is being interviewed by Steve Mandel and ?uestlove for the Questlove Supreme podcast. He mentions Georgie Fame’s Fame At Last EP as one of the first records he can remember owning; into the Discogs cart it goes. Elvis also raves about Fame’s Sound Venture album from 1966; Google leads me to him raving about the record back in 1999 in Mojo: 

I saved up for a few weeks to buy Sound Venture…It was such a hip record. Apart from anything else it had such a great title! And Georgie plays killer organ. I'd been used to the sound of the big band but this was different. There was no strict dance tempo and it wasn't smooth like Joe Loss – this was a swinging band and the line-up was a who's who of the jazz scene. It had a huge impact on me because the songs were all over the place from James Brown to Willie Nelson. He was one of the first British R&B artists to discover James Brown, which was a big deal then because the only pop we heard was Brian Matthew four hours a week on the radio – the rest of the time it was tea-dance music, the Palm Court orchestra and Geraldo. There was no way we could have any personal knowledge of those original artists – and if we did the records were too expensive and I was too young to go to clubs to see them. Every record changes you a little, but Sound Venture knocked a wall down for me.

Hearing Georgie Fame is like a hidden tumbler falling into place, to unlock a greater understanding of Elvis Costello’s music and vocal style. That biting edge that you can often hear in EC’s vocals sounds at least partially inspired by Fame’s vocal style, an influence buried deep in Costello’s own singing skills but present nonetheless.

Fame’s influence seems to echo down through the decades of EC’s career, from his version of “My Funny Valentine” as the B-side to “Oliver’s Army” in 1979, to the sophisticated melancholy pop of 2018’s Look Now. His music jumps and jives as much as it croons, and you can hear some of that in EC’s songwriting too; “Lil’ Pony” from Sound Venture is just one example of a track on the record where Fame seems to be cramming every syllable he can into each vocal line.

More than anything, even just on this one record, Fame demonstrates a willingness to adapt that is very much in line with the approach Elvis has taken to his career. His voice is central to the songs, but it’s also just another rich element in the overall sound. There’s a selflessness in this approach; you don’t serve yourself or your instrument, you serve the song. If there’s anyone who has spent decades working in service of every song he’s attempted, it’s Elvis Costello. 

The paths of EC and Georgie Fame have intersected on a few occasions. Fame and his band, the Blue Flames, opened for Elvis Costello and Steve Nieve at the Royal Albert Hall in 2014; EC guested during Fame’s set, and Fame returned the favor on Mose Allison’s “Everybody’s Crying Mercy.” Costello also contributed an original composition, “That’s What Friends Are For,” to Fame’s 1979 album of the same title. Fame sounds tremendous on the recording, and the musical approach calls to mind a gumbo of New Orleans blues and country funk. 

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