Elvis Costello & Flip City - Flip City Demos (1974-1975)

Yesterday, I posted about Sting's music before the Police, which I think is surprisingly good. Now it's time to look at Elvis Costello's music before his first album in 1977, which I also think is surprisingly good. Everything here is still unreleased. But it's all studio recordings with excellent sound quality, and the vast majority are songs written and sung by Costello that haven't appeared anywhere else (with the exception of "Imagination (Is A Powerful Deceiver)," a version of which appeared as a bonus track for the "My Aim Is True" album). I'm surprised this music hasn't gotten more attention.

When Costello started his music career, he was heavily influenced by the pub rock sound, especially the band Brinsley Schwarz. For a few years, from 1974 to 1976, he was a member of the pub rock band Flip City. Although they played concerts, they never released any records, not even a single. But they certainly tried. The songs here come from three different studio sessions. 

The first one took place in 1974. It was recorded at a BBC studio, but it wasn't intended for BBC broadcast, since the band was so little known at the time. It was simply the case of the band having a connection that allowed them to briefly use BBC facilities to record some demos. The first song is the only one from that session here. They also recorded "Exiles Road" and "Radio Soul," but I haven't included them because they did later versions that I have included that are slightly better.

The other two sessions were done in the attic of a pub called Hope and Anchor in 1975. The owner of that pub was trying to get into the music business producing and selling records, so that person had built a recording studio there. They were searching for a potential hit single. They settled on the cover song "Third Rate Romance," since it was breaking as a hit in the US by the Amazing Rhythm Aces. But in the end, it never got released. The band broke up around the end of 1975. Costello won a record contract for a solo album in 1976, and the rest is history.  (At this point, he was still going by his given name, Declan McManus - he would get his new music name after signing the record contract.)

There are a few covers here. In addition to "Third Rate Romance," there's "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" by Bob Dylan, as well as "Packin' Up," and "You Win Again" by Hank Williams. "On the Road" was written and sung by Flip City guitarist Steve Hazelhurst. A couple of the originals would later get re-written and put on Elvis Costello albums. "Baseball Heroes" is an early version of "Miracle Man," and "Radio Soul" is very similar to "Radio, Radio." Also, "Imagination (Is a Powerful Deceiver)" is a distant relation to "Alison," though it's hard to tell.

This album is 43 minutes long.

01 Baseball Heroes [Early Version of Miracle Man] (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
02 Imagination [Is a Powerful Deceiver] (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
03 Pay It Back (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
04 Radio Soul [Early Version of Radio, Radio] (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
05 Third Rate Romance (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
06 Knockin' on Heaven's Door (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
07 Packin' Up (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
08 Please Mister, Don't Stop the Band (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
09 Exiles Road (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
10 Wreck on the Slide (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
11 On the Road (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
12 You Win Again (Elvis Costello & Flip City)
13 Sweet Revival (Elvis Costello & Flip City)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15284458/ElvisCost_1974-1975_FlpCityDemos_atse.zip.html

There are very few photos of the band Flip City. I picked the best one I could find. That's Costello singing into the microphone.