My Darling Clementine - Country Darkness, Vol. 2 (feat. Steve Nieve) (2020) Hi-Res

Country Darkness Vol 2 is the second EP in the Michael Weston King and Lou Dalgleish collaboration with Elvis Costello’s longtime keyboardist Steve Nieve. Loosely reinterpreting country/country-soul styled numbers from the Costello repertoire, it is available as a download or limited edition vinyl, this again illuminates the musical genius of both parties.

While vocally presented in their conversational style duo format, along with Nieve’s piano and organ, the four tracks also feature Shez Sheridan on lap steel, mandola and guitars, drummer Dean Beresford, Piero Tucci on accordion and Colin Elliot playing bass and cello.

The choices are lesser-known numbers in the Costello canon, kicking off with Nieve’s resonant, churchy piano setting the scene for a gospel-infused Either Side of the Same Town from 2004’s The Delivery Man, trading verses on a faithful reading albeit with piano and organ playing a more prominent role and the addition of a twangsome electric guitar solo from Sheridan.

Co-written with Jim Lauderdale, I Lost You appeared on 2010’s National Ransom as a backbeat driven uptempo country track, here the pace slightly slower with Nieve providing saloon piano, the vocals giving the chorus more of a kick than on the original. It’s followed by the earliest song, the cheating-themed Different Finger dating from 1981 album Trust, hewing to the melody line but given a very different Texicana arrangement with strummed acoustic guitar and accordion, Nieve adding a cantina piano solo as the duo make the song their own.

They end with the romantic betrayal-themed Too Soon To Know, retitled from Still Too Soon To Know on 1994’s Brutal Youth to perhaps underline the echo of Roy Orbison’s heart-wrenching ballad, spare, heavy piano notes accompanying Michael’s opening deep and emotionally cauterising vocals before Lou’s more tender yet no less plaintive tones take over for the second verse as organ adds to the accompaniment, the song building to a Big O climax, Lou’s vocal soaring before the harmonies bring it to a dying fall.

When they first conceived the project, they drew up a list of around twenty-five tracks, before whittling them down to a dozen. Which means, of course, that there’s still a Vol 3 waiting in the wings for, perhaps next year’s model, with fingers crossed to hopefully include American Without Tears (surely an obvious duet) and, a My Darling Clementine live staple, Good Year For The Roses. But whatever it holds, as with this and its predecessor, their aim is always true.