THE DELIVERY MAN - Elvis Costello & The Imposters (Lost Highway)

There's certainly an air of men in town on business about the swaggering opener 'Button My Lip', an uncompromising rhythm-based thrash propelled by overdriven guitar and stiff-armed piano chords. Costello punctuates his macho vocal with maniacal squeals and slightly unsettling laughter. "I am the mighty and the magnificent," he bellows repeatedly as the track draws to an unruly close. Fear not, though, gentle listener. This being an Elvis Costello record, a healthy dose of irony is never far away. The track splutters to an anti-climactic, flick-of-the-switch ending - a sharp reminder of the pop singer's true position in the grand scheme of things.

The slow-burning, piano-led ballad 'Country Darkness' follows, a distant relative of Costello's neglected 1980 noir classic 'Motel Matches' (from Get Happy!!). The disturbing, minimalist lyric is an object lesson in economy - not always a Costello forté in the past - and he sings it just perfectly, aided and abetted by some suitably spooky John McFee pedal steel guitar flourishes.

The band shifts back up a gear for 'There's A Story In Your Voice', a highly-charged duet with Lucinda Williams. Against a ringing guitar backdrop, Elvis takes the opening verse but is then upstaged as Williams cuts loose (and I mean cuts loose!) on a low-rent white-trash vocal of epic proportions. As the slurred words of defiance and disappointment tumble out it's hard not to picture her reeling wild-eyed around a trailer, scissors in one hand, half-empty beer bottle in the other, seeking items of her partner's clothing to inflict harm upon. (Fortunately for Elvis, he appears to have packed up and moved out to a motel.)

Continuing the theme of estrangement is 'Either Side Of The Same Town', a song originally co-composed with producer/songwriter genius Jerry Ragavoy for Howard Tate's Rediscovered album. Here it receives an authentic enough deep soul treatment but Costello for once fails to nail the vocal with true conviction. The chorus, in particular, drags just a little and, overall, the track doesn't quite scale the heights.

'Bedlam', on the other hand, is the real deal, the Imposters laying down a thunderous Meters groove while Costello rattles off one of those Dylan-inspired nightmare travelogues last heard to such effect on 'Tokyo Storm Warning'. As the dust settles on this stream-of-consciousness rant, the target of his ire finally becomes clear: "Bowing like an actor acknowledging applause / Playing the Crusader who was conquering the Moors". Anyone we know, El?

Next up is the title track, a restrained gem with Steve Nieve's insinuating organ part to the fore. Making sense of the cast involved in the storyline of 'The Delivery Man' might require some knowledge of Costello's original plan for a self-contained musical piece based around the relationships between the title character and three women. The same individuals recur in a number of the songs on this album but, as Basil Exposition would no doubt put it to Austin Powers: "I suggest you don't worry about this sort of thing and just enjoy yourself". And that goes for you, too.

'Monkey To Man' is a Darwinian update on one of Costello's favourite rhythm & blues records (Dave Bartholomew's 'The Monkey' from 1954). Taking a good look through "the bars we use to keep you out" the monkey once more speaks his mind. And just how impressive does his "idiot cousin" mankind seem to him in half a century on? Take a wild guess.

The poignant ballad 'Nothing Clings Like Ivy' features a heartfelt Costello vocal around which Emmylou Harris weaves an appropriately sinuous harmony backing. The music reminded me, fleetingly, of both the Beatles' 'She's Leaving Home' and 'Somewhere' from West Side Story although the song is, ultimately, nothing like either. It is gorgeous, though.

'The Name Of This Thing Is Not Love' marks the one true low point, a song simply not up to scratch in this company. As if sensing this, the band gets a little too busy and the maddening repetition of the title phrase swiftly outstays its welcome. An odd inclusion when recent concert performances indicate that much better songs didn't make the cut. File under F for 'filler' and give thanks for the skip button as we now approach an astonishing four-song closing salvo...

First up is 'Heart Shaped Bruise' where Miss Emmylou rejoins Elvis for a stunning duet in the style of her classic work with Gram Parsons. It's not quite in the class of 'Hearts On Fire' - but then what is? (Look out for a just-about-excusable musical joke ending.)

'Needle Time' finds Costello in one of his good old-fashioned pissed-off-at-everything moods. The catalogue of subjects rubbing him up the wrong way includes US immigration policy ("Now they want me fingerprinted like I was smuggling drugs"), the land of his birth ("those sour English") and, of course, his own failings. Why, he's so angry that he's even angry with himself for being angry! The Imposters are up for a scrap, too, underscoring their leader's testy guitar riffing with some muscular changes of pace in an ensemble performance which rivals even the Attractions' finest moments.

Cheesy sound effects and a swirling Hammond organ part adorn the neat segue into 'The Judgement', a lover's plea for forgiveness structured around a collection of increasingly tortuous courtroom clichés. In the wrong hands, this could have ended up sounding little more than superficially smart. However, a vocal just the right side of overwrought and another mighty Imposters performance allow the song to transcend its deliberately hackneyed lyric. Co-written (irony, anyone?) with ex-wife Cait O'Riordan and reclaimed emphatically from Solomon Burke (see 2002's Don't Give Up On Me) this is, quite simply, one of the best things Costello has ever recorded. (It cries out for 7" vinyl release complete with garish, crudely-illustrated sleeve depicting Elvis on his knees begging for mercy from a buxom, scantily-clad lady "judge". Or is that just me?)

Final track 'The Scarlet Tide' was originally co-written with T-Bone Burnett for inclusion on the Cold Mountain soundtrack, where it was sung by Alison Krauss. Costello has lifted it out of that film's US Civil War context to appear here in the form of a duet with Emmylou Harris set to his own ukulele accompaniment. At first, its sparseness sounds out of place, so different is it to anything else on the record. (Imagine playing a James Carr LP on a re-used cassette and finding that you haven't quite erased the recording underneath: this would be the Louvin Brothers track popping up unexpectedly at the end.) With each subsequent listen, however, the sequencing begins to make more sense. It's as if we are being transported away from the sweaty urban darkness which characterises the rest of the album up into the clear mountain air. The song certainly has contemporary relevance and Costello exploits this to close on a note that is, if not exactly hopeful, then at least defiant.

The odd minor quibble notwithstanding, The Delivery Man is superbly played and recorded music for grown-ups in a world of disposable, youth-fixated trash. Buy now and treasure always.

• Review based on the 13-track USA version of The Delivery Man. The UK edition will feature the extra track 'She's Pulling Out The Pin'.

• Mark Perry is unwell.