Elvis Costello drops Oliver’s Army over racist slur

Elvis Costello has said he will no longer perform one of his biggest hits, Oliver's Army, as the lyrics contain a racial slur – one used to describe Catholics.

The singer-songwriter, who was raised in London and Liverpool to an Irish-descended family, has also asked radio stations to stop playing the track.

“If I wrote that song today, maybe I’d think twice about it,” he told the Daily Telegraph.

Released in 1979, Oliver's Army was written by Costello after a trip to Belfast during the Troubles. Dealing with the British army and imperialism, it features the lyric: "Only takes one itchy trigger/ One more widow, one less white n*****".

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Referring to the offending lyric, Costello said the term was what his paternal grandfather was called while serving in the Royal Irish Regiment during the first World War. “It’s historically a fact but people hear that word go off like a bell and accuse me of something that I didn’t intend,” he said.

The song reached number 2 in the UK charts and number 4 in the Irish charts. In recent years radio stations have played the track with the phrase removed or censored, which Costello said had instead drawn attention to the slur.

“They’re making it worse by bleeping it for sure. Because they’re highlighting it then. Just don’t play the record!,” he told The Telegraph.

In live performances in recent years, he has sung a different version of the song, which does not feature the most controversial phrase.

Oliver's Army contains other dated references to Britain's influence and place in the world in the 1970s: "Hong Kong is up for grabs / London is full of Arabs / We could be in Palestine / Overrun by the Chinese line."

Costello, born Declan Patrick MacManus, lived in Ireland for much of the 1990s, when he was married to the London-Irish musician Cait O'Riordan (formerly of The Pogues).

He now lives in Vancouver with his wife, Canadian jazz pianist Diana Krall, and their twin teenage sons, Dexter and Frank.

His new album, The Boy Named If, will be released on Friday.