When my roommate sent me the CD of The Best of Elvis Costello and the Attractions in 1985, it was the later songs that really stood out for me, especially the sad history of “Shipbuilding” and the cleverness of “Everyday I Write the Book.” Like a lot of other Elvis albums, I picked up “Punch The Clock,” which had come out in 1983, in the vinyl clearance sales of the late ’80s.
Despite my love for a few of the songs on here (especially “Pills and Soap,” which reemerged decades later on “Wise Up Ghost”), I never really gave this many plays. I also never got it on CD, never digitized it, so it was mostly inaccessible to me until my recent return to listening to music primarily on vinyl.