Album · Elvis Costello & the Attractions
Punch the Clock by Elvis Costello & the Attractions
Punch the Clock is an album by Elvis Costello & the Attractions, released in 1983. 2 songs from it have charted on rock radio countdowns, with 67 countdown appearances in total. The biggest is “Everyday I Write The Book”, on 50 lists with a best position of #34.
Punch the Clock, released on 5 August 1983 on F-Beat in Britain and Columbia in America, is Elvis Costello openly chasing the charts after a stretch of records that sold less and less. With the Attractions (Steve Nieve on keyboards, Bruce Thomas on bass, Pete Thomas on drums) and producers Clive Langer and Alan Winstanley, he cut it at AIR Studios in London early that year, then brought in the TKO Horns and Afrodiziak for a bright, brassy blend of new wave, pop, R&B and soul.
It worked. "Everyday I Write the Book" gave him his first US Top 40 hit, and the album was his best seller since Get Happy!! The quiet heart of it is "Shipbuilding", co-written with Langer, with Chet Baker's trumpet drifting through like fog off the docks. The songs juggle romance and politics with hooks to spare, though Costello himself later soured on the record, hearing only a dated sound.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs from Punch the Clock on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Years |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Everyday I Write The Book | 50 | #34 | – | 1983–2026 | |
| 2 | Shipbuilding | 17 | #48 | – | 1983–2021 |
Only songs that appear on at least one countdown are listed. Release data from MusicBrainz.