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Everyday I Write the Book
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Everyday I Write the Book
"Everyday I Write the Book" is a song written by Elvis Costello, from Punch the Clock, an album released in 1983 by Elvis Costello and the Attractions. It charted on the UK Singles Chart on 9 July, before peaking at No. 28. It was also their first top 40 hit single in the U.S., peaking at No. 36 on the Billboard Hot 100.
In an interview from November 1998, Costello said "Everyday I Write the Book" was "a song I wrote in ten minutes almost as a challenge to myself. I thought, maybe I could write just a simple, almost formula song and make it mean something. I was quite happy with it and I tried to do it in a kind of lovers-rock type arrangement and I wasn't happy with it and then ended up putting this other kind of rhythm to the song, which was written originally as a kind of Merseybeat knock off...I invested less emotionally in it than any other songs from that time yet it's the one that everyone warmed to."
Costello also cited Nick Lowe and Rockpile as an influence on the song; he explained, "[Lowe] has always been a songwriter from whom I've taken cues — see his song 'When I Write the Book,' and my song 'Everyday I Write the Book'."
The lyrics draw various parallels between romance and the process of writing a book. The narrator identifies himself as "a man with a mission in two or three editions" and tells his lover "your compliments and your cutting remarks are captured here in my quotation marks." He also compares the stages of their relationship with chapters in a book, saying:
Chapter One, we didn't really get along
Chapter Two; I think I fell in love with you
You said you'd stand by me in the middle of Chapter Three
But you were up to your old tricks in Chapters Four, Five and Six
The music video for "Everyday I Write the Book" was directed by Don Letts and has been called a "classic MTV hit" and features footage of Elvis Costello and the Attractions performing in a studio with female backup singers Claudia Fontaine and Caron Wheeler dressed in African clothing and kente cloth headwraps. Footage of Costello and his bandmates performing is mingled with footage showing celebrity lookalikes of Prince Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales, Charles incongruously doing household chores and Diana watching television in a middle class domicile. Clips of the silent films being watched by Diana are included in the montage.
When Prince Charles appears wielding a rapier and wearing a swashbuckler costume like that of the actors in the silent film, Princess Diana rolls her eyes and returns her attention to the television. Further attempts by Prince Charles to impress his spouse—including presenting her with a red rose and jumping through a flaming hoop—are similarly rebuffed as she is more interested in the romances depicted on her television. Costello later commented that he had "no idea" of the reason for the interspersed royalty scenes, which were, he says, the director's idea. At one point, the singer drops two stone tablets similar to those in the classic film The Ten Commandments and they are smashed.
The single was backed with the non-album B-side "Heathen Town", which Costello described as his answer song to the Flying Burrito Brothers' "Sin City". It later was released on the compilation Out of Our Idiot.
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Everyday I Write the Book
"Everyday I Write the Book" is a song written by Elvis Costello, from Punch the Clock, an album released in 1983 by Elvis Costello and the Attractions. It charted on the UK Singles Chart on 9 July, before peaking at No. 28. It was also their first top 40 hit single in the U.S., peaking at No. 36 on the Billboard Hot 100.
In an interview from November 1998, Costello said "Everyday I Write the Book" was "a song I wrote in ten minutes almost as a challenge to myself. I thought, maybe I could write just a simple, almost formula song and make it mean something. I was quite happy with it and I tried to do it in a kind of lovers-rock type arrangement and I wasn't happy with it and then ended up putting this other kind of rhythm to the song, which was written originally as a kind of Merseybeat knock off...I invested less emotionally in it than any other songs from that time yet it's the one that everyone warmed to."
Costello also cited Nick Lowe and Rockpile as an influence on the song; he explained, "[Lowe] has always been a songwriter from whom I've taken cues — see his song 'When I Write the Book,' and my song 'Everyday I Write the Book'."
The lyrics draw various parallels between romance and the process of writing a book. The narrator identifies himself as "a man with a mission in two or three editions" and tells his lover "your compliments and your cutting remarks are captured here in my quotation marks." He also compares the stages of their relationship with chapters in a book, saying:
Chapter One, we didn't really get along
Chapter Two; I think I fell in love with you
You said you'd stand by me in the middle of Chapter Three
But you were up to your old tricks in Chapters Four, Five and Six
The music video for "Everyday I Write the Book" was directed by Don Letts and has been called a "classic MTV hit" and features footage of Elvis Costello and the Attractions performing in a studio with female backup singers Claudia Fontaine and Caron Wheeler dressed in African clothing and kente cloth headwraps. Footage of Costello and his bandmates performing is mingled with footage showing celebrity lookalikes of Prince Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales, Charles incongruously doing household chores and Diana watching television in a middle class domicile. Clips of the silent films being watched by Diana are included in the montage.
When Prince Charles appears wielding a rapier and wearing a swashbuckler costume like that of the actors in the silent film, Princess Diana rolls her eyes and returns her attention to the television. Further attempts by Prince Charles to impress his spouse—including presenting her with a red rose and jumping through a flaming hoop—are similarly rebuffed as she is more interested in the romances depicted on her television. Costello later commented that he had "no idea" of the reason for the interspersed royalty scenes, which were, he says, the director's idea. At one point, the singer drops two stone tablets similar to those in the classic film The Ten Commandments and they are smashed.
The single was backed with the non-album B-side "Heathen Town", which Costello described as his answer song to the Flying Burrito Brothers' "Sin City". It later was released on the compilation Out of Our Idiot.