Elvis Costello is a singer and songwriter whose career spans five decades and over 30 albums. He’s a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriter Hall of Fame. He’s won Grammy Awards, Ivor Novello Awards, a BAFTA, and he’s on Rolling Stone’s list of the greatest songwriters of all time. He put out his first album, My Aim Is True, in 1977. This month, he released a 49th anniversary edition of the album. So for this episode, I spoke to Elvis Costello about the making of “Alison,” from that debut album. Coming up, you’ll hear the isolated tracks from the original recording, as well as some additional parts that didn’t make the cut. And, in discussing the origin story of his song, we also ended up talking about the origin story of Elvis Costello himself.

You can buy or stream “Alison” here and you can buy the 49th Anniversary Edition box set of My Aim Is True here.

Illustration by Carlos Lerma.

in this episode:
Nick Lowe – producer
John McFee – guitar
Johnny Ciambotti- bass
Sean Hopper – keyboards
MMicky Shine – drums
Stiff Records
Clover
“Imagination (Is A Powerful Deceiver)”
Pathway Studios
“Ghetto Child” – written by Thom Bell for The Spinners
“Alison” cover by Linda Rondstadt

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Olivia Rodrigo is a Grammy-winning singer and songwriter. In June 2026, she released her third album, You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So in Love. The day it came out, it broke streaming records on Spotify and Amazon Music, and it debuted at number one on the Billboard Charts. I talked to Olivia Rodrigo here in my studio, and I also visited her long-time producer and co-writer Dan Nigro at his studio. Dan Nigro won the Grammy for Producer of the Year in 2025, in part for his work with Olivia Rodrigo. For this episode, the two of them told me the story of making Olivia’s song “The Cure,” from the original voice memo to the final version.

You can buy or stream “The Cure” here.

Illustration by Carlos Lerma.

For a transcript of this episode, click here.

in this episode:
Paul Cartwright – strings
Sterling Laws – drums
“Lovesong” by The Cure
“First Day of My Life” by Bright Eyes
“Video Games” by Lana Del Rey

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Paula Cole is a singer, songwriter and producer from Massachusetts. She put out her first solo album, Harbinger, in 1994. Her second album, This Fire, came out in 1996 and was a real breakthrough; she was nominated for seven Grammys, and she won the Grammy for Best New Artist. In fact, that year she was the first woman in Grammy history to be nominated for Producer of the Year without a male collaborator. For this episode, Paula told me about how she made one of the big hits from that album: “I Don’t Want to Wait.” It spent 56 weeks on the Billboard charts. And then, it was heard by millions more, when it was used as the theme song for the hit TV show Dawson’s Creek.

These days, Paula has been reclaiming her old music in various ways. A couple of years ago, she re-recorded some of her songs, including “I Don’t Want to Wait.” And that’s the version of the song that you’ll hear throughout this episode, and at the end, in its entirety. And on September 10, 2026, Paula is putting out an archival collection of her demos. It’s called Sonic Memoir: Demos 1989-1998. It includes the original demo of “I Don’t Want to Wait,” which you’ll also hear in the episode, as Paula tells the story of how she wrote and produced the song.

You can buy or stream “I Don’t Want to Wait” here, and you can buy Sonic Memoir: Demos 1989-1998 here.

Illustration by Carlos Lerma.

For a transcript of this episode, click here.

footnotes:
Jay Bellerose – drums, percussion
Greg Leisz – guitar (original)
Tony Levin – bass
Roger Moutenot – engineer
Kevin Barry – guitar (re-record)
The Magic Shop
Looking Glass
James Taylor – Fire and Rain
Tina Turner – What’s Love Got to Do with It
Yo La Tengo

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