Elvis Costello Releases ‘My Aim Is True’ Anniversary Box Set
The five-CD collection includes 104 recordings, with 52 previously unreleased tracks and a new 2026 remaster.
Elvis Costello has released My Aim Is True (49th Anniversary Edition) today, in digital form and as a five-CD box set. The collection spans 104 recordings, including 52 previously unreleased tracks, and adds a 72-page set of new essays by Costello tracing his progression from Declan MacManus to “D.P. Costello” and, ultimately, Elvis Costello. A 2026 remaster of the original album is included, while a 180-gram black-vinyl edition is due October 16.
Produced by Costello and Steve Berkowitz, the box set is organized across five discs: My Aim Is True, The Blue Print, The Stranger In The House, Becoming The Attractions and Covered In Clover. Its material includes demos, masters, outtakes, live recordings, interviews and other rarities, with the remastered album sourced from the original Pathway Studios master reels. The accompanying book combines Costello’s new writing with rare and previously unseen photographs, handwritten lyrics, diary entries from 1976 and contributions from Nick Lowe, John McFee, Gregg Geller, Bill Flanagan, Warren Zanes, Rosanne Cash, Peter Wolf and Jim James, plus recollections from Steve Nieve and Pete Thomas.
The set also documents the early development of “Watching The Detectives” through four recordings: a previously unreleased Pathway Studios trio version, a solo electric performance from the U.K. television program Good Afternoon that aired September 30, 1977, a live Attractions performance from San Francisco’s Winterland Ballroom on July 8, 1978, and the newly remastered 2026 version of the original recording. Costello writes that he initially resisted the idea of treating the record as a fixed anniversary object: “When first proposed, I thought the whole idea of celebrating a 50th Anniversary of My Aim Is True was preposterous. It made my teeth itch.”
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Two newly remastered 1977 Top Of The Pops performance videos have also been released alongside the anniversary edition. Costello performs “(The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes” in an August 31 appearance introduced by Tony Blackburn, while an October 11 broadcast features “Watching The Detectives.” The original My Aim Is True was recorded with producer Nick Lowe and members of the Marin County band Clover during four six-hour sessions at Pathway Studios, with Costello singing live on nearly every track.
