XTC : Classic or Dud.

Fave track on Oranges & Lemons (their last decent album) = "Across this Antheap".

And you may not like Apple Venus Vol. 1, Alex, but it's at least "decent."

"King for a Day" doesn't remind me of the Police either. It's a fine, pleasant song, but just a little too overproduced for my taste (like much of the Orange & Lemons album, I think).

I listened to Oranges and Lemons for the first time in years recently -- I found a used CD copy for $2, and it's easily worth that. While the production is annoying, what I found interesting is that the track I used to blow past are the only ones I really enjoyed. If you can get past the bad lyrics that infect the entire record, there are a few gems: "The Loving," "One of the Millions," and "Hold Me My Daddy" stand out.

Whatever. It's still all about English Settlement.

Big Express? Ehhhhh......with the exception of a few tracks, it's not their finest. Never cared for Mummer so much, either.

Then, of course....there are THE DUKES OF STRATOSPHEAR,.....who quite thoroughly rock.

Mummer would have been 10 times better had the same tracks been sequenced differently. It's chock full of top tunes, but the running order is just woeful.

O&L's high production really works in favour of the music, I reckon. Apart from King for a Day, which is agony to my ears. The raw power behind Antheap et al really pronounces the strengths in the songwriting. I agree on the relatively weak lyrics though; I think there were a few hassles with Virgin around that time, with the label wanting Partridge to produce hit singles and such.

Anyone heard the Fuzzy Warbles stuff? It's some of the best Partridge has ever done, and it's not overproduced. :)

"Black Sea": well, I do think, just to attempt to take down a peg an album I've always liked, that XTC did progress a bit like Yes. Thus, "Drums and Wires" is their undeniable "breakthrough" album much like "Fragile," and "Black Sea" is their undeniably "accomplished" yet overstated "improvement" upon their breakthrough, just as "Close to to the Edge" is similar for Yes. And to borrow a Meltzerian trope, it's their overstatement that is the point, on both LPs, overstatement as understatement as overstatement or something silly like that. I do like "Black Sea" much better than I do "Close to the Edge" (I have been somewhat obsessed, though, with "Siberian Khatru" lately, and find it very XTC-like). I never liked "Sgt. Rock" from "Black Sea" either, nor do I find the "Kinks-esque" "Respectable Street" all that great. But love "Towers of London," sure.

A Mate of mine used to live in Swindon, and worked in a small recording/rehearsal studio there, that XTC used to use, back in the day. One fateful day, he was assistant producer when they worked on their first attempt to do "Making plans for Nigel". This was one of the tracks on the "cupboard/wardrobe/whatever it was called" rarities/anthology thing, which I managed to get via Kazaa. So, I added it to a compil CD for him, and said "Now you can play it to friends and say "Hey, this track, I rewound the original tape!"

BLASPHEMY.. Oh hahahahahahaha. irony.

I heard "Respectable Street" on my CD walkman Friday morning, totally by accident, I was only trying to re-experience the whole of the Rag & Bone Buffet CD and I was surprised that suddenly reality was shapeshifting underneath my feet while "Respectable Street" played and I teleported to another heavenly post-punk planet and couldn't stop toe tapping and singing and god, what a mess. Surely that song could keep pace with Gang of Four as far as clasic post-punk goes.

Which reminds me, anyone want to join a band? I could bloody use a drummer, me.

Living Through Another CUE
BAH!

I listened to English Settlement all the way through again the other day, and as I get older, the more it becomes apparent to me that the last two tracks are 1) by a fair margin the best things on there and 2) utterly, utterly superb.

I bet you're probably right. English Settlement was always their most difficult album for me (as opposed to Go2, which frankly goes in one ear and out the other for the most part). It has its place in their catalogue, though, and I respect it.

I really need to hear The Big Express.

From some years back:

Anyone heard the Fuzzy Warbles stuff? It's some of the best Partridge has ever done, and it's not overproduced. :)

Hell yeah. The Fuzzy Warbles stuff can be broken down into the following categories:

1) Demos of stuff already released. And often these demos are VERY different (cf "Great Fire", "Me And The Wind") and better (cf anything from _Oranges & Lemons_ and _Nonesuch_)

2) Noodly bits and throw-away gags. Andy laughing uncontrollably, Andy doing imitations, Andy doing an answering machine message. These aren't even for diehards like me. Well, after the first few listens at least.

3) Instrumentals. I always liked XTC's instrumentals - the Homo Safari series is particularly cool. But these are inessential for the most part.

4) Complete, new, unreleased songs. This is the MEAT! And it's soooo tasty. "Sonic Boom" is amazing, "When We Get To England" is gorgeous, "My Land Is Burning" is powerful and politically relevant today, "End Of The Pier" is evocative of an England I never knew in a palpable way. That these songs were in Andy's shoebox for years is a crime, but at least they've seen the light of day.

Classic to the nth degree. XTC is one of the very few bands whose demos are worth hearing.

Thanks for helping me understand it better. I played the first Fuzzy Warbles CD and quit, so I will have go back and try to experience some more of it.

I've muddled my way through volumes 1-7 over the past year and Mr. Odds summation is pretty much OTM - the best stuff is the fully formed, unreleased songs, the rest ranges from interesting to completely unnecessary.

Thread here: S/D: Fuzzy Warbles (an XTC thread)

4) Complete, new, unreleased songs. This is the MEAT! And it's soooo tasty. "Sonic Boom" is amazing

Isn't it though?

I've created an iPod playlist of this MEAT of which you speak. It's 46 tracks and it's bliss.

see also "Wonder Annual", "Ship Trapped In Ice". If you took off the worst two songs on Wasp Star, and replaced them w/these, that album goes from C+ to A-.

I dunno, I totally love the Dukes of the Stratosphear stuff, but I can't stand XTC. In fact I kinda hate them. Am I a hypocrite for digging "Chips from the Chocolate Fireball" when I just cannot abide the "real" band?
It just seems like the Dukes are openly derivative so that changes the valence completely.

I think you'd like "Fuzzy Warbles" then, it's closer to the Dukes spirit than XTC, I'd say.

DD, so you're saying XTC's more (imo still pretty thinly) veiled references to 60s pop is the deciding factor in your hatred?

It's hard to put into words. I suppose it is that the sheer anachronism of the Dukes becomes kind of critical, like a gesture of defiance against what is current. Whereas the mixture of "classic" moves and au courant stuff in XTC feels kind of reactionary in a bad way; a kind of after punk return to Real Musical Values that is just reactionary enough to be annoying to me, but isn't so reactionary that it goes over the edge and becomes camp, like the Dukes. Does that make sense?

Thanks Alfred!

nice to see someone point out how strange and creative "Shake You Donkey Up" is, most people just describe it as annoying. I always loved that tune though, it's probably the only post-Barry tune that really captures how wacky they used to be

It's creatively annoying.

Nice write-up (Join the Dots) - thanks for sharing!

I recently got the new "The Big Express" surround edition and totally agree with Vinnie's post. Steven Wilson did an excellent job here, smoothing out the jarring artificial bits while not diluting its rock moments, to the album that needed it the most. Also - in the liner notes, Andy wants to make it clear that not all the drums on the album are from a drum machine, which apparently was a common misconception. Just one quibble: for some reason, they didn't include the music videos for this one, like they did with the others.

Here's a good article about Wilson's process: https://www.soundonsound.com/people/steven-wilson-remixing-classic-albums
This is key: "He sums up his approach as being devoutly faithful to the original mix when he's working in stereo, and creating something fresh when he's working in surround."

It explains why I was not really blown away by the stereo "Skylarking" remix (it sounds exactly like the mix I've heard 100+ times, but maybe just a little cleaner and without the crossfading between tracks) BUT the surround "Skylarking" remix is a whole different experience. I HIGHLY recommend hearing it in surround! Another "you MUST hear this in surround" recommendation for XTC fans is the Dukes of Stratosphear comp "Psurroundabout Ride" - he really goes for it, and it works! And back to "The Big Express," on "Wake Up" (where the intro guitars are hard-panned Left/Right on the stereo version), on the surround version, they bounce around on four speakers, making it even more disorienting.

I have all of the XTC surround editions and honestly love them all and will buy any more they put out - apparently they can't find the multi-tracks for all the songs on "English Settlement" and "Mummer," so that's the hold-up for those.

Audio nerd stuff (in case this is helpful for anyone Googling these issues):
1) Listening to the surround "The Big Express," for some tracks, the first two seconds of some songs would get cut off. I changed the "Audio Format" setting on my player (Playstation 5) from "Bitstream" to "Linear PCM" and that fixed it.
2) "Black Sea" would only play in stereo, not surround. I figured out that changing the "Audio" track setting on the player from "1. English" to "2. English" allowed it to play in surround. I had this exact same issue (and the fix is the same) for the King Crimson "Larks' Tongues in Aspic" surround DVD. (I didn't have this issue with other XTC or King Crimson surround discs, so I guess it's a disc mastering error?)

apparently they can't find the multi-tracks for all the songs on "English Settlement" and "Mummer," so that's the hold-up for those.

They have all but the single a-sides.

Listening to the surround "The Big Express," for some tracks, the first two seconds of some songs would get cut off. I changed the "Audio Format" setting on my player (Playstation 5) from "Bitstream" to "Linear PCM" and that fixed it.

Thanks so much for this tip--I have this issue when hooking my Mac up to my receiver for DTS .wav files in VLC, will try this trick to see if it sorts it out.

xps glad you enjoyed the piece!

I haven't heard any of Wilson's mixes at home as I haven't any good setup for them. But TBE is the one I'm most eager to hear and I'm wondering if it will spotlight slightly buried things in the old mix, like the synth (electric piano?) in This World Over or the cannonballs in Seagulls. Still sad he omits the crossfades though.

listening to Wasp Star for the first time in forever and wow I forgot how late-90s altrock it sounds. it's like a good version of the Fastball album. some moments remind me of Third Eye Blind. hard to believe it's actually XTC sometimes.

pretty weird final album in retrospect, it sounds like a debut somehow. idk of any other artists with long careers who have pulled off something like that. I don't mean albums where they sound young I mean albums that sound like a good band's first set of songs produced to be very of its era

like imagine if this was a new band and the last song on their debut was "Wheel and the Maypole", how exciting that would be

There's a really good, and very candid interview with Haydn Bendall on the XTC Podcast from a month or so ago, lots of info about Apple Venus.

"Stupidly Happy" def sounds like it was inspired by "Never Let You Go"

Although now I'm realizing they might have come out too close to each other to have one inspire the other

I think some of those late 90s bands loved XTC. The glasses guy from BNL imagine very much so. It's All Been Done sounds like his take on it

IRRC he had Wasp Star written, like Apple Venus, in the wake of Nonsuch, so early to mid 90s. His demo, as they tend to, sounds a lot like the final arrangement, released within months of the Third Eye Blind song in 2000
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2RhxrsZI2A

The Wheel and the Maypole is such a fitting and lovely end to the discography of the best band ever

And obviously let's not ruin things with facts obviously (e.g. the 2005 tunes)

otm

according to Wikipedia, most of these songs were originally written between 1994-1996. they indeed are pretty close to the demos but there are certain touches - the vocal distortion on "Stupidly Happy", the drum fills on "We're All Light" - that sound very late-90s altrock.

The glasses guy from BNL imagine very much so. It's All Been Done sounds like his take on it

yes! always thought this song sounded like something on Nonsuch. a bit more obnoxious though.

wonder if not having Dave Gregory on board caused them to farm out more of the process which made it sound more modern. I'm really curious what a follow up album would've sounded like.

also I kinda forgot about the 2005 tunes, they're not bad. the band didnt really make a big deal out of them so I still consider Wheel and the Maypole their 'last' song