XTC : Classic or Dud.

http://68.media.tumblr.com/65cd1a8c4b92c1488f0ac88065edaaca/tumblr_oodkmu8V5B1rp9p7do1_500.jpg

ok

http://chalkhills.org/reelbyreal/s_ThingsFallToBits.html

https://youtu.be/ne35P7kbucs

Mentioned upthread, this is the band recording Towers of London at an estate with a chain smoking Steve Lilly white.

It is and it isn't - this was pretty much staged for the cameras and isn't actual footage of them recording the song as it appeared on Black Sea, which had already been done by the time this was shot.

AP: I'm not sure whether it's a fire extinguisher making that initial clank. It's certainly one in the fake "re-recording" that we did at the Manor studios -- you know, in that BBC film, "XTC at the Manor." I've got a funny feeling it may have been a dinner plate and something else on the actual version we recorded on Black Sea, at the Townhouse studios. I wouldn't be surprised if it was a dinner plate and something like the bottom of a heavy mic stand, or a section of pipe or girder or something. I think the fire extinguisher was the only thing laying around at the Manor that sounded vaguely right.

Hahaha

AP just announced that Black Sea is the next 5.1 reissue

'Living Through Another Cuba' and 'Travels in Nihilon' should sound ace in 5.1

love you AP but please write some new music

Living through another cuuuuue
BA!!!

Russia and America are at each other's throats, but don't you cry

Not sure if this has been posted but I really enjoyed this podcast interview with Andy https://www.sodajerker.com/episode-8-andy-partridge/ - he comes off as a right grumpy West Countryer, kind of adorable

What about the narrator of "my bird performs" kind of bragging about his stupidity the same way the protagonist of "mayor" does.
"Shakespeare's sonnets leave me cold" - yeah right

I always thought 'My Bird Performs' was partly innuendo...

Andy sure does like his thinly veiled innuendo, cf. "Wonder Annual".

Pink Thing = not so thinly veiled

my bird performs was a colin though

LOUDER THAN TANKS ON THE HIGHWAY
LOUDER THAN BOMBERS IN FLIGHT

I'm a stuck record I know, but Mummer *is* the best.

I just can't stop listening to Mummer this week. I'm in danger of overloading. Favourite bit: 'The only job that I do well is here on the farrrrm / And it's breaking my baaaack' - just this little moment of poignance in an otherwise positive-sounding song, akin to the 'Something tells you that you've got to get away from it' on Madness's 'Our House'

Just gonna put this out: Not very keen on Supergirl or Ladybird for some reason, even though I presume these are considered highlights on their respective albums

'Ladybird' rules, it's 'Human Alchemy' that I'm not fond of.

'Love On A Farmboy's Wages' is such a perfect, beautiful song and it just sounds great. Some of the most beautifully recorded 12-string guitar I've ever heard is on Mummer.

All the more impressive when you think how shoddy a lot of guitar music in the '80s now sounds. '...Farmboy's Wages' is probably my favourite XTC song these days.

From the '80s, rather.

'the wheel and the maypole' ambushed me on youtube yesterday, properly a classic

LOAFBW is the song that's got me back into the band I have to say.. Despite having it on a compilation, I never took notice of it. I'm enjoying quite a few cuts off the slightly-maligned Oranges & Lemons too, with its Skeletons and Scarecrows and warpy basslines

xpost:

'The Wheel and The Maypole' is one of their best ever songs! It's the last song on their last album and it's fantastic... even more remarkable given Wasp Star is one of their patchiest records.

yeh cosign, tw&tm rules

pissed off that the Apple Venus / Wasp Star albums aren't on Spotify. At least get Maypole up on there.

I know Andy hates all their videos but I've always found this one eerily evocative/perfect for the song

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VSFU0jKVYs

I love that Terry plays on "Beating of Hearts," where he's essentially just playing a drum loop. Did he play on Love on a Farmboy's Wages and then quit, or was the song introduced and he threw his sticks up in the air and walked out?

They attempted to run through 'Love On A Farmboy's Wages' with Chambers, but he quit before they could get a decent take, iirc. If Partridge is to be believed there was no throwing up of sticks in the air - it wasn't that kind of departure.

This is interesting, local public access TV show from 1981 in Lawrence KS featuring XTC playing live and some awesome localised TV ads.

https://archive.org/details/BTABHXTC

Gave a listen to English Settlement for the first time in forever the other day -- first time I'd listened to any XTC album in a long time -- and I was reminded what an engaging success it was. Also how I was listening to it -- it was less the tunes-as-such, more the sheer variety in arrangements, rhythms and so forth.

That's the next one on my list. I'm finding it a little impenetrable so far, but I love Drums and Wires and Black Sea

ES is just so verdant, it and and BS are perfect siblings.

Mummer remains my favourite so far. The first half alone is also so varied in terms of scope. It's stunningly ambitious

Partridge called ES a 'big friendly giant of a record' which is a good descrip

Just seen this from AP's twitter :(

Due to a deep personal loss suffered by my APE label manager, (ie:the man who does it all), BLACK SEA 5.1 will not be released until next year.

Ah, that sucks, but condolences indeed to him.

Black Sea is one of XTC's absolute best records (if not their best) whereas English Settlement is let down by side three.

for years I'd slotted The Big Express ahead of Mummer. At this thread's suggestion, I bought the remastered Mummer and am impressed. The keyboard integration is less frantic than on the later album, perhaps because TBE sounds as if Partridge and Moulding wrote half of the songs for the sake of experimenting with the new technology (a similar thing happened with that year's Hall & Oates album).

Mummer is enhanced by the bonus tracks, but The Big Express is the superior album, IMO. There's more live drumming on The Big Express than people think. All those powerful drum fills on 'Train Running Low on Soul Coal' are live, as is all of 'Wake Up' etc. etc.

Yes, I like "Jump" and "Toys."

'Jump', 'Toys' and 'Gold' should have been on the album proper, IMO... with 'Human Alchemy' removed.

"Human Alchemy" and "Funk Pop a Roll" stink.

I like 'Funk Pop a Roll' - gorgeous 12-string sound!

no one ever agrees about anything re: this band

the Coen brothers of bands