XTC : Classic or Dud.

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