We'll fix you rabbits up... with your musical "feed"!Originally Posted by squiz17
brilliant band. and Colin should get more love both as an equally brilliant, if less prolific, writer and also a most excellent and clever bassist
We'll fix you rabbits up... with your musical "feed"!
brilliant band. and Colin should get more love both as an equally brilliant, if less prolific, writer and also a most excellent and clever bassist
And the code is a play, a play is a song, a song is a film, a film is a dance...
I pretty much like everything, especially 'The Big Express' forward, but by the time of Apple Venus, it was just scattered tracks. (Love 'Easter Theatre' and 'Can't Own Her', but the rest not so much) 'Remember The Sun' from 'Big Express' was the first XTC song that blew me away. Honestly, 'Nonsuch' could be a favorite, but on another day 'Oranges & Lemons' will be my favorite.
Oranges and Lemons was my initiation too and I can't decide if it or Nonsuch (which I got next) is my favorite. I think Nonsuch is their most consistent album and by far the best recording/production (in fact it's one of a half dozen albums I use to audition audio equipment), but O&L has a few of my very favorite tunes. When I first got those two albums, I couldn't stop listening to them! These days I don't listen nearly as often, but I still consider them to be the best pop/rock band since The Beatles. There's no XTC album that I love from start to finish; there's always a couple of tunes that don't click with me, but the strong tracks are SO potent that I don't mind.
Black Sea is as far back in their discography as I care to go and for me, English Settlement was their first great album. But XTC fans are often divided between the early and later periods of their development. I felt that Andy's voice was a little too affected on those early albums, as he has admitted feeling the same way in interviews. But I love his voice from Skylarking on and the vocal harmonies are often brilliant. And though there's never a lot of soloing, they're great instrumentalists too. Collin is one of rock's most unique bass players; he never goes for the obvious bass part.
No "Knights in Shining Karma?" I think it's among their best!
Agreed 100%! Plus Harvest Festival is always a knockout
"Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible"
-Frank Zappa
There are times when I'm listening to XTC when I think, "these guys wrote a lot of songs that are every bit as good as Lennon and/or McCartney songs". YMMV.
Last edited by progeezer; 03-23-2015 at 11:51 PM.
"My choice early in life was either to be a piano player in a whorehouse or a politician, and to tell the truth, there's hardly any difference"
President Harry S. Truman
Agreed! They even stopped touring and became a studio band like The Beatles. Unfortunately, while The Beatles might've been the most successful pop/rock band with the most airplay, XTC never quite made it out of "cult hero" status and few of their tunes got much in the way of airplay. Maybe their music was a little more quirky and challenging and took more effort to absorb, I don't know. Still, it's a dirty shame...
I personally love River of Orchids, but the one that really hits me every time on Apple Venus is Green Man, and nobody ever seems to mention this one.
Perhaps a few more mentions than 'Your Dictionary'. My wife really does not like that one.
"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it."
-- Aristotle
Nostalgia, you know, ain't what it used to be. Furthermore, they tells me, it never was.
“A Man Who Does Not Read Has No Appreciable Advantage Over the Man Who Cannot Read” - Mark Twain
Yeah I do like that one. And in fact, there's a few other tracks I enjoy on vol 1. I'm with you that 'English Settlement' was a step forward for them. My favorite from that era was actually a b-side, 'Blame The Weather'. And one of my all-time favorite XTC songs ever is 'Good Things', under the alias 'Terry and the Lovemen', of which there's a more unplugged less produced version out there but I like the full produced version. Killer tune.
I had a friend who was a total XTC head and tried and tried to get me into them, but they never clicked with me. I did like the hit single "Dear God", but then bought the "Skylarking" album and it was not even on it (I think it may have been added later?). The rest of the album did nothing for me. I tried a few others too, but for some reason they just aren't my thing.
Although I used to like them a lot, I long ago lost the desire to listen to them for some reason.
The Big Express is probably the only album of theirs I'd still listen to because I always felt it was such ear candy.
Come on, folks - nobody's mentioned Dukes of Stratosfear yet?
Cobra handling and cocaine use are a bad mix.
Someone always brings them up. Good stuff, but I'm just not into that either anymore.
Mine was Big Express, where they started to get a little overly big with the production. Good album but the two you have are my hands-down favorites.
I really love Apple Venus Vol.1 and its companion, Wasp Star. Of course, Skylarking, Oranges and Lemons, and Nonsuch, are great, too! I could never get into Mummer. The rest, I haven't heard.
My intro was English Settlement at summer camp after 9th grade. Funny going from a high school where everyone listened to Zeppelin and AC/DC to a place where it was all Ultravox, XTC, Clash and Talking Heads. XTC was the one that really stuck with me and ES became a favorite for many years. I also went backwards and loved Drums and Wires and Black Sea. Both are great, but never investigated the first two LPs.
Fast forward a decade: in the early 90s I played golf every weekend with a group of guys who were all in a band together and were total XTC fanatics. They covered a lot of XTC songs and many hours on the golf course were spent discussing Andy Partridge's amazing chords and melodies. Orange and Lemons and Nonsuch were played non-stop. Those two are also classics.
Skylarking was my way in and remains a top 10 album for me too. I love XTC to pieces they are my Beatles. Best songwriting ever, IMO of course. These guys, Zappa, and Cardiacs are not my top 3 musicians/bands and I stand by that! Oranges, Big Express, Nonsuch, Apple Venus 1 and 2, English and Black Sea are favorites. Drums and Mummer are wonderful too and I don't have Go 2 or White Music yet...
The Dukes albums are AWESOME too. They take the best of the 60s pop/psychedelia and roll it into some truly amazing songs
"Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible"
-Frank Zappa
I have to agree. I love The Beatles but I like XTC more.
On the subject of Harvest Festival it may well be my favourite Partridge middle eight (and he's the king of them).
The key change into 'We all grew and we got screwed...' is just devastating.
YES KAVUS, this is the highlight of the whole album for me. A knockout of a bridge. Andy really is the king of them, and not just for a day. I am also a huge Colin fan too, he stands as one of my favorite bass players to boot.
"The Wheel and The Maypole" is such a stunning and powerful closer, it may be their best song ever (Although Mermaid Smiled will always be my favorite). This tune is timeless I think, the lyrics speak volumes.
"Everything decays, forest tumbles down
To make the soil, planets fall apart
Just to feed the stars and stuff their larders
And what made me think we're any better
And what made me think we'd last forever
Was I so naive? Of course, it all unweaves."
"Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible"
-Frank Zappa
I started off with the original Geffen US CDs that had the bonus tracks in the middle of some albums, and omitted "Mermaid Smiled" in place of "Dear God." I absolutely love this song, but I've never been able to tell if part of it is just because it's fresher to me, having memorized the original CD that I had before ever hearing it.
--
Mike |
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One of my all-time favorite artists; I even did the "completist" thing with them and bought the early stuff, the Partridge solo stuff, The Dukes of Stratosphear, and some unofficial releases. Every album from "Black Sea" on has several wonderful tracks, though there's always one or two tracks I don't like much...
I think Skylarking is a near masterpiece ----but have most of their music.
Drums wires and black sea.... Love these two.
Skylarking was my introduction to XTC as far as albums are concerned, but I remember loving the Making Plans for Nigel video. I bought Skylarking because of Dear God but needed some time to fall in love with the rest of it. Next was O&L then Nonsuch and so on and loved them all, but never really fell in love any album pre-Skylarking.
Intro was Skylarking. I think it's one of their best. Not a band I *love* but I do think most albums are good. My favorites are probably White Music, Drums and Wires, English Settlement and Skylarking. I'm not so much into their later period, although every album still has a bunch of songs I like a lot.
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