XTC C/D S/D

Oh, and the song "Tissue Tigers" from the album Rag & Bone Buffet-- what an amazing track. I have no idea what the time signature is; it's almost presaging math-rock, but it's really poppy and eccentric. It's brilliant, frankly. Who throws a song like that away? That's better than 95% of bands best songs.

oh, it's in 4/4, but it sounds like it's in 17/6 or some shit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ut5xh6ZGfA

People will always be tempted to wipe their feeeeeeeet
On anything welcome written on iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit - a timbalambla timbalamba toodamatoodama

No one's mentioned "Life Begins at the Hop"? It didn't come up on a find-search. I don't really have any feeling for this group, and just own the matched compilations, but "Life Begins at the Hop" is undoubtedly one of my ten favourite new wave songs. "Senses Working Overtime" is good too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yiknQ9xyJk

Yep "Life Begins" is the beginning of many XTC tunes that seemed to be absolutely pitch-perfect. That "tell me, what do you say" chorus is really something.

A bunch of my all-time favorite XTC songs come from the beginning of their career*, and I'm always surprised by the indifference of many fans to their first couple albums and associated singles. They changed a hell of a lot over the course of their career, but they were on fire right out of the gate.

* "Are You Receiving Me?", "Mekkanik Dancing", "Science Friction", "This Is Pop?", "Neon Shuffle" (most of White Music, really)

love their early singles, I just think the albums themselves are uneven

Waxworks blew my mind when I first heard it.

go2 is iffy, but i like white music almost all the way through. few of their albums strike me as perfect from front to back, tbh, but i've always been more interested in songs than albums.

Waxworks blew my mind when I first heard it.

yeah, i knew a bunch of those songs beforehand, but waxworks is an amazing collection of tunes. beeswax too!

White Music is a great album. Very jerky New-Wavey but also it seems to parody that genre at the same time. It's almost Zappa-esque in the way it's very self-consciously stupid but also brilliant.

otm

stick to music threads ;)

"Life Begins At The Hop" is so sweet; I especially like that it's an upbeat pop song about a church dance social. c-c-c-cola on tap

I've got something like 75 officially released non-lp tracks and it's almost all great. Best b-side band ever? Got my vote!

Yeah most of the CDs I have are the ones with B-sides as binus tracks they shoved right in the middle of the normal tracklist but tbh it took me years to figure that out because they never sounded like a drop in quality or out of place. Can't imagine Black Sea w/out No Language In Our Lungs in the middle.

you're australian now?

???

binus

jk

Can't imagine Black Sea w/out No Language In Our Lungs in the middle.

this is utterly otm, so much so that I thought it was part of the normal track list until this post

thought forgot

I'm pretty sure "Language" was part of the original track listing, unless it was some US-only dealie. The only copy of Black Sea I had was an 80s Geffen cassette (minimal artwork/info, no bonus tracks), and "Language is on it.

ha I see I am wrong! nevermind.

Yeah mine has "No Language" but the bonus tracks are "Smokeless Zone", "Don't Lose Your Temper", and "Somnabulist"

I think "Best B-side band ever" is actually OTM when you consider all the Fuzzy Warbles stuff; a 30-track "best of" of that stuff would be fantastic. Trouble is they're a great A-side band too :)

This floored me when I saw it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8htYS8mf8iY

ah yeah, 'no language' is on the original pressing, not sure what I was thinking tbh

See it's gotten to the point where it's somewhere in the middle of an XTC album, I think of it as a b-side, thanks weird Geffen CDs.
Thread has inspired me to pull out my LP of Black Sea

"I felt just like a crusader"
Towers of London might be my faves off Black Sea, all the Colin tracks are A+ fun, too, Black Sea was the album of theirs that really got me head over heels for this band.

xp me too! I've been playing mandopop nonstop for exactly a month (tuning my brain for exams), will break the run with this lp

Colin's really just my favorite bassist, ever, the end. Bass is totally the giddy heart of "Rocket From a Bottle."

my xtc-hating flatmate (c. 1997) found his way in through smokeless zone, then cuba, which he sang in the house for *weeks*

not to tread on your lovely bass post

Smokeless Zone is an improbable entry point imo!

when I played it to him, it was like the top of his head came off

xpost That clip of Freaks & Geeks is so great, I had the same reaction the first time I saw. Love that show and really love that song.

Did anyone check out Andy's "Powers" sound collage album?

Sonambulist is pretty ace
Love Colin

My improbable entry point was "It's Nearly Africa" on the early WOMAD compilation Music and Rhythm.

http://s.dsimg.com/image/R-2513295-1318535035.jpeg

And thanks to the magic of music nerd anal retentiveness, here's how it went from there:

Date of purchase / Title
Aug 6, 1982 Music and Rhythm (Various Artists)
Sep 9, 1982 English Settlement
Oct 7, 1982 Black Sea
Oct 8, 1982 5 Senses E.P.
Oct 8, 1982 Senses Working Overtime/Blame The Weather/Egyptian Solution 12"
Oct 11, 1982 White Music
Oct 11, 1982 Ball And Chain/Heaven Is Paved With Broken Glass/Punch And Judy/Cockpit Dance Mixture 12"
Oct 12, 1982 Take Away/The Lure Of Salvage (Mr. Partridge)
Oct 19, 1982 Go 2
Nov 4, 1982 Beeswax - Some B-Sides 1977-1982
Nov 4, 1982 Waxworks - Some Singles 1977-1982
Nov 30, 1982 Drums And Wires
Dec 2, 1982 3D E.P.
Plus a whole bunch of 7" singles that I didn't keep track of.

...and then the long wait until Mummer was released in September 1983

By the way, on the song "Tissue Tigers," is Andy singing "I've grown immune to your bald pussy"?

lol, "i've grown immune to your claws, pussy...cat"

are you guys just reading off the youtube comments?

...and then the long wait until Mummer was released in September 1983

Mummer was the first one I was eagerly waiting for too. I entered via Drums and Wires, liked parts of it but didn't love it. Missed out on Black Sea (I was broke and not buying much new music in 1980.) But then in 1982 I fell hard for English Settlement, backtracked and bought everything I could get my hands on.

are you guys just reading off the youtube comments?

if lump was, i didn't get it. i was just quoting the lyrics.

Plus a whole bunch of 7" singles that I didn't keep track of.

I hunted down a stack of XTC 45s to collect the b-sides before I knew that Beeswax existed (which itself was pretty hard to find). Nice to have for the picture sleeves, though. "No Thugs In Our House" folds out into a little finger puppet theater (or rather, it would if I chose to destroy it, which I will not).
http://www.shopvinylrevolutions.com/v/vspfiles/photos/VR838-2T.jpg

Cool! I remember that one.

i've got that!

are you guys just reading off the youtube comments?

if lump was, i didn't get it. i was just quoting the lyrics.

Nope, I wasn't.

I had forgotten about Spiral and The Good Things, both are pretty good, would add those to the list of great extraneous XTC tunes.

i've always loved "washaway", a colin b-side from the big express.

all of those big express b-sides were good. "Red Brick Dream" was my favorite; love that low-key wishywashy stuff

For real, that song is so dreamy. Blue Overall and Washaway are super strong, too. That whizzy guitar and barroom piano combo in Washaway is a delight.