Saint of the Month

Real Astrology
The Televisionary Oracle
Saint of the Month
July 1999

Saint of the Stage IT'S CURIOUS HOW the anonymous intimacy of the Internet allows us to claim someone who lives half-way across the country and whom we've never met as 'a good buddy.' But that's exactly how we feel about reader Bill Shuyler, our good buddy who has twice suggested prospects for Sainthood. This time Bill nominates Andy Partridge of the group XTC. We had hoped to exalt Andy for our May issue, therefore Bill's Beltane reference, but we were far too cranky that month to laud anyone. HERE'S A SUGGESTION appropriate for Beltane: Poet/singer/musician Andy Partridge of XTC. You have to admire someone who fights for 10 years to record songs like those on his most recent record--"River of Orchids," "Easter Theatre," and "Greenman"--insists on the title "Apple Venus" and then designs the cover art with this motto: "Do what you will but harm none." (And once again, I am not a publicist, I do not work with or for a record company or this artist or anyone else remotely related to the music industry or the selling of music.) Here are excerpts from a recent review. You can find many, many more listed at the Chalkhills website. QUOTED WORDS: (BayInsider -- Tim Quirk, Pop-Ed Columnist) In a better world, every band would be as good as XTC: complicatedly simple, literate and inspired, worthy of blind devotion. We don't live in a better world, however. We live in a pretty stupid world, a world where you don't usually get to hear XTC on the radio, a world where my nineteen year-old nephew has no idea who XTC are, a world where label woes have kept XTC out of the studio for seven years. . . . . . . XTC's best songs take place somewhere else entirely, in a pastoral wonderland of their own invention. It's a place where people travel by balloon, the mayor is the highest authority, pretty girls promenade along the quayside, farmboys fall in love, and everyone lives in a quasi-mystical relationship with the elements. . . . . . . XTC's talent lies in their ability to make that world sound not only more attractive than our own, but more real. And with their long-awaited new release, Apple Venus, the band succeeds again. Apple Venus is another triumph of XTC's world-making prowess. . . . . . . It's also audacious--not many pop bands would risk returning from a seven year absence with an album of acoustic-based, orchestrally-enhanced recordings. . . . . . . That ability to rise above their own cleverness is another mark of XTC's genius. It's pretty easy to sound smart; it's a lot more difficult to make everything sound right. Take "I'd Like That," a simple love song which addresses the most elemental of rock song subjects: the desire to fuck the person you've just met. Partridge knows how to make that urge sound like a natural part of his yesteryear paradise: rather than compare his love with that of Bonnie for Clyde or Sid for Nancy, he states, with all seriousness, "I'll be your Albert if you'll be Victoria." The music, too, seems basic and timeless: acoustic guitar, bass drum, and slapped knees. But Partridge can't resist dropping in a line like, "I wouldn't Hector if you'd be Helen of Troy." If anybody else tried that, he'd come off as a pre-Christian Letterman, and this delicate vision of innocently depraved longing would shatter. Partridge, however, consistently gets away with stuff like that, partly because bookworm fans like myself eat it up, but mostly because his melodies and his delivery are so convincing. Cleverness is usually distancing; with XTC, it's often the opposite, a testament to how transcendent pop can be when each note and every word are chosen with the utmost care. Excerpt of lyrics from "Easter Theatre" (Partridge) Gold sun rolls around Chocolate nipple brown Tumble from your arms Like the ground your breasts swell Land awake from sleep Hares will kick and leap Flowers climb erect Smiling from the moist kiss of her rainbow mouth Stage left Enter Easter and she's dressed in yellow yolk Stage right Now the son has died, the father can be born Stand up If we'd all breathe in and blow away the smoke New life, we'd applaud her new life Odin mounts the tree Bleeds for you and me Splashing on the lamb Gamboling with spring step Buds will laugh and burst Racing to be first Turning all the soil As the prompter's fingers through her spinning script Stage left Enter Easter and she's dressed in yellow yolk Stage right Now the son has died, the father can be born Stand up If we'd all breathe in and blow away the smoke New life, we'd applaud her new life. Excerpt of lyrics from "Greenman" (Partridge) Please to bend down for the one called the Greenman He wants to make you his bride Please to bend down for the one called the Greenman Forever to him you're tied And you know for a million years he has been your lover He'll be a million more And you know for a million years he has been your lover Down through the skin to the core Heed the Greenman Heed the Greenman Please to dance round for the one called the Greenman He wants to make you his child Please to dance round for the one called the Greenman Dressed in the fruits of the wild And you know for a million years he has been your father He'll be a million more And you know for a million years he has been your father Run to his arms at the door Lay your head, lay your head, lay your head, lay your head on the Greenman Lay your head, lay your head with mine Lay your head, lay your head, lay your head, lay your head on the Greenman Build a bed out of oak and pine See the Greenman blow his kiss from high church wall An unknowing church will amplify his call

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