Brief history lesson: XTC, in big trouble with Virgin for not coming up with a radio hit on The Big Express, ship off to America to record with opinionated genius weirdo Todd Rundgren. Rundgren wants to make collection of singles into concept album revolving around the hours of the day. Rundgren and Andy Partridge hate each other a lot and fight constantly. Tense atmosphere rubs off onto gentle bassist Colin, who quits band. (He came back the next day.) Album comes out, makes nary a splash in U.K. or here. Someone plays b-side "Dear God" on U.S. college radio station. Huge college radio hit. Album re-pressed with "Dear God" on, everyone loves album. Boom! XTC are back, baby!

History aside, this is one buzzy, punch-drunk wonderful album. Despite all the shit they've said about him over the years, "the Runt" really did kick our boys from Swindon into high conceptual gear. Any great XTC album depends on Colin having strong enough songs to balance Andy's, and his five songs here are all muscular and oblique. Not only are these Andy and Colin's strongest and most confident songs since English Settlement, they hang together despite having nothing really in common with each other. Does Colin's morose "Dying" really belong on the same album as the fake beatnik jazz of Andy's "The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul"? Can you compare either to the Philip Glass pointillism of "1000 Umbrellas," which also contains Dave Gregory's finest four minutes? And yet Rundgren's little touches, like the drones that hold together the entire first side and the great segues between several of the tunes, keep our ears open for the wild pop experimentation going on here.

I think that in many ways this is XTC's most experimental album. Every song seems to push the limits of what can be done with a pop album containing 14 pop tunes. "That's Really Super, Supergirl," which is just a song about being alone when your girlfriend is off saving the world, is really kind of heartbreaking as well as being frothy and trivial; Andy's twisted psyche gets a workout in the extended metaphor "Another Satellite," wherein he tells a girl to get lost, but his passion for her shows through even as he's putting down her "moony moony face"; and "Sacrificial Bonfire" is the most uplifting song about goat sacrifice as you'd ever want to hear. "Dear God" itself, a song Andy despised at the time, is starting to look like one of his best -- angry, witty, and historically important for the band. Gently, gently, they push back the barricades, while at the same time sounding lush and lovely and sexy. XTC, sexy? The mind boggles the whole time.

The first time I heard this album I was disappointed; I wanted them to be the old almost-dancey XTC again. But what I got was not only priceless and perfect and the beginning of my obsession with this great band, but also one of the greatest summer make-out albums in pop music. Believe it or not, but I'm tellin' you, you'll be hitting the sheets before they even get to "Earn Enough for Us." Cheers!

-- Matt Cibula

Copyright © 1998, 1999 Big Shot Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved.

 Go back to Chalkhills Articles.

You wrote XTC off, didn't you? Just because they went on strike against Virgin for five years, got dropped and had to start their own label to get a deal and because Andy's marriage broke up and he went partially deaf for a while and had prostate problems and his wife left him for another guy and Colin's wife was sick so he stayed home to take care of her and then Dave left the band, you thought they didn't matter anymore. Well, XTC always matters, and this album matters all over the place.

Mind you, it doesn't ROCK, so don't play this around your Korn-loving roommate. (Rocking stopped being the point about 15 years ago to XTC anyway.) This is intimate and serious music, as comfortable with violins and horns as it is with acoustic guitar and percussive thigh-slapping. "River of Orchids" is the first track, and between the drops of water, the pointillist stabs of orchestral strings, and the hiccupping brass circles, it's hard to think that this is the same Andy Partridge who wrote "Complicated Game" or "Reign of Blows." But the point of this entire album is that Andy and Colin aren't the same guys they used to be. The album's original title was "The History of the Middle Ages," and its songs are so personal it's embarrassing at times. Whether its Colin's "Fruit Nut," about how he really really likes his gardening shed, or Andy's "Your Dictionary," about how he really really hates his ex-wife, every song here is real and true and pretty much about being middle-aged. And, unlike all the other crappy boomers who sing about that subject (stand up, Sting), XTC don't wallow in self-pity about it. Hell, "The Last Balloon" urges us to throw old people overboard "like so much sand." This is a mature record by two amazing musicians and friends who have weathered a lot and seem to be okay, all things considered.

So if you're a callow youth who doesn't want to think about all that old-dude stuff, or a shallow person who wants something more "normal," go buy some other album, or wait for Apple Venus Volume 2, due in the spring of 2000, and reputed to be "the rockin' one." Me? I'll be listening to this album until I die, because it's quite beautiful, and it's nice to have role models like these.

-- Matt Cibula

Copyright © 1998, 1999 Big Shot Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved.

 Go back to Chalkhills Articles.

So we were all poised for Apple Venus Volume 2, which they said was going to be out this fall, and we got this album, which consists entirely of the 8-track demo versions of every song on AVV1. If these guys were any other band, I'd be first at the barricades, bandanna tied jauntily around my head, urging my rabid disciples to "Burn! Burn the exploiters! Let's show them what happens when you try to squeeze the record-buying public!" But, y'know, it's XTC, and y'know, they're like totally my favorite band sometimes. So it's cool. Plus, now that they're indie rockers, they can do lo-fi if they want to.

Sonically, Homespun isn't as good as AVV1; the vocals are weakly recorded and real violins sound better than synthesized ones. But what you get here goes beyond mere audiophilism; this album is a window into the creative process itself. You get to hear "I'd Like That" taped in mono the instant it was composed, and then the whole 8-track demo, which really sounds a whole lot like the song on the "real" album and actually carries more dramatic impact. "Your Dictionary" actually improves with underproduction, as the great coda's lyrics are finally intelligible: "Now your laughter has a hollow ring/and a hollow ring has no finger in/so let's close the book and let the day begin/and our marriage be undone." Now those are some damn good lyrics. Although some of the more hoity-toity numbers like "River of Orchids" and "Easter Theatre" are probably "technically" better on AVV1, I think the thrill of discovery heightens the Homespun versions of these orchestral compositions, even if they are played on a Proteus. And while the "Harvest Festival" on AVV1 is certainly immense, this rougher version made me cry like a freakin' baby while driving to Chicago one Sunday afternoon.

What makes Homespun great is the care that went into it: the handwritten lyric sheets with scribbles and cross-outs, the funny D.I.Y. art parodying the original album's, and above all else, the best liner notes ever written. Colin explains that he writes his songs in certain keys because he doesn't want his family to overhear him singing. Andy talks about his McCartney fixation and about how he wrote "Greenman" on his daughter's tiny Romanian-made school guitar. There's some really hilarious, touching stuff here, and it all turns Homespun into a great album in its own right rather than just a vanity project. I say that this is just as good an album as Apple Venus Volume 1, but you should buy both. Reward TVT for putting these albums out, and reward Andy and Colin for their stubborn brilliance.

-- Matt Cibula

Copyright © 1998, 1999 Big Shot Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved.

 Go back to Chalkhills Articles.

Perched in front of his computer, Cibula takes a deep breath. He is faced with the biggest conundrum of his short career as a music critic: can he be truly objective about the new album by XTC, one of his favorite bands? Or will he succumb to blatant boosterism? O, how he wrings his hands! Ah, how he gnashes his teeth! His fear-crazed and bloodshot eyes dart back and forth, searching for something that sounds neutral, or even - gasp! - negative...

At first, Cibula thought he could say that "Playground" wasn't an inspired opener, but then he listened to it a little harder and now thinks it's just peachy, with 14-year-old Holly Partridge on backing vox. What exactly is there to complain about in "Stupidly Happy"? The whole song has only one chord. Literally; one chord. Sounds and details and verses jump in, but the riff and the looped drumbeat just keep pounding away so you can remember what dumb love is all about. And what a cold unfeeling lizard-neck Cibula would have to be to complain about "In Another Life," a Colin Moulding track that takes equal parts Kinks, skiffle, lo-fi pop, and alt.country and pours them all over a wise and profound lyric about two people keeping love alive.

Cibula gets up and starts to pace wildly, as the modified Beatleskank of "My Brown Guitar" fills his dank study. Finally, something to hold onto! Cibula hates the Beatles and all their works! But the melody here subdues him, and those gently-fucked-up lyrics: "You want some lovely/I've got some lovely/In my head/(In my head)/Where the lions/Wear the right tie/Where the gems roar/There be lovely" - And suddenly Cibula remembers that he used to love The Beatles too, and that Partridge is a genius, and he hangs his head in shame because he knows he's no critic - he's just a guy who loves a band, and this is going to be a rave review, and he's pissing away all his integrity, and he just doesn't care.

And as he rocks back and forth, idiot grin on his weatherbeaten visage, alone but not lonely in his lair, we'll just list some more relevant information: 1.) "The Wheel and the Maypole" might be the greatest song the band has ever recorded, and has just made its into my all-time top ten after five days. 2.) "We're All Light" is very close. 3.) The percussion on "Boarded Up" is Colin and Andy walking and hitting the backs of guitars. 4.) "Wounded Horse" is a country blues song. 5.) They're using guitars again. 5 ½.) Chuck Sabo and Prairie Prince are absolute geniuses on the drums. 5 ¾.) Colin's songs are really tight on this record. 6.) We could go on about a lot more songs but our editors are making us shut up now. 7.) This album makes us very happy. Even poor old miserable Cibula is dancing now.

-- Matt Cibula

Copyright © 1998, 1999 Big Shot Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved.

 Go back to Chalkhills Articles.

Regular readers of this site (and friends and family members and college roommates and editors and wives and children and casual acquaintances and people who have sat next to me on the subway and basically everyone who has ever spent any time anywhere near me) know that XTC is one of my favorite bands. I'm in the club, there's no dragging me out. I own English Settlement on vinyl AND compact disc, I was a regular visitor to at least two different fansites until they closed down or moved or something, I have held my own in the infamous Jeff Brannion "Get drunk as shit and name every song off every XTC album in order starting with White Music GO!!" challenge. I'm a lifer, boyo, and ye had better believe it now.

So let's talk about this, the biggest collection of XTC rarities and demos and hits and album tracks ever issued. It's four discs! It's huge! It's unprecedented! It's beautifully put together and has great liner notes written by both Andy and Colin, the only remaining members! And I'm supposed to say it's a disappointment! Because this tries to be both an artists' choice compilation and a rarities collection at the same time, and kind of fails, because you can't really do both.

And, honestly, that's how I feel about the concept and the execution of it -- right up to the time when I actually hear the damned thing, at which point I get all gooey and misty-eyed. I love every bit of this stuff, whether or not I own it already (the album tracks, some of the "unreleased" studio tracks) or not (the lovely live versions, the demos, etc.). I don't mind hopping from Disc Two from blistering live versions of "Meccanic Dancing" and the infamous "Atom Medley" (consisting of "Into the Atom Age," "Hang on to the Night," and "Neon Shuffle") to unused and rejected single edits of songs from Drums and Wires to a rehearsal tape of "Generals and Majors" to the album releases of two Black Sea songs and then right back to live stuff, because A) this is great music, and B) I'm a big fan. The riches to be gained by this approach far outweigh any nagging sense that you'll feel if you buy this set and then say "Aw, hell, I already have a bunch of these songs in these exact versions."

Because they really are some of the greatest songs of the last 25 years, and Coat of Many Cupboards gives us many different looks at them. Stripped of its studio finery, Moulding's "Wonderland" reveals itself to be not an overly mannered pastoral piece, but a soul song with keyboard riffs right out of Ann Peebles' "I Can't Stand the Rain." Most of the songs are Partridge's, of course, and we've heard most of them before one way or another, but even in their demo versions they range from the amazing (love that "Let's Make a Den") to the furious (that live version of "Paper and Iron" absolutely slays) to the just frankly bizarre (how did he ever think that "Fireball XL5" would be a punk-pop dance hit? or that it would be a good idea to do a dub mix of it?).

As a starting place for XTC worship -- oh, I must have meant "study" -- maybe this wouldn't be such a bad place to start. But that's a junkie telling someone else to turn on, and as such should be treated with skepticism.

-- Matt Cibula

 Go back to Chalkhills Articles.