Chalkhills Digest Volume 2, Issue 84
Date: Tuesday, 12 March 1996
Chalkhills Digest, Volume 2, Number 84
Tuesday, 12 March 1996
Today's Topics:
Re: Chalkhills Digest #2-83
One Tape, lots of reasons
"My Weapon" guess
Gormenghast/Steerpike
Two And A Half Cents
Van Dyke Parks & Orange Crate Art
Ugly Underneath Food Metaphor et al.
Top Ten Albums
Top 10 LP's of All Time
Dear God CD Single
Videos, Beach Boys, Twomey
Just three things ...
Re: Chalkhills Digest #2-83
Surfin' Back (history of rock & roll)
Top Ten/Loving sounds
Oodles of Topix!
Videos, weapons, BBs
Peter Pumpkinhead CD for free...
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message-ID: <3144DCF1.78B8@pe.net>
Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 18:09:53 -0800
From: Anthony Ciarochi <ciarochi@pe.net>
Organization: Press Enterprise
Subject: Re: Chalkhills Digest #2-83
DrBeat1@aol.com wrote:
> I worked my way backwards through the catalog.
>I'm through Black Sea and have found that I can adapt to all the band's
>musical phases and still love them!
Be sure to let us know when you get to 'Go 2' ! :-)
* ------------------------------------------------------------------------
Anthony F. Ciarochi On-line Administrator -- PE.net
ciarochi@pe.net CS Major, Univ. of CA, Riverside
http://pe.net/~ciarochi
'Spend at least 15 minutes every day
listening to something you hate...'
* ------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------ From: richard.pedrettiallen@octel.com Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 18:15:49 -0800 Message-Id: <144ded30@corp.octel.com> Subject: One Tape, lots of reasons This deals with the preparation of the Tribute Tape. If you are not interested, save yourself! If you are, sorry for the length. __ 2 tapes = too much. 100 minutes is a lot of music and I'm sure that this tape will generate more traffic on Chalkhills than Testimonial Dinner. We will all be exposed to new interpretations and musicians that we've never heard of (some of which, we will wish had stayed that way) and musicians we will never hear >from again. Anyone who wanted to contribute a song was given the opportunity to participate. Many people quickly responded with wild enthusiasm and some people have been very slow in responding. I love the fact that we have had such good response that a second tape is quite feasible and only if the production of tape one turns out to be agony would I not consider doing a second, but I won't even attempt them simultaneously. The production of two tapes, ideally, would be wonderful but when do I cut off the requests? How can I budget time and materials for anything if I never know what I'll end up working with? Why can't we look forward to a second tribute tape at some later date? Maybe an annual thing? That would give people an entire year to put together their grandiose production or record the chance get-together when Andy drops by your house to jam and have a pint of Burton Porter. In any event, I have to set some limits, milestones and guidelines. It was first come, first served with a deadline. It is the only way that something this "detached" can be implemented. I don't manage the contributors. I have no power or authority over them. They are essentially doing this out of love and love makes people do strange things. All my planning can still get twisted if someone submits a 12 minute space-jam of ANOTHER SATTELITE. ***TO ALL CON-TRIBUTE-ORS: Please try to keep the length of your cover relatively close to the original time. If this will be a problem please fling me a note. re: Multiple versions of the same song. I've had enough requests for four songs in particular that I could make a 60 minute tape with multiple versions of just those four songs. This would be interesting for a few plays but it would probably fade to the back of the tape box pretty fast in most collections. Additionally, some songs would not be evaluated objectively and individually but by comparison which could make others gunshy to participate in future projects. If a second tape is made next year, there shouldn't be any problem with putting another persons version of a song done on tape one. As I've mentioned, I received email from a doomsayer who implied that I was setting myself up for frustration, scorn and the heartbreak of Psoriasis, to name but a few maladies. The project requires management. I want to do this project and I'd love to not lose any e-friends over it but I refuse to voluntarily let it get out of my control. I agree with the contest to name the tribute tape. Can someone volunteer to receive the suggestions, post the list, solicit votes and compile the results? My personal favorite right now is "Living Through Another Tribute" and I've got a feeling it will have a great deal more meaning in September. Cheers, Richard
------------------------------ Message-Id: <199603120216.VAA21854@pppl.gov> Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 21:18:31 -0500 From: Tobin Munsat <tmunsat@pppl.gov> Subject: "My Weapon" guess >From: sellheim@zfn.uni-bremen.de (Erich Sellheim) > >In "My Weapon", the lyric sheet quotes the last line as "My stinking >weapon", which doesn't make too much sense to me. >Any suggestions? My Secret Weapon?
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 22:04:27 -0500 (EST)
From: Bill Curran <bcurran@freenet.hamilton.on.ca>
Subject: Gormenghast/Steerpike
Message-ID: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960311215428.29827B-100000@james.freenet.hamilton.on.ca>
I have had this situation you see, where I er, have to er, listen to XTC
whenever I read any of the Gormenghast tales. I thought I was alone in this,
my love of these stories. I do not know a single person that has
read them, my friends can't get past the first page, they look at me in
the strangest way, and quickly change the topic of conversation. They like
some of the more catchy XTC pop, but fail to understand my need to play
pretty much all the albums all the time.
Thanks to Natalie for provoking my first post to Chalkhills - I will
attempt to participate more - enough lurking! (Its been 3 months since I
discovered the list).
Bill Curran Sysprog - MVS OS/2 xNIX WINx DOS
email : bcurran@stelco.e-mail.com Rexx on every one of them!
bcurran@netaccess.on.ca
http://www.freenet.hamilton.on.ca/~aa131/Profile.html
------------------------------ From: Benjamin Woll <bwoll@abacus.bates.edu> Message-Id: <9603120344.AA01317@abacus.bates.edu> Subject: Two And A Half Cents Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 22:44:20 -0500 (EST) Becki DiGregorio - good to hear from another Religion major out there. I got another email from a guy named Harrison Schmidt who was studied Theology at Kenyon, I'm at Bates. Just finished writing a thesis on faith development theories called The Divine Movement. It relates process theology to the work of James Fowler...email me if you are interested - it also has got lots of psych. Cheers, and I agree with your positioning of English Settlement on your list. Everytime I listen to that record it amazes me in a completely new way, and I listen to it a lot... Natalie Jacobs - I agree with your well reasoned defense of not taking an an author's intent all that seriously when interpretating work. Knowing that Andy was writing about another woman in Another Satellite gives us insight into the reason for the song's being, but it does not offer us anything resembling definitive, unambiguous meaning. Successful psychoanalysts (yes there are a lot of crackpots out there) like Freud and Erikson show us that significance often lingers deep within our mind's constructions, and these meanings are often created unintentionally. An artist also does not always have the best, or penultimate perspective on his own work - Orwell consistently denied Animal Farm was about the Russian Revolution, but come on!!! Criticism exists because, when done well, it makes good works richer and eliminates spotty material from the canon. Can you imagine reading Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow without looking at someone else's ideas on the text? Does anyone honestly believe that the state of the arts would be healthier today if we were not so afraid to call Debbie Gibson and Melrose Place mindless shit? Anthony's Remembering Guernica was well written and pretty damn funny, but a world in which the audience is left out of the creative equation is a world I want no part of. Whatever lacks multidimensional, multidirectional rhythm is bound unto death. Boredom is something, thank God, that XTC leaves to the Def Leppards of the world. Millions is about Mao. Another Satellite is about Religion. Dear Madam Barnum - who else but Margerat Thatcher? If these interpretations are part of the discussion, they are part of the solution. Thanks for pointing this out Natalie, Cheers, Ben
------------------------------ From: MRFrench3d@aol.com Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 23:21:29 -0500 Message-ID: <960311232128_348499721@emout08.mail.aol.com> Subject: Van Dyke Parks & Orange Crate Art In response to the Chalkhillian who had high hopes for the Brian Wilson-Van Dyke Parks collaboration, "Orange Crate Art", you will be disappointed. Almost 4 years in the making, "Orange Crate Art", is very typical of Parks' idiosyncratic style of production and songwriting. The songs are all highly orchestrated with plenty of interesting sounds and ideas, but somehow it all sounds like an overproduced, anachronistic mess. I was very excited to hear this project, but once I heard it, I just wanted to play "Pet Sounds" and "Song Cycle" and forget the whole thing. If you are interested there is a fairly lengthy and interesting interview with Mr. Parks on the "Addicted to Noise" website. The website is http://www.addict.com/ATN/ To get directly to the interview try: http://www.addict.com/issues/2.03/sections/I_Robot/The_Producer/ Before you buy it, try to find it used. Bill XTC Song of the Day: Deliver Us From the Elements
------------------------------ Message-Id: <v01530502ad6ab53ea737@[202.241.19.135]> Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 14:22:18 +0900 From: hellman@tanaka.jrdc.go.jp (Olof Hellman) Subject: Ugly Underneath Food Metaphor et al. Hey fellow Fans-- It happened again. A song I had thought was sub XTC-standard has caught my interest. Yesterday all of the food metaphor in Ugly Underneath just came up and hit me on the head (mouth?). Why didn't I notice it before? So I'm asking for help: Some bits of the song don't seem to fit in, and I can't believe that they don't. What's the "wheel" that you are supposed to roll away with a fork? Is it an obscure reference to caravans that never move from the front garden? And is there any relation between masks and spoons? Is there some other profound way in which the food metaphor fits into the failing marriage / corrupt politician themes? Anyone notice how the two verse so neatly pair up in meaning: "I wouldn't have suspicions" matches with "so warm you could bake by it" "they have you and they're gloating" matches with "fairy tale's shredding" et al.. Anyone else feel that "coordinated bedding" could refer either to linens or to some bed-related actions? And another recent revelation. Is it no accident that "Hold me my daddy" is adjacent to "Pink Thing" ? Now I can't listen to that one without seeing a man walking down the street holding his baby singing the song out loud in a blatant effort to offend the prudish, while the baby is thinking "Hold me -- hold me". - Olof Olof Hellman Tanaka SolidJunction Project / JRDC http://marcie.jrdc.go.jp/och/Olof.html
------------------------------ Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 23:52:46 -0600 (CST) Message-Id: <199603120552.XAA03781@thor.inlink.com> From: jims@inlink.com (Jim S) Subject: Top Ten Albums Just thought I'd chime in: 1. XTC - Oranges and Lemons 2. XTC - English Settlement AND Skylarking 3. Beatles - Rubber Soul AND Abbey Road (TIE) 4. k.d. lang - Ingenue 5. XTC - Black Sea 6. Sam Phillips - Cruel Inventions AND Martinis and Bikinis (TIE) 7. REM - Automatic for the People AND Document (Tie) 8. XTC - Mummer 9. Fleetwood Mac - Tusk 10. Posies - Dear 23 Okay, so I hedged a bit with all the ties. And there are STILL some I feel awful about leaving off. Among the honorable mention are Liz Phair (Exile in Guyville and Whip Smart), Tori Amos (Little Earthquakes), Todd Rundgren (Something/Anything), Bruce Springsteen (Nebraska) and Nine Inch Nails (The Downward Spiral). Thanks for listening. Jim S. <jims@inlink.com> "Here's to swimmin' with bow-legged women."
------------------------------ Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 16:00:53 +0900 (JST) Message-Id: <199603120700.QAA20069@gol1.gol.com> From: mwicks@gol.com (Michael Wicks) Subject: Top 10 LP's of All Time Fellow Chalkhillians! Just a quick note here to throw in my Top 10 LP's (in very rough order): 1. XTC-Skylarking (Gold, Silver, RegularCD, Tape, LP, doesn't matter what, a wonderful, masterful, etc etc...thank you very much Messirs Andy, Colin, Dave, Prarie,and Todd) 2. The Beatles-Abbey Road (They knew it was their last, and what a swan song it still is!) 3. Steely Dan-Aja (listening to this almost made me late to work one day!) 4. TOTO-TotoIV (the first LP I ever bought, at age 14, and still sounds fresh today!) 5. Jethro Tull- "A" (the first LP I ever listened to all the way through-Apocalyptic! 6. XTC-Oranges and Lemons (without this, I never would've made it through college!) 7. The Police- Ghost in the Machine (Gordon Sumners, where are you now? Summers and Copeland don't need you anymore! Great album) 8. Hiroshima- Another Place (hard to decide among this Jazz/Fusion group; all of theirs are superb pieces of music, with the sound of the Koto and Shamisen whisking me off to a stone garden beneath the eaves of a temple in Kyoto. And then back to L.A. in just one chord progression! Nice balance between California, New York, and Japan. 9. XTC-English Settlement (if England is like this, I'm ready to go! Nonsvch close behind) 10. Steely Dan-Katy Lied (this one pulled me through a nasty breakup a few years ago) Honorable mention goes to.....naah, would take too long! : - ) I have some demo tapes of Skylarking, Helium Kidz, and Mummer/The Big Express, and I have a Mr. Martin Fuchs to thank for those. He lives in Hannover, Germany, and has finished/made an XTC Discography/LivePerformances of tapes he has available, and, though not quite as comprehensive as Shigemasu's Wonderland, it nonetheless lists every song XTC ever (and in some cases, never) recorded. You can e-mail me for his address, as I have to dig it out! A review (highly personal) and a question of/about Go2 coming up! Also, I must respond to Greg Beecher and say that I would love to know more about the recording of XTC's songs, a la Mark Lewisohns' The Beatles Recording Sessions. How bout some of us Chalkhillians doing an XTC Recording Sessions-type thing, if anyone out there has access to some of that kind of info. (I don't, but I would be the first person to buy/read that kind of info!) Lastly, if anyone would like details of the Skylarking video project that I am just now getting around to writing a script for, all ideas/comments can be e-mailed to me or left at my home page: http://www2.gol.com/users/mwicks/index.html please bear in mind that it is still under heavy construction! Cheers, Michael (mwicks@gol.com)
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 08:28:31 +0100 (MET)
From: Zastai - A MUD Addict <tvanhold@zorro.ruca.ua.ac.be>
Subject: Dear God CD Single
Message-Id: <Pine.HPP.3.91.960312082609.29659E-100000@zorro.ruca.ua.ac.be>
Recently someone suggested buying the Dear God CD Single instead of
Skylarking Gold. Does anyone know where to get that single? Or the
Skylarking Gold CD for that matter, as I've been looking for both for
several months now (with no luck).
Any help is appreciated.
#ifndef _SIGNATURE
#define _SIGNATURE
cout << " Tim Van Holder aka Zastai <tvanhold@zorro.ruca.ua.ac.be>\n";
cout << " 2nd Year Computer Science at Antwerp Univerity, Belgium\n";
cout << " MUD Locations:" << endl;
cout << " Speedy @ ShadowMUD <zorro.ruca.ua.ac.be:4000>\n";
cout << " Zastai, Jarkeld, Rastafari @ Carrion Fields "
<< " <maple.can.net:9999>" << endl;
#endif //_SIGNATURE
------------------------------ Message-Id: <m0twV4Z-000IDcC@venus.mcs.com> Subject: Videos, Beach Boys, Twomey Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 08:29:10 -0600 (CST) From: "Joe Lynn" <jtl@mcs.com> I'm de-lurking after a long sideline stint.... From: William HamBevan <whambeva@jesus.ox.ac.uk> > - On the subject of the 'Laughing Prisoner': the performance given by > XTC was of 'The Man who Sailed Around his Soul'. It took place in the > gardens of Portmeirion - the set of 'The Prisoner' - in a sort of > Italianesque Summer house. All the band members were wearing the black > blazers with white piping that Patrick McGoohan wore in the series. This clip has appeared on a couple of "compilation tapes" that I've seen at record swap meets. The version I have came with _Play at Home_, the BBC concert, and the _ES_ videos. It's an n'th generation copy, so I'm used to seeing the guys in a blur. From: becki diGregorio <ziglain@cruzio.com> > .. > pop). How can us small band of fans somehow convey the necessity of > releasing these gems?? If only Virgin could realize the number of buyers of > such a video, they might just get the hint that they could make a small > fortune, and more importantly give the lads most of the take (since they > deserve it so much more). When _Look Look_ was released in Canada (in '91 or thereabouts), I called Virgin in the US to see if there were any plans to release it here. I figured, "it's already converted to NTSC, it's HiFi, the cover art is done, they've been releasing videos like _Genesis: A History_ and the Roxy Music video history in the USA, and it wouldn't be a lot a lot of work on their part, why not?" The person I spoke to knew exactly which video I was talking about, and she said they had no plans to release it. She also admitted that she didn't know why, since XTC has such a loyal core of fans. Shortly afterwards, a Canadian Chalkhillian and I did a swap and I got my tape anyway, so I didn't pursue it further. Suffice it to say one can never predict what the record companies will do. From: Bill Godby <wgodby@sun.tir.com> > Hey! Hey! Hey! I'm not crazy. It was great to hear that I'm not alone in > hearing all those Beach Boyzz melodies oozing out of the Partridge vocal > apparatus. I still don't completely understand the connection. The Black > ... > and Philip Glass's The Laughing Policeman. Where's the BB's? Maybe he > was just afraid to mention them, since they don't quite fit his dossier. > Has anyone see anything in print that admits the truth? I know I've seen interviews where Andy admits to liking _Pet Sounds_ and addresses the Carl Wilson-like vocals on "Pale and Precious." I'll have to dig through my stuff to see if I can find one of these documents. On the Beach Boys' boxed set, they included a lot of studio outtakes, especially snippets of the _Smile_ sessions. I couldn't help but think of our guys noodling around in the studio and producing sounds like the ones Brian Wilson came up with. And when I heard the de-constructed version of "Heroes and Villains" I knew exactly where the inspiration for "Pale and Precious" came from. From: DrBeat1@aol.com > .. > I am glad for this book, but is it me or was it rather lacking? > .. > Colin wrote a song, there isn't much detail. Also, aside from the > detailed overview of Skylarking, the latter albums are given a total > "rush treatment". Hardly any ink is given to The Big Express, Oranges & > Lemons, and particularly Nonesuch. (Like it or not, Nonesuch was not > exactly "thrown together"! Surely, the artists would have lots to tell > about the development of these songs.) I think _Nonsuch_ gets the "rush" treatment in the book because it was either just released or just about to be released when the book was published. Maybe there wasn't a lot of info available to Twomey at the time. I agree that there wasn't a lot of info given on the later releases, but the story the band has to tell up until the release of _The Big Express_ is a bit more sensational than what followed. How can you follow up Andy's breakdown, the band's financial problems, the rocky relationship with the record company, the Todd Rundgren episodes? Anything after all that would be anticlimactic. Still, it's a decent book and a great place to see Colin and Terry with rock'n'roll hair. jtl -- jtl@mcs.com
------------------------------
Message-Id: <s145537e.066@DICTAPHONE.COM>
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 10:26:43 -0500
From: Tim Kendrick <TKEN@DICTAPHONE.COM>
Subject: Just three things ...
Hi !
Just three things:
1.) I didn't mean anything against Richard P. for his
work on the tribute tape. If he only wants to commit
to only one tape, that's fine, I totally understand. I was
only trying to keep everyone happy.
2.) "Remembering Guernica" was just a joke, to get a few
laughs - I think we could come up with a better name
for our tribute tape.
3.) Here is my list of my all-time favorite albums/CD's
(these are NOT what I would necessarily consider
the best albums ever made - that list would include
the Beatles, Velvet Underground, etc.. Rather, these
are what I find myself listening to over, and over, and over
again, without ever getting sick of them.)
1.) "The Big Express" by XTC
2.) "Mummer" by XTC
3.) "Nonsuch" by XTC
4.) "A Fierce Pancake" by STUMP
5.) "Eye" by ROBYN HITCHCOCK
6.) "Throwing Muses" by THROWING MUSES
7.) "All Fools Day" by THE SAINTS
8.) "Bone Machine" by TOM WAITS
9.) "Deflowered" by PANSY DIVISION
10.) "Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain" by PAVEMENT
XTC SONG OF THE DAY: The Loving
(I don't know what the hell they're saying !)
------------------------------ Message-Id: <v02140b00ad6b2fb2492b@[198.69.129.114]> Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 11:13:42 -0500 From: lstead@cais.cais.com (Lewis Stead) Subject: Re: Chalkhills Digest #2-83 >Just thought i'd toss in my two cents on the gold cd. since i'm an avid >collector of the MoFi stuff, i have to say the gold cd pressing of >"skylarking" is decent. the most noteable improvement in my opinion is the >increased strength in the percussion. it's much fuller and seems to give >the songs a bit more energy, helping it rise above rundgren's generally >flat and compressed sounding mastering techniques. Interesting. I was going to comment that I had picked it up and compared to the "regular" CD, the percussion seems a bit less pronounced than the mass market CD and more like the original vinyl which I learned to love. While the vinyl is too dead on the percussion, the engineers seem to go a bit crazy on pumping it up on the mass market CD versions of Skylarking and Mummur, giving it a sort of booming sound. I thought the Gold CD of Skylarking reached a nice compromise, much more pronounced than the vinyl, but very tight. Lew !------------------------------------------------------------------------! ! Lewis Stead -=- lstead@cais.com -=- http://www.webcom.com/~lstead/ ! ! Snailmail to P.O. Box 41015; Bethesda, MD 20824-1015 ! ! Support S-1567 for Freedom of Speech on the Internet ! ! Congress 202-224-3121 -=- White House 202-456-1111 ! !------------------------------------------------------------------------!
------------------------------ From: Martin_Monkman@fincc04.fin.gov.bc.ca Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 08:50:46 -0800 (PST) Subject: Surfin' Back (history of rock & roll) Message-id: <9602128266.AA826649524@FINSMTP1.FIN.GOV.BC.CA> Irony doesn't convert to electrons very well, does it? My comments about "Pale and Precious" being a Beatles homage via "Back In The USSR" seems to have been misunderstood. I know, as should everyone else, that "Back In The USSR" combines Chuck Berry's "Back In The USA" with "California Girls" (a David Lee Roth song). As Troy Peters noted, "Surfin' USA" is rather like the aforementioned Chuck Berry song ... so much so, in fact, that "Surfin' USA" is now credited to Berry (i.e. Chuck gets all the song writer royalty cheques). Martin
------------------------------ Message-ID: <01BB0FF9.8A362C20@DIALUP1138.SISNA.COM> From: Randy Watkins <randyw@sisna.com> Subject: Top Ten/Loving sounds Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 09:51:03 -0800 Okay, I've gotta contribute to this one. It was just too hard to resist! Those words in "The Loving", to my strange ears, was always "Take It!". Go figure. My top ten albums: 1) Wish You Were Here -- Pink Floyd 2) Mummer -- XTC 3) Smile Session Tapes -- The Beach Boys 4) Oranges and Lemons -- XTC 5) Dark Side of the Moon -- Pink Floyd 6) Glassworks -- Philip Glass 7) Magical Mystery Tour -- The Beatles 8) Barrett -- Syd Barrett 9) Amused to Death -- Roger Waters 10) English Settlement -- XTC Although my top ten seems to be lopsided (towards Floyd and XTC), I've always found it interesting that Partridge has listed Syd Barrett, the Beatles and the Beach Boys as musical influences. Rando "In the sad town, cold iron hands clap a party of clowns outside." ....Syd Barrett
------------------------------
Date: 12 MAR 96 16:00:41 EDT
From: PCulnane@dca.gov.au
Subject: Oodles of Topix!
Message-ID: <0000vfxpfjjv.0000uouqwmie@dca.gov.au>
I just love Chalkhills - since my first posting a week ago, I've made
friends all over the globe! Here are some thoughts on topix from Chalkhills
# 83:
1) MY TOP TEN ALBUMS (in no particular order):
"Chips From The Chocolate Fireball" - Dukes of Stratosphear
"Klaatu"/"Hope" - Klaatu (contained on 2-for-1 CD)
"Low" - David Bowie
"Zinc Alloy & the Hidden Riders of Tomorrow" - T.Rex
"Revolver" - The Beatles
"Grand Prix" - Teenage Fanclub
The Ambrosia album with the pyramid cover ("Somewhere I've Never Travelled"?)
"A Wizard - A True Star" - Todd Rundgren
"Black Sea" - XTC
"Parklife" - Blur
"Cosmic Wheels" - Donovan
Ok, so that's 11 or 12, but this is just off the top o' my head; tip o' the
iceberg. There's so much more beautiful music out there; very hard to
narrow down to a top 10. It's very interesting to see what other XTC fans
like besides the mighty Swindonians, so let's keep this topic open!
2) THE PRISONER
Who has seen this wonderful late-60s series starring Patrick McGoohan? The
XTC doco "The Laughing Prisoner" was based on this series and was filmed in
Portmeirion, Wales where the series was made. I've got a boxed set of the
complete series on video. I thoroughly recommend The Prisoner and urge you
to watch it if it pops up on cable or whatever. NOT to be confused with
"Prisoner" (aka Cellblock 9) which is a whole different kettle of fish
(Aussie women's prison soap featuring Bea, Vinegar-Tits et al)
3) Thanx Ira Lieman, Brian Marchese, Becki diGregorio and others for your
comments, offers and suggestions on XTC videos. LET'S HAVE THE VIDS!!!!!
Is there scope within Chalkhills to set up some kind of "EXCHANGE MART" for
people wanting to trade good quality material? Anyway, anybody with video
stuff to sell or swap, please e-mail me (PCulnane@dca.gov.au) and I will
respond with my lists.
4) ENGLISH SETTLEMENT
The current UK CD of this album has the lyrix in it. The first UK CD
edition had no lyrix and omitted a couple of trax. (I guess it was hard to
fit a whole double-album onto one CD in the early days of the new format).
Nowadays the CD is restored to all its glory with full booklet & lyrix.
It's worth shelling out extra for UK imports of all XTC albums (on Virgin),
'cos they all sound much better than their US counterparts.
5) MY WEAPON
Erich Sellheim asks about words to "My Weapon". Since the song seems to be
about the singer's penis, and what he likes to do with it, it seems apt
that said weapon is "stinking", especially by the last verse! Or am I a
prime contender for Siggy Freud's couch?
6) SKYLARKING GOLD CD
I've re-evaluated my previous comments about this. It's pretty good. It
needs to be turned UP. I had it on low volume when I first heard it, and
didn't really give it a fair go. If you don't yet own the album in any form
and love XTC, then save up & buy this. Yes, Sean, it'd be lovely to see
what they (MFSL) do with D&W. Black Sea would be great on enhanced
remastered gold as well.
....."well you bring me colour where i once had just black and white" (AP)
Paul Culnane. Canberra. Australia
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 96 14:16:03 CST
From: "Bernhardt, Todd" <tbernhardt@aga.com>
Message-Id: <9602128266.AA826666504@cc.perftech.com>
Subject: Videos, weapons, BBs
'Allo, 'allo:
From: "Anthony Ciarochi" <ciarochi@pe.net>:
>BTW, I feel the same way about some (not all) music videos. They
>often are the interpretation of some film director, NOT the artist who
>wrote the song. But unfortunately, after seeing the video, that is
>frequently the vision that pops into your head.
I think Andy agrees with you, Anthony. I remember laughing one day at a
response he gave to an interviewer who asked, "What's the best way to
watch a music video?" Andy said something along the lines of, "Turn up
the brightness and contrast all the way -- until you can't see the
picture anymore -- and sit back and listen." Works for me. (You have to
wonder about the quality of a song when the only reason you
like/understand/whatever it is because of the video that goes along
with it.)
From: sellheim@zfn.uni-bremen.de (Erich Sellheim):
>In "My Weapon", the lyric sheet quotes the last line as "My stinking
>weapon", which doesn't make too much sense to me. I tend to understand
>"My Sinclair weapon", but I don't know if this means anything.
>Any suggestions?
I always thought it was "my secret weapon".
From: "Sean Robison" <sean_robison@studio.disney.com>:
>Just thought i'd toss in my two cents on the gold cd. since i'm an avid
>collector of the MoFi stuff, i have to say the gold cd pressing of
>"skylarking" is decent. the most noteable improvement in my opinion is the
>increased strength in the percussion. it's much fuller and seems to give
>the songs a bit more energy, helping it rise above rundgren's generally
>flat and compressed sounding mastering techniques. what would have made it
>better though, would have been the inclusion if "mermaid smiled" as a bonus
>track. i'm curious to see if MoFi attempts some more gold pressings of
>other xtc discs. i'd love to see an audiophile treatment of 'drums and
>wires'.
Agreed. Haven't heard the gold disc, but it shouldn't be hard to improve on
the classic Rundgren midrange-heavy mix ("Second Wind" is just about the
only album I've heard by him with a really good mix.) I'd also love to hear
an improved mix of D&W -- Black Sea is such a huge-sounding album that it
makes you wonder what little Stevie Lillywhite coulda done with D&W if
they'd had the same technology/knowledge/attitude/etc.
Wait a minute here ... Let me pull on this asbestos jumpsuit (ooh! that
itches!): Ok, now I'm ready. Am I the only one on this list who
DOESN'T like the Beach Boyz? Never really cared for them, but I
recently picked up Pet Sounds on CD because so many people (Andy P.
included, of course) have cited it as an influence. I listened. I
*tried* to like it. I considered its context, and who it influenced.
I ended up giving it to my older brother. I dunno, I like my music to
have an ED GE to it (no U2 jokes, please), and the BBs are just too,
well, pale and precious for me. If I'm going to listen to them at all,
I prefer them filtered through the genius of AP, thankyouverymuch.
ByeBye!
------------------------------ Date: 12 Mar 96 16:08:53 EST From: Simon Sleightholm <101477.1611@compuserve.com> Subject: Peter Pumpkinhead CD for free... Message-ID: <960312210853_101477.1611_EHU57-1@CompuServe.COM> I have a spare copy of The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead on CD, Cat No VSCDG 1415 (with Wardance and demos of My Bird Performs & Always Winter Never Christmas) If there is anyone who would like this I will be happy to send it to anyone for no more than the cost of postage - it only cost me a pound at a record fair. E-mail me if you're interested. As ever, Simon.
------------------------------ End of Chalkhills Digest #2-84 ******************************
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