XTC

XTC established themselves in the British alternative scene of the eighties through their edgy, off-kilter new wave, taking the poppiness of glam rock and framing it within the more esoteric stylings of their post-punk and punk-funk peers. I usually like to sample a band through one of their early albums, preferably a debut, but for XTC I purchased what I was told was their greatest album, a mature masterpiece coming out almost a decade after they had formed. It turns out I made a mistake. I am generally a fan of edgy post punk from that era so it came as something of a shock - and disappointment - to discover that Andy Partridge and Colin Moulding had directed their apparently formidable songwriting ability towards nostalgic orchestrated pop. Instead of Talking Heads or Gang of Four, Skylarking is compared to the pop masterpieces of the Beatles and Beach Boys, specifically Sgt. Pepper for the former and Pet Sounds for the latter. High praise, of course, and utterly unwarranted. There is certainly no doubt that XTC intended this album to match those two classics with full, layered arrangements on each song all tied together by Todd Rungren's production which, more often than not, segues the end of one song into the intro to another, thereby establishing a seamless suite of music, in homage to so many concept albums from the sixties. The production is not poor by any means but the sound is not as impressive as has been suggested and the eighties keyboards and heavily treated guitars do sound a little dated at times (although no more than a lot of eighties records). The main problem with the album is that for a pure pop masterpiece the whole thing is overwhelmingly trite and disappointingly underwhelming as a result. Given the maturity of the songwriters a lot of the tracks sound like they could have been written by a child ("That's Really Super, Supergirl" being a case in point). Ironically, the most mature song on the album actually begins with a child's vocals before Andy Partridge replaces him on "Dear God" to deliver his atheistic tirade against organised religion. It was apparently not originally included on the album and it is unsurprising given it is a far weightier and more impressive affair than most of the sugar and sweetness of the childish pop. Similarly, "Earn Enough for Us" is the most enjoyable song on the album given it is the only one to display the band's melodicism as a driving up-beat rock song. The remaining songs come too close to being simply nursery rhymes and the more experimental excursions, such as the swinging jazz of the execrable "The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul", appear to show a band with a dearth of talent, rather than an abundance of it. "Grass" is the pick of the lush, orchestrated pop mainly because its hooks are simply more intelligent than the rest of the mush. It is not as if the album is offensive or unlistenable but the concept of it requires immaculate melodicism and the band's efforts are simplistic in the extreme and fall far short of the standards set by their sixties heroes. I realise ambivalence towards this album is no reason to write off early XTC, given they fail through trying to do something different, but it has certainly set back my enthusiasm to give them a second try. Mind you, if this really is the best they achieved I would undoubtedly be better served looking elsewhere.

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Email me at: jackfeeny@yahoo.co.uk