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XTC - SKYLARKING
Geffen, 1986.

Grupa XTC je najve ć a "izgubljena" rok grupa, a album Skylarking je ako ne njihov najbolji (konkurencija je velika), a ono je svakako njihov najzreliji album.
Producent Todd Rundgren je doprineo koheziji zvuka i aranžerskom majstorluku, ali je čvrsta ruka ovog iskusnog majstora svakako doprinela i tome da Skylarking sadrži manje ludila nego što ludila na pločama XTC-a obično ima. Sve to zajedno zove se zrelost.
Glavni autor pesama je (kao i uvek) Andy Partridge, a "sporedni" autor pesama je (kao i uvek) Colin Moulding. Specifičnost ove ploče je veći broj Mouldingovih pesama (nego obično) i njihov bolji kvalitet (nego obično).
Kao i na drugim izdanjima ove grupe, očigledni su uticaji Beatlesa i Beach Boysa i vaskolike psihodelije šezdesetih (ali bez acida). Tu je sve što treba da bude: elegantne melodije, neobični obrti, plutajuća produkcija, zelena trava, šareno cveće, voćnjaci (jabuke uglavnom), tirkizno nebo, ružičasto sunce, duga preko čitavog neba, možda jedno strašilo daleko u polju...
Još od albuma English Settlement (1982) svi albumi su konceptualni. Teme su ljubavne, porodične, pastoralne, religiozne... što sve čini ovu ploču (to uostalom važi za čitav opus ove grupe) atipičnim rok albumom. Duh XTC-a je bliži duhu engleske poezije epohe romantizma nego grupi Rolling Stones (iz moje perspektive, to bi bio najveći kompliment grupi XTC koji se može dati).
XTC dolaze iz Swindona, grada na jugozapadu Engleske - iz srca mitološke Engleske. U krugu od pedesetak kilometara je smeštena većina drevnih zagonetki ove zemlje: Stonehenge, njemu sličan, manje poznat a mnogo luđi Avebury, divovski crteži kredom na zelenim brdima... ni kralj Artur i vitezovi okruglog stola nisu daleko. Sav taj tajanstveni svet se ogleda u pesmama XTC-a, ali bez imalo mistike, bilo čega mračnog, "darkerskog", što inače redovno prati umetnička poniranja u daleku i nejasnu prošlost. Ništa od toga - ovde sve puca od životne radosti i ljubavi, slavljenja ciklusa vegetacije... a u sve to su udrobljene ironične opservacije savremenog života. Magično, maestralno i jako moderno, na svoj jedinstven način... i detinjasto, paganski nevino kako to samo XTC umeju da urade.
Skylarking je idealna ploča da se sa njom dočeka proleće, a kad zaduva vetar razvigorac, promenićemo ploću. Tada ćemo da sviramo album Go2, a kada dođe mesec maj, pustićemo English Settlement da nam svira. I sve tako, za svaku sezonu, za svaki mesec i za svaku mesečevu menu - odgovarajući naslov, a sve od grupe... XTC.


tekst napisao i omot oslikao: Saša Markoviæ Mikrob
  © www.harizma.com MMIV

It.Arti.Musica.Rock
May 2002

XTC - Skylarking (1986)
di Nellogiovane

E' una teoria di folgorazioni (beat, psych, prog, new wave, punk), quello che porta Andy Partridge (chitarra e voce), Colin Moulding (basso e voce), Terry Chambers (batteria) e Barry Andrews (tastiere) a fondare gli XTC. E' il 1976, e siamo a Swindon, Inghilterra: tempo due anni ed escono lo scalpitante White Music e l'irrequieto GO2. Il meccanismo però sembra non ingranare, e Andrews abbandona. Lo rimpiazzerà il versatile chitarrista Dave Gregory: è la svolta, la quadratura del suono. Di lì a poco arriverà lo schizofrenico e strabiliante Drums And Wires (1979). In seguito realizzano dischi strepitosi come The Black Sea (1980) o English Settlement (1982) e non raccolgono che briciole di gloria. La fama di meravigliosi perdenti di talento comincia a consolidarsi. Poi, quando le cose iniziano a girare per il meglio, ecco la fobia da palcoscenico di Partridge a rendere impossibili tournée e promozioni. E così arriviamo al 1986, quando - persa per strada la batteria di Chambers (che non sarà mai sostituito stabilmente) - decidono di affidarsi al "mago" producer Todd Rundgren per la realizzazione di Skylarking. Saggia decisione? Macché. Una tragedia. Una iattura. A sentire gli acidi commenti di Partridge, dietro ad ogni traccia si cela un compromesso, in ogni suono il fantasma dell'intuizione originaria, la stessa tracklist pare sia dovuta passare per tali alterchi e divergenze da uscirne malconcia e mutilata. E c'è da crederci, così come c'è da credere che anche nel rock, a volte, possano accadere miracoli: ogni volta che metto questo disco nel lettore, infatti, nemmeno l'ombra di tanta tribolazione - anzi! - il meccanismo mi sembra magia, l'incanto si ripete soave, l'architettura pop frizza duttile e perfetta.
Summers Cauldron, ad esempio, sembra stata concepita, realizzata e posizionata in apertura di scaletta per adempiere a precise funzioni ambientali: l'impalpabile cicaleggio iniziale, immerso in quella crema elettronica che tutto abbraccia, esige come un'atmosfera densa e rallentata, pur tra i pungolamenti della chitarra cristallina e le carezze di quel coro meravigliosamente beachboysiano... Il trapasso in Grass avviene senza soluzione di continuità, ed è come tuffarsi in un prato di soffici percussioni, all'ombra tenera degli archi in fiore (carezzati da un venticello orientale), in una festa sensuale e avvolgente di colori, con la compagnia degli odori, umori e ormoni del caso. Appena più aggressivo è invece il piglio di The Meeting Place, che introduce uno strano bestiario di effetti laterale, ma siamo pur sempre in una terra di mezzo tra il McCartney più giocoso e il Brian Wilson più malinconico (o viceversa), trainati da un alternarsi felpato di piano e sintetizzatore che proclama Dave Gregory gran cerimoniere della situazione.
Il pop frizzante di That's Really Super, Supergirl rischierebbe di passare inosservato se non fosse che — guarda un po' — non ha un pezzo né un pezzettino fuori posto: chitarre e tastiere scivolano sui pensieri come guizzi d'argento o riflessi di sole, i vocalizzi di Mr. Partridge sono spigolature accorate mentre una prurigine di tastiere germoglia tra pennate pungenti e percussioni briose. Ballet For A Rainy Day è invece un frutto spurio dai tanti sapori, basso e piano sugli scudi, con quella dominanza swing aperta alle più struggenti escursioni melodiche e la benedizione di un bridge straordinario (roba da costruirci una canzone tutta intera). E proprio all'anomalia "estrema" della pop-song alta, con il pensiero ed il cuore rivolto a Yesterday, guarda il tepore febbricitante di 1000 Umbrellas, pazzesco errebì per archi e voce, tanto sprezzante nei versi quanto lirico nel chorus: basta sentire come vibrano e lacrimano e sghignazzano e ammiccano quelle corde per convincerci che si tratta — sotto tutti gli aspetti — di un capolavoro.
Il cuore del disco è affidato ad un trittico portentoso: Season Cycle (umorale, umoristica e swingata, con un backing vocals che estasierebbe i migliori CSN&Y), Earn Enough For Us (un riffare più spesso e crepitante che anticipa in qualche modo la svolta dei Rem di lì a poco) e l'esplosione lisergica di Big Day (non fosse che per lo svolazzare argentino delle sei corde, o per l'incedere nebbioso della linea melodica, replicherei l'ascolto fino a struggermi nella più intrigante delle dolcezze).
Segue la new wave di ritorno di Another Satellite, che ridisegna le inquietanti traiettorie di Wire e Joy Division nell'ottica di una visionarietà cangiante e lieta (quello stillare di vibrafono, quel basso pigro, l'incresparsi rigoglioso del synth...). E poi c'è Marmaid Smiled, delirio caparbio e versicolore, gagliardo innesto tribal-jazz su vibrante fusto pop, l'arrotarsi inesauribile di genio e misura, ottoni (finti), vibrafono (finto?), il basso (cazzutissimo) e una batteria in punta di bacchetta (non l'ho ancora detto, è Prairie Prince) attorno alla duttilità prodigiosa del canto.
Rimaniamo nei paraggi di un certo jazz (quello irrequieto, levigato e fumoso caro a Joe Jackson) con la successiva The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul (legni in evidenza, percussioni insidiose, piano letterario, chitarra stellare), mentre Dying è una ballata sghemba che recita la sua amarezza inquieta senza rinunciare ai segni e ai timbri della magia (il caracollare fibroso della ritmica - come un meccanismo inceppato - e la vaporosa stratificazione del canto di Moulding). Chiude il disco il valzer incantato di Sacrificial Bonfire, ancora miele per timpani insoddisfatti, la tenera spirale delle corde, quella voce arresa alla malinconia, un vibrare caldo di pelli tese, il rosseggiare nostalgico degli archi sulle tracce invisibili di un cuore nudo: il nostro, finalmente.

Virgin (Denmark)
2001

Skylarking af XTC
1986
XTC var et band der skrev sange der måske var for gode til radio. Det engelske band har lavet en lang række gode plader op gennem 80´erne, og mange af deres numre er sidenhen blevet indspillet af andre, bl.a. Crash Test Dummies har stor forkærlighed for bandet, der stadig styres af sangeren Andy Partridge.
Han har i næsten 20 år haft sceneskræk, og derfor er bandet aldrig nået længere ud end deres trofaste publikum på et par hundredetusinder verden over. Synd og skam for sangene er ganske enkelt fremragende.

CNY Music & Art
August 2001

Non-Local Pick of the Month

British trio XTC went for the brass ring with their 1986 release, Skylarking. The band, comprised of Andy Partridge on lead vocals and guitars, Colin Moulding on vocals, bass and other effects, and Dave Gregory on vocals, guitar, piano, keys and other sounds. The band teamed up with musical maven Todd Rundgren, who produced their most cohesive album. The songs are very British, all too often sounding like a Beatles album, but still has enough of XTC's own style to feel less like plagiarism, and more derivative. Often described as a "perfect summer's day", Skylarking remains XTC's biggest album to date. What could be more appropriate than to have Skylarking appear as the August Classic Disc.

The disc opens up with "Summer's Cauldron", a song that completely sets the tone for the rest of the disc. The song opens up with the looped rhythm of crickets and birds and other natural sounds, and leads into a joyful reminiscence of picnics in fields and strolls by still lakes. The song serves as an intro to the following song "Grass". The thumping drums and piano help to deliver lyrics like

When Miss Moon lays down
And Sir Sun stands up
Me I'm found floating round and round
Like a bug in brandy
In this big bronze cup
Drowning here in Summer's Cauldron

Trees are dancing drunk with nectar
Grass is waving underwater
Please don't pull me out this is how I would want to go
Insect bomber Buddhist droning
Copper chord of August's organ
Please don't heed my shout I'm relax in the undertow

"Summer Cauldron" is Andy Partridge's ode to summer. The song serves as an overture to the next two songs. "Summer's Cauldron" segues perfectly into a song called "Grass", which is Colin Moulding's take on high-noon in the summer. The lyrics reference things as innocent as buying ice cream cones and as obscene as flattening the clover. The song is a quick but well written tune that incorporates a good melody with lazy acoustic guitar and percussion. The song ends with the same rhythm of birds and crickets.

Part of the melody of "Grass" can be heard in the following song, "The Meeting Place." The song switches gears, from a natural setting, to an industrial setting. "The Meeting Place" has a loop of factory noises running underneath it. The theme of this song is identical to "Grass", in that it describes sneaking in a quick shag. This time, the scene describes a couple who work together sneaking out of work to have a go. One of XTC's strongest musical traits has been their ability to back extremely graphic stories with extremely innocent sounding arrangements.

The album plays out in little clusters of songs. The opening trio of songs are linked musically and thematically. One of the few songs that stands on its own is "That's Really Super Supergirl", which is, in essence about the life of a superhero's spouse. The song is a cleverly written rocker that combines great keyboard effects with strong drumming to drive the message of Andy Partridge's words.

The next cluster of songs deals with weather (sort of). This trio opens with "Ballet for a Rainy Day", which is Andy Partridge's descriptive take on the best of a rainy summer day. This piano heavy song contains wonderful harmonies and one Colin Moulding's nicest bass lines. The song totally feels like a rainy day on some boardwalk/carnival. Like the first two songs on Skylarking, "Ballet" segues directly into "1000 Umbrellas". Like "Ballet" the title for "1000 Umbrellas" implies weather. However, the umbrellas in this song are used as metaphorical imagery, deflecting a rain shower of tears from a heart-broken man. Musically, the song is one of the best on Skylarking. There is an incredible string-quartet arrangement, by Dave Gregory, on this tune that runs around the entire song.

The end of the "Weather" trilogy arrives with the Beach Boys homage, "Season Cycle". If ever there was a song worthy of being called an outtake from Pet Sounds, this is it. The song contains the dreamy harmonies of classic Brian Wilson songs, as well as Beach Boy flavored calliope and piano. The highlight of the song comes from the rhythm section, though. Colin's bass line and drums from Prairie Prince are super energetic, adding a rocking edge to the song that help elevate it from the chance of being a Beach Boys rip-off.

The second half of the disc opens with the strongest track on the disc, called "Earn Enough For Us". This is a fast paced tune with heavy drums, ringing guitars and Beatle-esque bass. The song tells the story of a man's struggle to provide a future for his lover. As in

Found a house that won't repair itself
With its windows cracking
And a roof held together with holes
Just because we're at the bottom of the ladder
We shouldn't be sadder
Than others like us
Who have goals for the betterment of life
Glad that you want to be my wife, but honest
I've been praying all the week through
At home at work and on the bus
I've been praying I can keep you
And to earn enough for us

Producer, Todd Rundgren's influence is very heavy in this tune, adding a certain amount of psychedelia.

Where "Earn Enough For Us" talks of building a future together, the following song, "Big Day" flashes forward to a couple's wedding day. The song's cynical attitude toward marriage is a stark contrast to "Earn Enough", yet the music accompanying this sentiment cushions the blow. As with "Earn Enough", "Big Day" has psychedelic elements to it.

The pallet is cleared with the next two songs, which are stand-alone tracks. The first, "Another Satellite" is a simple song, relying on a looped synth-drum track and long, sustained chords as the backdrop for Andy Partridge's heavy, echo-effected melody. The second of these brilliant stand-alone songs is the jazz/lounge song "The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul". The song is a beatnik's dream of a metaphorical quest; and oceanic voyage of self-discovery. The song is heavy in bass, bongos and flute to begin with, but jazzy piano and drums join in before the big band kicks it all up a notch.

The most controversial song on the album is also the one that may be most responsible for this album's success. "Dear God" is a discourse on the chicken-and-the-egg theory. The song opens with an acoustic guitar and the voice of child singing the lead vocal, hauntingly stating:

Dear God,
hope you got the letter, and...
I pray you can make it better down here.
I don't mean a big reduction in the price of beer
but all the people that you made in your image, see
them starving on their feet 'cause they don't get
enough to eat from God, I can't believe in you

The rest of the band bursts in, and Andy Partridge takes over the vocal to expand on this sentiment. The song ends with Andy's last line "If there's just one thing I don't believe in," being answered with the child's voice quietly saying, "It's you. Dear God." Andy's real purpose of the song is to dispel people's notions that God is an elderly man with white robes and a beard, dictating Man's every action. Andy wanted to alert mankind to their own apathy and responsibility to make things better. Religious groups all over the world were up in arms over the atheistic overtones in the song.

"Dear God" starts off the last song-theme on the album; the final chord runs right into "Dying", a song about an elderly woman's demise. The song, written by Colin Moulding has some of the same chords as Andy's "Dear God", and the band plays up on the similarities. The death theme carries over into the final track, the Olde-English flavored "Sacrificial Bonfire". As with many other songs on the disc, the playful music joyfully sings the delights of burning a heretic.

XTC's career after Skylarking has never been as successful. The band has enjoyed minor success with the albums Non-Such, and the Apple Venus volumes One and Two, but have not been able to capture the attention of the mainstream audience. The quality of their music has certainly never diminished, but they have not been able to recapture the sheer brilliance of Skylarking. The album combines straight out rock with beautiful arrangements and harmonies, to create something truly unique. As it's been stated before, Skylarking is a perfect summer's day.

Review by Michael Haight

Birmingham Post
May 26, 2001, Saturday
CD REVIEWS: ROCK & POP
by Andrew Cowen / Alison Jones

REISSUES OF THE WEEK

XTC Skylarking (Virgin): Just one of a raft of reissues of Swindon's finest for the Virgin label, Skylarking is, along with Apple Venus Vol 1, undoubtedly their masterpiece. Perversely, it's the album which almost caused a collective nervous breakdown with in-studio fisticuffs with producer Todd Rundgren. It's the American's Phil Spector-esque wall of sound that lifts the album into the realms of the classic, although without the songwriting strengths of Andy Partridge and Colin Moulding it would be a different story. Skylarking sees XTC's folksy Brit rural muse at its most effective on a Beatley song cycle celebrating the wonders of British summertime and its associated whimsy. Definitely a hymn to a bygone age, you can almost smell the hedgerows on cuts such as Season Cycle, The Meeting Place and Ballet for a Rainy Day. The hit single, Grass, is one of Moulding's most whimsical tracks, but also one of his finest, topped only by the stunning Big Day later on the album. With some seamless editing, much of this is in the same league as side two of the Beatles' Abbey Road. All the XTC albums have been digitally mastered and there's a batch of Japanese imports in the shops in cute cardboard LP sleeve replicas. Rating: HHHH

Copyright 2001 Midland Independent Newspapers plc
[Thanks to Wesley Hanks]

Q
circa 2000
Buyer's Guides | 50 Best Albums Of The Year

Skyarking
XTC

Longterm students of XTC's brittle whimsy will already have savoured fleeting moments of what threatened to be a 'pastoral' period. Skylarking goes the whole hog, marvellously articulating the boyish innocence and earthy medieval flavour of a bygone, uniquely English, rural life through a set of angular, eternally inventive songs that faintly recall the muzzy psychedlia of the Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour (and produced by Todd Rundgren). Daft, pioneering, warmly recommended.

© Copyright EMAP Digital Limited 2000.

Das Kultursyndikat
circa 2000

XTC - skylarking (Virgin - 1986) * * * 1/2

Natürlich. XTC in ihrer mittleren Phasen, und alle reden davon, wie schön diese Band eine Melange aus dem Sound der Beatles und der Beach Boys erschafft. So ein Unverständnis!? Einflüsse der beiden großen Bands sind zwar nicht zu leugnen, doch darf man sie nicht überschätzen. XTC laben sich gerne am Sound der Sechziger, doch sind sie auch immer Kinder ihrer Zeit, oder auch dem was später kommt. In den Achtzigern zeigten XTC ohne viel Federlesens, wie man eine Popplatte ohne einen übermäßigen Elektronikfuhrpark erbauen kann. So zum Beispiel auf diesem Album, "skylarking", welches 1986 geschaffen wurde. So wie es damals XTC vormachten, hören sich heute, vierzehn Jahre später, Haufen an unglückseligen britischen Quasipop-Bands an, nur schlechter, ergo ideenloser. Man übertreibt nicht, wenn man festhält, daß Andy Partridge und Colin Moulding, die großen Köpfe der XTC's, Propheten sind.

Für "skylarking" tat sich das Trio, zu Partridge und Moulding gehörte noch der Multi-Instrumentalist Dave Gregory, mit dem amerikanischen Produzenten Todd Rundgren zusammen. Heraus kam ein Album, das zunächst recht unspektakulär wirkt, und für die Verhältnisse XTC's sogar recht unbritisch. Doch dieser Eindruck täuscht, wenn man sich auf die Platte einläßt und ihr eine Zeit der Reife einräumt. XTC-Songs kommen aus dem Hinterhalt, sie sind nur selten sofort konsumfähig, daher gelangen den Briten auch nur selten Hitsingles, was jedoch der Qualität nicht entgegenwirkt. Fein ziseliert kommen die Songs daher, wie barocke Geschenkpackungen mit feinem Inhalt. Nun, nicht alle Songs sind letztendlich Zuckergebäck, dieser Einwand sei gemacht, doch erfreut das Album immer wieder und mit der Zeit auch immer mehr.

Richtig erhebende Klasse erlebt der Hörer dann im Laufe der zweiten Vinyl-LP-Seite. "the man who sailed around his soul", "dear god" und "dying" im Trio aneinandergereiht gehören zum Besten, was bis heute unter dem Bandlogo veröffentlicht wurde. Ein Fest, bei dem man viele zeitgenössische Popplatten verbrennen könnte. Die Wucht in die sich "dear god" hineinsteigert, die quasigroovende Gelassenheit des "man who...", die innere Abgeschlossenheit aus der "dying" ausbricht: Lehrstücke sind das, musizierende Völker! Nennt mich einen weltfernen Spinner, doch ich habe Nektar und Ambrosia genascht, mein ist das letzte Lachen. Ich werde es mit Andy Partridge teilen.

Candidate
circa 2000
Recordbox

XTC: Skylarking

OH, it was obvious after Britpop (and Blur stealing the whole of "Black Sea" for "The Great Escape") but XTC are brilliant. It's very unfashionable these days, but sometimes you just need loads of really great melody lines. Like "Rubber Soul", this record is just full of whistling moments. Bathtime, walking-the-dog, alone-on-the-beach sort of hums. That's what the finest British pop craftsmen have always done, and this will always be the soundtrack to a fantastic holiday. So summery they spent a fortune recording crickets and birdsong to overdub, and, despite "Love On a Farmboy's Wages" not being on this (it's on the otherwise a-bit-rubbish "Mummer") the folkiest XTC album of the lot. (All the melodies sound like a peal of churchbells, and that's surely the mark of BritFolk quality...)

(Every time I think of a really great tune, I usually find out it's already on this record.) J

[Thanks to Joel Morris]

Music.com
circa 2000
COLUMN
by John D. Luerssen

Alt Rewind:XTC:Skylarking

The clever and infectious post-punk innovators in XTC emerged during the late 1970s as a quirky, eclectic pop band. With irresistible early singles like "This Is Pop," "Making Plans For Nigel," and "Generals And Majors" best exemplifying this point, the group soon grew away from new wave and evolved into an art band. A 1982 double-LP, English Settlement, made them bona fide stars in their native England and widened their US fan-base courtesy of one great single, "Senses Working Overtime," but the effort was structured around intricate arrangements that took some getting used to. Acclimated fans embraced both 1983's Mummer and 1984's The Big Express, which continued to lay the experimental-pop foundation that would be beautifully realized on their 1986 masterwork, Skylarking.

Although the sessions were recorded under strenuous circumstances, with producer Todd Rundgren frequently at odds with frontman Andy Partridge, the album was immediately heralded by critics upon it's release as a classic. Despite such accolades, XTC spouted off in interviews about their dissatisfaction with the results of Skylarking. Perplexed disciples disagreed with the trio, finding it to be the act's strongest accomplishment to date.

In a strange twist of events, the album's most successful excerpt, the scathing and controversial "Dear God," was originally relegated to B-side status, and left off of original pressings of the disc. When adventurous radio personnel flipped over the world-weary pop single, "Earn Enough For Us," they got instant audience reaction. The sudden popularity prompted the opportunists at Geffen to add the song to all future versions. Note: Most true audiophiles, in attempt to preserve the track listing as originally intended, prefer to reprogram the CD to play the song first, before venturing into the pastoral, Beatle-esque elements of Skylarking.

Thirteen-plus years after release, repeated listens still confirm nearly every song is a triumph: "Big Day" addresses wedding day jitters with trippy accompaniment; "That's Really Super, Supergirl" is a perfectly-penned, infectious love song; Rich orchestration supports "Sacrificial Bonfire" while "Another Satellite" is subtle and contemplative. The bizarre-but-fascinating disc opener, "Summer's Cauldron," effortlessly slides into the set-highlighting tribute to "Grass," the kind you smoke and the kind you lie in. Other top tunes include are the harmony-drenched "The Meeting Place" and the thought-provoking "Ballet For A Rainy Day."

With the flawless musicianship of singer/guitarist Partridge, bassist/singer Colin Moulding, and the multi-instrumental talents of Dave Gregory, XTC delivered an album like no other. Skylarking ranks among the best rock albums of all time, and in the alt-pop subgenre, it may be the best that we have.

© 1998-2000 Music.com, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Space Ghost
January 7, 2000

Music Review

XTC Skylarking UNI/Geffen

Do you know what Zorak hates? Mamby pamby music made in a time when everything is supposed to be better. Zorak does not like R.E.M. with the bald weirdo flailing about and is irked when no one offers alternatives in modern times. Where is the Boston or Uriah Heap of today Zorak ponders out loud while making a hair and toenail pie for Space Ghost's Wednesday night Rook party. That is why I offer the XTC. It is the only letter band Zorak can listen to without spitting on the nearby person. XTC has its claws on the pulse of music throbbings. I am going to steal DNA from XTC and Public Enemy and Boston and Uriah Heap and Henry Rollins and make a true rock god. You will all dampen your khakis. Pfft. 		ohyeah
Rating But Moltar Says..."Somebody's cranky cause the world didn't blow up."

TM & © 2000 Cartoon Network. All Rights Reserved.
[Thanks to Peter Mullin]

The Gallery of Indispensible Pop Music
circa 1999
The Inner Sanctum

XTC -
Skylarking		 This isn't even my favorite XTC album. But I have to acknowledge that it's the most consistent, and probably even the best. I have only my own taste to blame here. This is a fine jumping-in point for a major body of work that can be intimidating to latecomers in terms of its sheer size. Beautifully cohesive (with the slightly jarring exception of the surprise hit Dear God, added late in the game) and gorgeously arranged, Skylarking just feels like summer. Not the Beach Boys sort of summer, but the kind the rest of us live; life goes on, it's just more languid. 1,000 Umbrellas is one of the best breakup songs ever written. The rest of them were probably also written by Andy Partridge.

[Thanks to Elizabeth S.]

Chapters.ca
1999

Skylarking
XTC

XTC trade in their post-punk quirkiness for a brand new sound and an entirely different vision. Instead of quick, seemingly unrelated pop songs, Skylarking is a sprawling, thematic venture, full of surprises and texture. 'Ballet For A Rainy Day' justifies the Beatles comparisons, but it's songs like 'Grass' - a lucid tune about young love - that proves XTC consistently forge new ground on their own merit. Todd Rundgren manned the production booth, introducing strings, horns and a sense of revitalization into an already innovative group.

Jeff Partyka's Mega-Music Page
1998



XTC's Skylarking: Ballet For A Summer's Day

Utter the phrase "Eighties music," and most people will likely think of one of two things: the Bruce Springsteen/Michael Jackson/Purple Rain/MTV American "superstar" side, or the synth-driven, brightly-clothed Europop offered up in droves by acts such as Culture Club, the Thompson Twins, the Human League and (in his Let's Dance/Tonight incarnation) David Bowie. I suppose it's predictable, given my general prejudice for Sixties music, that my favorite album of the Eighties was more or less an anachronism. . .a sonic throwback to the sound and spirit of mid- to late-Sixties pop as epitomized by the Beatles, the Beach Boys, the Kinks, the Small Faces and others. XTC's Skylarking sounds more like 1966 than 1986, the year of its release. . .or for that matter 1976, the year of the punk revolution that ushered in the "new wave" movement through which XTC first made a name for itself.

The first place I ever heard of Skylarking was in the pages of the May 1987 issue of Stereo Review magazine, which featured Steve Simels' album review as the lead piece in the "Best Recordings of the Month" section. What caught my eye was Simels' likening of the album to the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper, calling it "an out-and-out homage to what the Beatles and George Martin wrought back in the Summer of Love," "an utterly fab record on its own terms," and "the great pop album that some of us figured XTC always had in them." It's a brief piece (three paragraphs) that mentions only one of the album's songs, "Earn Enough for Us," which Simels calls "a marvelously deadpan working-class lament that should be a hit single, sound[ing] suspiciously like a Bruce Springsteen song as it might have been arranged and produced by Paul McCartney in 1967." I was 14 when I saw Simels' review; having been a Beatles fan since the age of 3 (as well as a recently converted fan of Springsteen's and a young MTV viewer who'd seen and rather enjoyed XTC's "Senses Working Overtime" video back in '82), I was immediately sucked in. I showed the review to my father, a fellow Beatles fan, who decided to check out Skylarking along with me. It was he who purchased the LP (I didn't get my own copy 'til I bought the CD a few years later).

We went downstairs, put it on the turntable, and listened. (He rejected my idea of going right to the beginning of Side 2 and "Earn Enough for Us," predicting correctly that Skylarking would be the kind of album one should listen to straight through, in the proper order.) Dad seemed more or less disappointed; he decided that XTC sounded nothing like the Beatles, apart from the very White Album-ish violins that segue "Ballet for a Rainy Day" into "1,000 Umbrellas." But I was spellbound. I immediately loved the opening medley of "Summer's Cauldron" and "Grass," and "Ballet for a Rainy Day" sounded gorgeous and melodic, and "Earn Enough for Us" (for me) lived up to its promise and then some . . . and the album as a whole sounded magical. It's never worn off; Skylarking has consistently remained an all-time favorite for me, and it sounds better every time I listen to it. I'm always surprised by subtle touches in the arrangements that I've forgotten or even missed, spot-on lyrics that haven't hit me before, Colin Moulding's beautiful bass lines . . . this is an album with many treasures in sound, spirit, and soul, just waiting to be discovered.

Put simply, Skylarking sounds beautiful. Discussing the Beach Boys' "Heroes and Villains" in his book Rock & Roll: The 100 Best Singles, Paul Williams writes that the song "sounds like a running brook." I agree with him; that song has always reminded me of nature, of the outdoors. It certainly has nothing to do with the lyrics; there's something about the overall sound conjured up by the Beach Boys and their engineer that makes the record seem more like the result of an act of nature than an act of songwriting or recording. Skylarking achieves something similar across a full-length album, but in different ways. In a promotional interview conducted just after the album was released, Andy Partridge repeatedly refers to it as a "summery" album. The music very tangibly exudes a feeling of summertime, partly and most obviously (but not solely) through some of the lyrics. Partridge's "Summer's Cauldron" and Moulding's "Grass" contain overt lyrical references to summer but, more than anything, that intoxicating "buzzing" rhythm track really achieves a remarkable evocation of the heat and laziness of summer. The cool, wet rains of the season are represented by "Ballet for a Rainy Day" and "1,000 Umbrellas," another pair of "musical Siamese twins" (as Partridge refers to them) that work musically and lyrically to heighten the album's evocative effect.

The album is based on the brilliant songs of Partridge and Moulding, but instrumentalist Dave Gregory, the one non-songwriting member of XTC (who, sadly, left the band in early 1998), contributes greatly to the record's success. It's his deft touches that make many of these arrangements sparkle (the little lead guitar lines in "Grass," the piano in "Ballet for a Rainy Day," the string arrangement in "1,000 Umbrellas"). Partridge, as ever, shines vocally, while Moulding. . .with his higher-than-usual number of tracks. . .provides variety as well as his usual solid, attractive bass lines.

XTC have given us many more fine songs since Skylarking, but they've never again succeeded in crafting such an evocative, enjoyable experience of an album. I'm a huge fan of the band's but, as much as I would like to believe that XTC could make an album like this in their sleep, it's obvious that producer Todd Rundgren deserves a great deal of credit for Skylarking's achievements. Stories of Partridge's volatile working relationship with Rundgren are legendary in XTC fan circles, but for us listeners any strife was well worth it. As much as I love the rest of the band's output, I don't think they've ever made an album so pure, so bereft of filler, as this one. (The one possible exception, 1987's incredible John Leckie-produced Psonic Psunspot, was credited not to XTC but to the Dukes of Stratosphear, their psychedelicized alter egos who also have the pre-Skylarking EP 25 O'Clock to their credit.) It was Rundgren who devised the album's summery theme (he's credited on the inner sleeve for creating the "continuity concept"), who hand-picked and sequenced the songs from the more than 30 demos Partridge and Moulding gave him. His work in this area alone is a model of creativity and innovation, and even Partridge later admitted his admiration of Rundgren's work on the record. So my hat's off to you, Todd . . . and to you, Andy, Colin, and Dave, for Skylarking.

this essay © 1998 Jeff Partyka

SoundCheck
November 1998
By Royce Bardon
Reproduced by permission

One of the best post-Beatles pop albums. Superbly produced by Todd Rundgren, Skylarking proves that XTC took their Beatleslessons very seriously. Andy Partridge, Colin Moulding and Dave Gregory write and sing about marriage, "Big Day", sunny youth, "Grass", a creator, "Dear God" and growing old on "Dying". All this is wrapped in a buoyant, spirited, shimmering pop production.

If you can imagine a complex work, with strings, various electric instrumentation and multi-layered vocals coming across as totally sincere and tasteful than you have a feel for what Rundgren accomplishes on Skylarking.

In essence, Skylarking is a conceptual work about life in its many stages and details. It sounds like heavy going, but it's actually wildly entertaining. In simple terms it's just about impossible to dismiss Skylarking. A must have? If your taste runs to impeccably performed and arranged pop music, a resounding yes!

Homeless Page
Written in June 1998
by Stanislav Zabic

    XTC:

    Skylarking

    One of the best records I've ever heard in my life! And I'm not overjudging! Very, very near to the perfect. Excellent songs, but above all great packing! The album is produced by Todd Rundgren. Although all songs were written by Moulding and Partridge, Todd's influence is so big that I have a feeling that he is the one of the authors too! It's really hard to make an exception on any song from this album, but let me try. Maybe the best part of the album is "1000 Umbrellas" and "Dear God". This may be the best album that XTC ever did, so try to find it somewhere, satisfaction guaranteed.

Rolling Stone #565
16 November 1989

The 100 Best Albums of the Eighties
#48
Skylarking
XTC
Geffen

"THIS IS GOING TO SOUND POMPOUS AND arty," says XTC's Andy Partridge, "but the whole album is a cycle of something: a day or a year, with the seasons, or a life. It's a cycle of starting, aging, dying and starting again." He is referring to Skylarking, the British trio's superb eigth album.

Recorded largely at Todd Rundgren's studio in Woodstock, New York, Skylarking's fourteen songs abound in elemental imagery and music that is pastoral, understated, and carefully arranged. The album is a celebration of nature and particularly of summertime.

"The atmosphere of the album is one of a playfully sexual hot summer," says Partridge. "On a hot day, a lot of life is going to be made somewhere, and it's probably gonna be outdoors on grass. It's just about summer and being out in the open and discovering sex in a stumbly, teenage way."

The concept of the album as a song cycle is underscored by musical interludes and incidental sounds between tracks. The songs are related by key, tempo, and subject matter. Oddly enough, the thematic framework was not the band's idea but producer Rundgren's. Guitarist Partridge and bass player Colin Moulding, XTC's principal writers, had worked up thirty-five songs, which they sent Rundgren in advance of their arrival in America. He selected fourteen of them, decided on a line-up and instructed the band to be ready to cut them in that order.

"He tended to go for the gentler songs, for songs of a certain atmosphere," says Partridge. "We'd sit down and talk about where the emotion was headed: the emotion, the atmosphere, the heat, the geographic place, the time of day - this journey you're supposed to go through on the whole record."

Partridge's iconoclastic "Dear God" was left off the album at his insistence. Relegated to the B side of a twelve-inch single, "Dear God" generated such an overwhelming response when played on radio that it became XTC's unlikely first hit in America - and was added to later pressings of Skylarking. "I thought I'd failed to precis the largest subject in man's mind, which is man's belief of what the truth is," Partridge says. "How the hell do you condense that into four minutes?"

Skylarking, as it turned out, was the album that broke XTC to a larger audience in America - and it couldn't have come at a more opportune time. "We were at our lowest ebb, moralewise, because we weren't selling any records and it wasn't the LP that Virgin and Geffen wanted made," Partridge says. "They wanted a slick, hard, American rock album: The quote was 'Can you make it somewhere between ZZ Top and the Police?'"

Though subdued and sublime, Skylarking was not an easy album to make. The band members argued with Rundgren and one another; Moulding actually quit at one point, and Partridge repeatedly threatened to fly back to England. Though he didn't like the album initially, Partridge's opinion of Skylarking - and of Rundgren - has softened. "I now see with the benefit of hindsight that it's a fine album and he did some sterling work," says Partridge.

Producer: Todd Rundgren. Released: March 1987. Highest chart position: Number Seventy

LM
circa 1987

Never in their long a distinguished career have XTC made a duff record. They've made a few mediocre ones (Mummer was a tad patchy and English Settlement rambled uncontrollably at times), but they've always managed to slip one or two glistening gems into each LP while keeping the quality control set high for all tracks.

But despite their laudable attention to detail XTC have outlived their usefulness. When they perfected their distinctive and intricate blend of student pop (best highlighted on the classic Black Sea LP) they were already six or seven years out of date; now they're beginning to sound senile.

Still, Skylarking is a good LP, and its thematic approach is intriguing. The opener, Drowning In Summer's Cauldron [sic], billows in on banks of clicking crickets and modulating synths, producing a perfect picture of a heady, brow-mopping July afternoon in the countryside.

Just as you're about to drift off, the track segues effortlessly into Grass. Romantic rustic themes swirl and twirl as the song develops, finally fading into a reassertation of the opening cut. Pretty conceptual, man.

Ballet For A Rainy Day pulls us quickly into the autumnal glory, while 1000 Umbrellas shivers as the November heavens open, pouring discontent into a dying year.

Season Cycle - a bit of a corker - questions the natural powers that govern our lives, and reinstates the pastoral theme that dominates the LP's first side. Perhaps XTC should consider this one for their next single.

Side Two deals more directly with human experience. Earn Enough For Us tells of a young man's efforts to support his girl and his household, Big Day discusses the implications and complications of marriage, Another Satellite comments on the passing of years [sic], and Dying is an overpowering, highly intimate view of our inevitable fate, provoked by the death of a loved one. Disturbing stuff.

The album's highlight is The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul. XTC tackle an unfamiliar musical area in the boisterous stab at cool jazz, and come up trumps.

It's probably one of their finest tracks EVER.

Like all XTC albums, Skylarking grows and improves with repeated plays. It could prove to be one of their biggest LPs to date. Get it.
75%, Paul Strange

XTC may be perennial misfits, but they make consistently interesting records; this time round it's pleasant soft-focus psychedelia, strongly reminiscent of mid-period Beatles. As ever, XTC have come up with a surefire commercial failure.
65%, Richard Lowe

The first time I listened to this XTC album I checked several times to see if my Walkman batteries were flat. The musical style may be strictly for fans, but the album's strongest point is the lyrics. The song list gives an idea: In A Sacrificial Bonfire [sic], Dying, That's Really Super, Supergirl and so on.
65%, Mike Dunn.

[Thanks to Simon Sleightholm]

Relix
Issue 14-02, March/April - 1987
Vital Vinyl
by Tierney Smith

As for XTC, their Skylarking (Geffen), offers both quality (lots of variety here) and quantity (14 new ones). The songs themselves, lyrically at least, are a bit on the trippy side — virtually impenetrable in the literal sense yet highly evocative. Singer Andy Partridge's relaxed vocals give extra impetus to the vivid imagery of the LP's lead-off track, "Summer's Cauldron," punctuated by the sound of birds singing. The lyrics ("Drowning here in summer's cauldron/Under mats of flower lava/Please don't pull me out/This is how I would want to go/Breathing in the boiling butter/Fruit of sweating golden Inca") propel the listener straight into the heart of summer's grip.

From there on, Skylarking is a musical smorgasbord of catchy choruses. Tunes like "1000 Umbrellas," with its swirling string section, and "Sacrificial Bonfire" have a stately air that makes them a cut above your average pop trifles. XTC's lyrical stance isn't quite so elusive on the Beatle-ish "Big Day," ,a cynical view of marriage, or the black humor of "Dying." Commercial it isn't, though Skylarking runs the gamut from upbeat pop ("Earn Enough for Us," "That's Really Super, Supergirl") to jazzy touches ("The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul") and the lush smoothness of "Ballet For A Rainy Day" and "Grass." Don't count on any hit singles here. That makes it up to the listener to do the discovering.

Copyright 1996-2000 RELIX Magazine

Billboard
January 10, 1987
Reviews & Previews

XTC
Skylarking
Producer(s): Todd Rundgren
Geffen GHS 24117
Genre: POP
PICK

Andy Partridge, Dave Gregory, and Colin Moulding may not have a string of commercial successes under their collective belt, but they do turn out intelligent, finely crafted little jewels of albums--albeit on a somewhat irregular basis. The overall tone here is less hard-edged than in past work; the band never takes the easy way out, however, employing unique sounds and unexpected melodic twists to wonderful effect.

© 1987 Billboard and BPI Communications Inc. All rights reserved.
[Thanks to Wes Hanks]

Q
1986

XTC
Skylarking

XTC 'unfur' to the Hermit of Mink Hollow? Maybe in Q1 they were, with all those disparaging remarks about raccoon shit, but I can't see that Todd Rundgren's production has done them any drastic harm. Indeed it's barely touched them. Skylarking is essence of XTC, grown-up and still playing pop in territory somewhere between The Beatles and Squeeze. Plangent guitar sounds recall Revolver (1966), vocal harmonies have a salt-and-Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) tang, daily lives stories come from Up The Junction or, in XTC's case, out in the country - wherever ordinary people are doing the nation's dirty work and trying to break the mould, get out of the trap.

In fact, an XTC album is just like life, isn't it? Remember grannie's sweet jar on the sideboard and your multi-coloured tea-cosy and feel guilty about not being nicer to her, then afraid because you're going to die some day too (Dying)? Bask in Summers Cauldron, a sound as shimmery as a heat-haze. Celebrate a wedding - in the light of the divorce statistics (Big Day). That's it. Just when you think XTC are all heart to the point of sentimentality, they bite.

Q Rating: * * * *

Reviewed By: Phil Sutcliffe

[Thanks to Christopher Marrinan]

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26 April 2008