XTC - The Big Express
#271
October 15 1984
XTC
The Big Express
3.5 out of 5
Highlights:
Wake Up
Shake Your Donkey Up
Everyday Story of Smalltown
I heard this last when I was blogging. It was part of an XTC retrospective. I'm not that big a fan. I LOVE English Settlement and Skylarking but for the rest of their catalog, I'm pretty ambivalent.
As often happens, my favorite songs are the ones by Colin Moulding and opening the record with one of his speaks volumes to me. The fact that an obnoxious and scraping song like "All You Pretty Girls" was the lead single also says a lot to me.
Whatever is going on in Andy Partridge's brain...must be a strange collision of carnival and murder house. "Seagulls Screaming Kiss Her Kiss Her" is an example of this for me.
I can't believe I've listened to this album again.
Here's my original review from 2008. I stand by it.
"Wow. This sounds a LOT like “No Thugs”. But not enough to be classified as plagiarism. In point of fact, it's actually an improvement. Then we're back to some Partridge craziness. In the case of “All You Pretty Girls” he's channeling Danny Elfman. It's a percussive trifle and not a great one, at that. But, that's okay. Because “Shake You Donkey Up” kind of explains what this album is all about.
The Big Express is the first album that brings together the song structures of Settlement, the herky jerk of the first record and the expansive sound of Mummer into a cohesive whole.
It doesn't always work. But even some of the failures are interesting. The dancing skeleton music of “Seagulls Screaming Kiss Her Kiss Her” is better than the melody or lyrics. But it isn't hatefully experimental as I've felt so much of Partridge's music can be, you know? He's always been oppressively impenetrable and he is here, as well. But the production overwhelms his worst intentions.
While not horrible by any means, The Big Express is also not that interesting. And it feels inordinately long. Without anything to grab on to, without any real hooks the whole album just leaves me wanting. So, even a song like, “I Bought Myself a Liarbird” which is under 3 minutes, feels like it's five because it’s boring and uneventful.
I kinda wish Andy Partridge would just shut up and let the band play his music. Hand lyric writing over to Colin Moulding. "
All that said, I liked it a wee bit more this time than last and I attribute that to the fact that I was listening to NOTHING but XTC at the time and this time 1984 is so filled with shite that even this is more acceptable than a lot of that stuff. (Looking at you, death metal)
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/the-big-express/724362839
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