#XTC #new wave #post-punk #progressive pop #art rock #pop rock #baroque pop #art punk #power pop #psychedelic pop #orchestral pop #1980s #1990s
The 1980 release Black Sea represents the last stand of the punchy, angular new wave that had won XTC strong critical and college radio support. Still arranging with an ear toward the stage they'd soon retire from, they continued working in the Drums and Wires style that had christened their previous release. Black Sea brims with XTC trademarks: engaging guitar hooks, cleverly rendered lyrics, and frenetic, creative melodicism. The material represents the pinnacle of XTC's early incarnation - a counterpoint to contemporary punk imbued with style, rhythmic punch, and melodic charm. From: https://www.roughtrade.com/us/product/xtc/black-sea-1/vinyl-lp
Respectable Street
Andy Partridge: “Actually inspired by my neighbour who spends half her life banging on the wall should I so much as sneeze. Not knocking people who have ‘respectable’ ideals (I know I must have a few), more of a song of people with double or hypocritical values. You know the sort, blind drunk one night, church the next. Or the mother who urges her daughter to go out and have fun dear, isn't abortion wonderful. If their daughter got pregnant they would beat her senseless.”
Andy: “The BBC felt the lyrics on the song on Black Sea would upset people. They asked if I could rewrite it and, being a good boy, I did. Contraception became ‘child prevention’ and abortion became ‘absorption’. Still they wouldn't play it. Here's that old peoples, pre-chewed version.”
Andy: “The A&R man decided the BBC wouldn't play this with words like ‘abortion’ and ‘contraception’, so he took out all the words he didn't like. It wasn't a big hit, though, because the BBC still didn't play it. A couple of bands have covered it, and they always get the chords wrong. The second one's a seventh, formed from the E-string up. They always miss it.”
Dave Gregory: “It's not really a guitarist's chord, that one.”
Andy: “Nope, but it's a Partsy one.”
From: http://chalkhills.org/reelbyreal/s_RespectableStreet.html
