XTC’s Andy Partridge always seems to have a new project cooking. This one, THE 3 CLUBMEN, is a trio performing what I would call posh pop. The four songs on their EP, The 3 Clubmen, are smooth and kinda quirky. Think of the early, experimental XTC of Go 2 merged with the end-of-life XTC of Apple Venus and you’re getting close. Andy’s mates on this one are multi-instrumentalist Stu Rowe of The Lighterthief and singer/guitarist Jen Olive, who does the bulk of the singing. (Andy supplies supporting and backing vocals, among the various instruments he plays.)
Right from the start there’s a dreamy vibe to The 3 Clubmen, as evidenced on opening track “Aviatrix” (is that like a dominatrix-slash-flight attendant?), with its sing-songy verses and chorus of “Straight into the sun you shoot me like a gun/I’m flyyyyying, flyyyying, I’m coming undone.” Track 2, “Racecar,” has a definite Go 2 thing going on – I can hear hints of “Battery Brides” and its off-kilter, kooky time signature throughout. (Traces of the guitar slashes of latter day XTC “Wake Up” are also detected.) Following track “Green Green Grasshopper” sounds like it could almost be a Dukes of Stratosphear outtake, as if the Dukes were trying to tame their psychedelic tendencies and make them safe for the world of 2023. 
“Look at Those Stars” is a showcase for Olive’s mod, affected vocals, which border on being twee but with a decidedly more adult sound. The song’s message is a good one (things aren’t so good in my life “but, hey, would you look at those stars?”).
Don’t know if we’ll ever get another XTC album but at least Andy’s keeping busy with his “solo” releases. Something from him is better than nothing, and anything is at least something. Something/anything? Yes, The 3 Clubmen is really something. – Marsh Gooch
3/5 (Lighterthief TAB001, 2023; available via Burning Shed)
As if I don’t cover ROBYN HITCHCOCK & ANDY PARTRIDGE enough already, they go and put out a record together. I didn’t see that coming. Planet England is the name of their nascent collaboration, a 4-song 10″ and CD EP featuring the two elder statesmen of new wave/post punk playing a style of rock that’s a mixture of the typical sounds they’re known for, with a splatter of psychedelia thrown on top.
Fans of both Hitchcock and Partridge will be drawn to Planet England. It’s not different enough from either’s catalogs to turn off their fans, nor is it different enough to lure new recruits to the cause. That being said, if anything, it’s a great teaser for the rumored Beatles cover album they’re doing. I may not have seen this pairing coming, but now that I’ve witnessed it I’ll be sure to keep my eyes ’n’ ears open for their next outing.
A couple of years ago XTC’s Colin Moulding and Terry Chambers teamed up to form TC&I, and after releasing an EP of new material (2017’s Great Aspirations; 
While it’s nice to hear some of these XTC tunes played live, there’s a certain vibrancy missing on this disc. I think that’s partly due to the recording itself, which is missing some top end shimmer and therefore lacking in live vibe, and partly because Moulding’s voice seems kind of weak. They may have been able to beef it up for XTC’s studio recordings but in this live situation it lacks bulk.
Here’s a couple of brand new cover songs by ANDY PARTRIDGE, he the main man of XTC and the Dukes of Stratosphear. Undertaken to ring in the completion of his new home studio, the two homages – to Pink Floyd and The Bonzo Dog Band – are played entirely by one human(oid).
Many fans of Mr. Partridge are probably expecting something that sounds like the Dukes of Stratosphear, XTC’s doppelganger in the psych rock world. But neither cover really enters that land, even though they’re both from the era the Dukes mined for their two celebrated records. And though I would be prone to favor either song, being a big fan of both early Pink Floyd and The Bonzos, I’m going with “Humanoid Boogie” – by a sliver – as my pick from this limited edition 10″ record. Rumor has it that it’s already sold out (they only pressed 1396 copies, for an arcane reason that Andy Partridge explains 
Late Christmas gift or early birthday present to myself? Who cares. It finally arrived, just seven weeks after they shipped it from the UK… and I’ve been listening to it practically non-stop ever since. XTC’s Black Sea is the 1980 album by these British heroes of the new wave, and it was an amazing slab of wax: muscular power pop, thinking man’s rock, whatever you wanted to call it, it was an album like no other in their catalogue, past or present.
Those songs still excite me — I never get tired of ’em! — but the side enders “Language” and “Travels” are pure pummel now, with both their lyrics and their gargantuan grooves coming through loud and clear!
Great Aspirations is definitely an excellent showcase of Colin’s bass playing – always one of the secret weapons in XTC’s armory. He also plays guitar and keyboards, which have only ever been evident on the handful of his demos that have come out as B-sides of XTC singles. Yet, for Moulding (to paraphrase Sun Ra), bass is the place. As for Terry Chambers, he’s still the quite capable drummer he always was, but there’s a tightness to his playing here that feels too perfect, like a drum machine, or at the least, a digitally recorded, quantized drum track. There’s a lack of swing in the drumming so the songs feel sort of plain. And that, along with the production, which is “stock” good but lacking the kind of excitement that XTC’s best records have, make this a bit of a ho-hum affair. I hope this is just TC&I testing the waters and there’s something better in the works. Perhaps a great aspiration for something even better…
Before the internet, “fanzines” were just about the only way us hardcore fans (“fan” + “[maga]zine” = fanzine) could stay on top of the latest info on our favorite bands. Limelight was an XTC fanzine edited and written by Mark Fisher. The self-published ’zine ran for over a decade, spanning nine issues and the metamorphosis from typewriter/rub-on letter layouts to more professional, early word processor (computer) layouts.
There’s a lot of interesting – if a bit lightweight – content here, with its word jumbles (“Complicated Games,” taking its name from an XTC song title), fan letters and most of all the gossipy stories on the band’s studio activities. Fisher must have gotten at least some of his info from the band or its management, as both Limelight and The Little Express were always noted in the credits of XTC’s albums. The fact that they are once again willing participants in the publication’s pages shows that Mark Fisher must have had the band’s approval both then and now.
They’ve taken both of XTC’s alter ego releases as THE DUKES OF STRATOSPHEAR and put them into an ultra-mega-deluxe box set called The Complete & Utter Dukes that includes both CD and vinyl versions (180 gram, too!), a 7″ single, a 500-piece jigsaw puzzle, some Dukes Dollars, and a coupon for a Dukes t-shirt of your very own. All of this comes in a real nice purple velvet box. So if you haven’t picked up 25 O’Clock or Psonic Psunspot since they were reissued by Andy Partridge’s Ape House label, now’s the time. The remasters are much better than the ones Virgin originally put out, the CDs feature extra demos and stuff, and the vinyl is very psychedelically psupreme. (The vinyl versions come out separately in their own right anytime now.)
This time, XTC’s US label, Geffen Records, took notice and released the album on both vinyl and CD (under the title Chips from the Chocolate Fireball, including the 25 O’Clock tracks). Once more XTC took a backseat, not hopping into the driver’s seat again until Spring 1989’s Oranges & Lemons. Thirty years after their final release, the Dukes of Stratosphear continue to thrill with their recorded righteousness—often outshining releases by XTC proper. If “Little Lighthouse,” “What in the World??” and “My Love Explodes” don’t smother you in their organic guitar goodness, you may well be a lost cause.
Here’s another great album anniversary for me to go on about: English Settlement, the 1982 2LP set from XTC, turned 35 this week, and it’s yet another release with a distinguished place in my collection.
the band’s established wheelhouse. Sadly, when issued here in the US by Epic, the album was whittled down to a single LP and that really changed its feel. Yes, the “hit” singles were still there – “Senses,” “Ball and Chain” and “Thugs” were all released as 45s in England – but the flow was interrupted. You wouldn’t have known this if you were a casual XTC fan, but after I had devoured Black Sea the year before, I read up on these guys! I knew, according to Trouser Press or NY Rocker or maybe it was Creem, that the UK version was a double album, and that’s the one I wanted. Unfortunately, that wasn’t to be until the late ’80s when, after Skylarking had become a sensation, the band’s US label, Geffen (now distributing Virgin releases here) reissued the album in its original 2LP configuration. None of this matters now, because these days you have your choice of either full-length 2LP or single CD when buying it new.
NuDisc 