What Do You Call That Noise? – XTC Discovery Book – Photo Credit: Mark Thomas
Following the worldwide release of The XTC Bumper Book in 2017, comes a musical exploration of one of the most essential pop groups of the 20th century, XTC!
Entitled What Do You Call That Noise? and written by Mark Fisher, the XTC Discovery Book showcases every member of XTC with exclusive quotes, including Andy Partridge on mixing, Dave Gregory on arranging, and Barry Andrews on the piano – not to mention an in-depth review of Colin Moulding and Terry Chambers playing live as TC&I for the first time in 36 years.
This fabulous book features interviews and comments from Rick Buckler of The Jam, Chris Difford of Squeeze, Debbi Peterson of The Bangles, and much more.
Andy Partridge comments on the book’s release: “Every XTC album that got ignored gave the band a real power jolt. It was like being the Duracell bunny and getting a fresh set of batteries in your back. It made us want to strive harder. Weirdly, it does feel like the band is being appreciated now. We’ve become a historical artifact that’s more important than when it was a pot in Cro-Magnon times. As a museum exhibit it’s become priceless, but as a Neanderthal pot nobody wanted to bother pissing in it. It makes me feel valued – as long as I don’t go into national treasure territory!”
The book is out on 4th March 2019 and is available for pre-order now at XTC Limelight
Here’s a vintage video clip of XTC’s 1979 single “Making Plans for Nigel”. Enjoy!
Take a peek at some of the quotes in the book here;
“The song is a little machine. If you take apart the machine, it’s not a clock any more and you can’t tell the time by it.” – Andy Partridge
“Music… I couldn’t imagine life without it. It’s always there.” – Dave Gregory
“I was always quite envious of XTC because they weren’t put in the same pigeonhole as punk bands. They were regarded as a bit more arty than that. We always had to fight off this flag, being under the banner of punk.” – Rick Buckler, The Jam
“I remember when I first heard “Making Plans for Nigel” on the radio… I absolutely loved the song, especially the drum part. Boy, I wish I could’ve seen them live.” Debbi Peterson, The Bangles
“That’s part of the essence of XTC for a lot of people – the dissonance. It took me a while to accept it, because I did feel that, rightly or wrongly, part of my role was to straighten things out.” – Dave Gregory
