This one's for Troy (and other XTC nutcasses)

[Ex Lion Tamer]

XTC doing All ALong the Watchtower, Live circa 1978

[Troy]

Oh sure, send me spiraling down the youtoob hole for a while. Never seen some of these before. Great stuff!

They had so much in common with the Police back then This was in the movie Urrgh!:



No thugs in Our House:



The sublime Snowman:



First performance in 17 years on Letterman:



This guy had stagefright? Partridge can't stop mugging and acting the fool, even 17 years later when he's supposed to be hiding in the back.

[3-LockBox]

I think you meant 7 years, but anyway, too bad they didn't tour as much as they could have. But on the other hand, where would they have played during the '80s? I think their concert potential was on the wane by the time O/L cameout, given the state of pop music in the late 80s. They'd prolly do better now.

Great to see them live though; they were the sh!t back in the day though, weren't they.

[3-LockBox]

Seeing both Moulding and Will Lee on bass (Lee is playing rythm and Collin is playing a counter rythm) it reminds me of the double trio concept that King Crimson toured with back in the '90s. I wonder what a band like XTC woulda sounded with a full time double trio, as layered as their music was in the late '80s and later.

Too bad they're kaput.

[Finch Platte]

Wow. Wow. That's great seeing that old footage.

No other band has had an impact on me like XTC, at least around the Drums & Wires, Black Sea and English Settlement days. I've seen them in concert, but I was dancing the whole damn time and don't remember much, except that my friend & I had this huge circle we cleared bashing into each other, pogoing our brains out.

I would give anything to die and come back to play drums on these discs. I'd have to wear diapers, because I'd keep soiling myself.

Thanks for the YouTube links, guys. Awesome!

fp

[Dave_G]

I saw them in like 1982 or so here in Atlanta and they were excellent. I have liked them for a long, long time too.

I may have to check out those videos.

Dave

[JAMOOL]

They're broken up proper now huh? Really sucks, I love these guys, they're second only to McCartney and Lennon in my book! Thanks for the footage!

[unleasHell]

sorry guys that reminds me of a devo version, but I did like Bryan Ferry's and Neil Young's versions that pop up to the right,

did you check them out???

[BradH]

...where would they have played during the '80s? I think their concert potential was on the wane by the time O/L cameout, given the state of pop music in the late 80s...

They probably would've played the same type of venues they played in '82 if not larger. They were well on their way to Talking Heads-like popularity with English Settlement. After that, I watched unlikely bands like R.E.M., Chili Peppers and Midnight Oil grow from club giggers to huge unit sellers.

For me, "Books Are Burning" was the real highlight of Letterman. Seems like Partridge's solo was longer than this one...

[kexodusc]

We used to cover Peter Pumpkinhead in my junior high/high-school band (yeah I'm dating myself) in the early 90's. It was such an awesome tune for us that nobody knew and always got a good response the way we played it.

We won a pretty big (for us) battle of the bands show as the only under-aged group with that as our last song - didn't hurt that like 5 other bands all covered Jane's Addiction or Nirvana that night.

Would have kept playing that tune forever too. Then the Crash Test Dummies stole our thunder after about 2 years of this and made a ton of money off that song. Damn.

Sorry to ramble...just found the Pumkinhead video...still awesome!