I wrote this yesterday in another forum where someone had mentioned XTC (the English band...Andy Partridge, Colin Moulding, Dave Gregory et al) but since that was an Off Topic post in a non-music forum, I figure the question/concept might get more traction here.
XTC is a weird band in my personal listening history...through no fault of their own, I certainly think their music is clever and exquisitely well-crafted and catchy etc. ...but more because of how different it is from all the other music that I've liked but that has prompted other people to recommend XTC to me.
This phenomenon first started back in the very early 1980s when I was still an undergraduate at music school.
Preface: During my teenage years I was mostly listening to archetypal 1970s British prog-rock (e.g., Yes, King Crimson, Gentle Giant) and nascent jazz-rock fusion (e.g., Mahavishnu Orchestra, Return To Forever, Weather Report). Plus lots of Beatles, Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd... and some Classical music, and some "normal" Jazz, and some musical theater.
But by the early 1980s though I was getting really into certain pop/New Wave/post-punk bands...definitely not all of them though; there were only some that seemed to incoprorate (sometimes subliminally) the depth and sophistication I had enjoyed from the prog and fusion bands within their seemingly stripped down pop songs...e.g., The Police, Talking Heads, Peter Gabriel, Romeo Void, The Fixx, Missing Persons, Tears For Fears, Japan, Thomas Dolby, the Adrian Belew-era of King Crimson, etc.
Anyhow, circa 1980 nearly all my college buddies had similar musical tastes and personal listening histories: They all started with prog-rock and fusion, then gravitated to this Police/Talking Heads-type pop.
And so -- here's the part that to this day I don't get -- all my college buddies who had similar tastes and personal listening histories all said "Oh, you also must love XTC!"
:shrugs:
Well, I didn't "love" XTC at the time. (I probably still don't, though I do respect them immensely.) The thing I genuinely don't get is how XTC fits into the aesthetic I just described. I don't hear any connection between XTC's music and Police/Talking Heads-by-way-of-1970s-prog-rock-or-jazz-fusion.
And yet it wasn't just my undergraduate buddies who thought I would like XTC: Folks throughout my life, even recently, once they hear about the music I grew up with, assume that I must also like XTC!
It's inexplicable. And uncanny.
Anyone else experience this? And/or, anyone understand what it is that so many of my aquaintances hear in XTC's music that makes them think I would love it?
XTC is a weird band in my personal listening history...through no fault of their own, I certainly think their music is clever and exquisitely well-crafted and catchy etc. ...but more because of how different it is from all the other music that I've liked but that has prompted other people to recommend XTC to me.
This phenomenon first started back in the very early 1980s when I was still an undergraduate at music school.
Preface: During my teenage years I was mostly listening to archetypal 1970s British prog-rock (e.g., Yes, King Crimson, Gentle Giant) and nascent jazz-rock fusion (e.g., Mahavishnu Orchestra, Return To Forever, Weather Report). Plus lots of Beatles, Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd... and some Classical music, and some "normal" Jazz, and some musical theater.
But by the early 1980s though I was getting really into certain pop/New Wave/post-punk bands...definitely not all of them though; there were only some that seemed to incoprorate (sometimes subliminally) the depth and sophistication I had enjoyed from the prog and fusion bands within their seemingly stripped down pop songs...e.g., The Police, Talking Heads, Peter Gabriel, Romeo Void, The Fixx, Missing Persons, Tears For Fears, Japan, Thomas Dolby, the Adrian Belew-era of King Crimson, etc.
Anyhow, circa 1980 nearly all my college buddies had similar musical tastes and personal listening histories: They all started with prog-rock and fusion, then gravitated to this Police/Talking Heads-type pop.
And so -- here's the part that to this day I don't get -- all my college buddies who had similar tastes and personal listening histories all said "Oh, you also must love XTC!"
:shrugs:
Well, I didn't "love" XTC at the time. (I probably still don't, though I do respect them immensely.) The thing I genuinely don't get is how XTC fits into the aesthetic I just described. I don't hear any connection between XTC's music and Police/Talking Heads-by-way-of-1970s-prog-rock-or-jazz-fusion.
And yet it wasn't just my undergraduate buddies who thought I would like XTC: Folks throughout my life, even recently, once they hear about the music I grew up with, assume that I must also like XTC!
It's inexplicable. And uncanny.
Anyone else experience this? And/or, anyone understand what it is that so many of my aquaintances hear in XTC's music that makes them think I would love it?
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