XTC - Skylarking (APELPR113) LP Due 27th September
Skylarking: XTC’s most commercially successful album was, for many years, also its most mythical with tales of “lost” multi-track tapes (sadly true of other XTC albums but not this one), a song originally dropped from the album only to be replaced when it inadvertently became a hit single in the USA, a perfect match, on paper, between the ideal Britpop band a decade before the term was invented & an Anglophile super-producer that turned rather imperfect in personality terms but still resulted in a classic album.
Still, a masterpiece remains a masterpiece however traumatic its origins & this is one of those few albums that sounded great at the time & sounds just as great, if not better, now.
When Steven Wilson remixed the album in 2016 – for new stereo & 5.1 Surround Sound editions on CD/Blu-ray, the release was successful again with both original & a new generation of fans. However, this remix was never released on vinyl.
Frequently requested as a vinyl release in recent years & with the new CD/Blu-ray release this Autumn in Dolby Atmos (remixed again by StevenWilson), the timing is ideal for Ape House to make the 2016 mix available on 200-gram vinyl the first of Steven’s XTC mixes to be issued on vinyl.
1. Summer's Cauldron
2. Grass
3. The Meeting Place
4. That's Really Super, Supergirl
5. Ballet for a Rainy Day
6. 1000 Umbrellas
7. Season Cycle
8. Earn Enough for Us
9. Big Day
10. Another Satellite
11. Mermaid Smiled
12. The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul
13. Dear God
14. Dying
15. Sacrificial Bonfire