Mention the words “pop music” and music snobs go scurrying to the safer confines of the obtuse and obscure. OK, OK, so perhaps we’ve inhabited those confines at times, but mainstream sounds don’t all sound bad to us. Just most of it.
XTC, on the other hand, was a band that gave pop music a good name. Since their bare, new wave/punk beginnings, melody had always mattered. Eventually, the orchestration got lusher, the arrangements got more intricate and the lyrics got smarter. By 1986’s Skylarking, they seemed to come at crafting taut, witty and crisp pop songs naturally. Never mind that “pop” never translated to “popularity,” as “The Mayor of Simpleton” was the closest they’ve gotten to a hit stateside.
XTC, especially guitarist, singer and songwriter Andy Partridge, was capable of achieving pop on the grand scale on the order of Brian Wilson, as they did on a late-renaissance treat like Apple Venus, Pt. 1, or straight up no-nonsense pop of the follow-up Wasp Star (Apple Venus, Pt.2). Wasp Star may have more hooks than a six-inch bass lure, but it sticks to the ribs because these guys don’t just bang out these songs, they craft them.
Case in point is the opener Playground. Built around a crunchy, repeating guitar riff that’s a reworking of The Cars’ “Let The Good Times Roll,” Partridge writes a clever metaphor about adult life as simply being a continuation of school (“you may leave school, but it never leaves you”). The vocals here are layered nearly as meticulously as they are for their more ambitious work. Colin Moulding’s bass doesn’t enter until the first chorus, but you’ll know, as he goes high and melodic in the fine tradition of Paul McCartney. The break-it-down bridge reveals a vaguely hip-hop beat chugging underneath before returning to the substantial slab of the main melody.
There’s plenty more fine pop craftsmanship to be found on Wasp Star, which, unfortunately, has not been followed up on nine years later and counting. Even if this doesn’t go down as their best work, it’s plenty good enough to want more. Tunes like the rocker “Playground” that’s so clever, succinct and catchy is the mark of the masters.
“One Track Mind” is a more-or-less weekly drool over a single song selected on a whim and a short thesis on why you should be drooling over it, too.
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