XTC Bumper Book of Fun for Boys and Girls

Buy now: XTC Bumper Book Mark Fisher, editor of The XTC Bumper Book of Fun for Boys and Girls , talks to Andy Partridge about his limited-edition EP covering two songs from 1967: Humanoid Boogie by the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and Apples and Oranges by Pink Floyd. MARK FISHER: I'm assuming you're sitting there in Dukes of Stratosphear garb. ANDY PARTRIDGE: It's only just coincidental that they're two songs I've always loved and always wanted to cover. There are other songs I could have equally picked: Citadel by the Rolling Stones or Mellow Yellow… seemingly all from the same sort of years. I guess I was just at that everything-impressiony stage. I would have been 13 – or 14 in November 67. So these were the first things you were listening to of your own volition. Well, one of the very first albums I bought in 68 was the Bonzos' Doughnut in Granny's Greenhouse. I took my paper-round money into a bookshop called Wymans. They had this groovy little ...

I'm pleased to have written a short introduction to this rather gorgeous 36-page photo book put together by Ronald Gurr featuring a selection of photographs of XTC in NYC at the end of 1980 by Virginia Turbett . When Turbett took this set of pictures in and around Madison Square Garden in December 1980, XTC were on a roll. Four albums in, they'd been playing alongside such heavy hitters as The Police, Oingo Boingo and, now, The Cars. The year had kicked off with a handful of dates in New York and they'd subsequently played Canada, Europe, New Zealand and Australia, as well as repeat trips to the US. Captured here in a chilly NYC, they are unguarded and relaxed – if, perhaps, exhausted by their relentless schedule. We see Terry Chambers larking about with woolly hat pulled over his face; Dave Gregory, never so happy as when he's got a guitar round his neck; Andy Partridge giving every shot its visual interest; and Colin Moulding, all mop-top, cheek bones and shy ...