ROCK LEGENDS TOUR TO PROMOTE ALBUM

From the Swindon Advertiser, first published Wednesday 24th May 2000.

XTC, Swindon's home-grown new wave rock legends, have released a new album.

Called Wasp Star: Apple Venus Volume Two, it will be snapped up by the worldwide fan base which generates stacks of magazines and hundreds of internet websites.

Bassist Colin Moulding and singer/guitarist Andy Partridge still live in town. They are veterans of the thriving late 1970s punk and alternative music scene in Swindon.

XTC evolved their own sound and signed their first major label deal, with Virgin, in 1977.

They found fame at the turn of that decade, with hits such as Senses Working Overtime and Sgt Rock.

Both are currently visiting Japan as part of a globetrotting promotional tour for the new album.

But a music tour will not be on the agenda ­ the band have not toured since 1982, when Partridge suffered illness and stage fright during a show in Paris.

Interviewed about the band's latest work, he found time to poke fun at the reception the band has encountered from some of those in the music industry.

He said: We've always been patronised as yokels from Swindon.

He added that the attitude seemed to be: It's a joke town, therefore they must be a joke band, and now they're a joke band in their forties who are past it.

The new album is the band's second release in as many years, a follow up to last year's Apple Venus Volume One.

Although XTC scored a number of hits in the singles and album charts during the early years of their career, they have never had mass appeal.

However, their appeal to a sizeable and sometimes obsessive hard core of fans continues.

The band have generally been popular with music critics, especially in the USA. They have been favourably compared with bands as diverse as Talking Heads, the Kinks and even the later Beatles.

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