XTC - Big Express - 200gm Vinyl

Limited 200gm vinyl LP pressing in gatefold jacket. XTC's seventh album, The Big Express was virtually ignored on release, much as it's immediate predecessor Mummer had been. If Mummer was XTC's quiet album, this was it's polar opposite: bright, brash, noisy - even cluttered on occasion if the song demanded it - as it became a concept album of sorts, a partly autobiographical reflection on growing up in an industrial town, Swindon, with it's history of engineering and railway accomplishments. Perhaps in keeping with that tradition of technical innovation, the album also made extensive use of (at the time) new technology with Linn-Drum programming (alongside drummer Peter Phipps), E-mu Emulator and other synths claiming space among the more traditional guitars, bass and drums mix under-pinning the vocals. This technology was juxtaposed with technology of a slightly earlier pop/rock era as phasing, backwards tapes and the inclusion of a mellotron hinted at a psychedelic influence that wo