Video: XTC - Mayor of Simpleton

Just in case you've ever wondered, this is the egg that hatched Crash Test Dummies. Make no mistake. 

​ The run-up to the 2009 elections has been quite a letdown compared to the fascinating and occasionally surreal 2008 campaigns. Obviously, there's nothing that can compare to last year's Presiden... Continue reading "Vote With a Bullet: Songs for an Otherwise Ho-Hum Election Day" >

Remember that underachieving genre known as college rock? The bands themselves weren't slackers -- a musical term that didn't even exist back then -- but as a genre it felt painted into a corner, never to reach an audience beyond viewers of MTV's 120 Minutes , fanzine readers and CMJ aficionados. A conversation I recently had at a barbecue revolved around who was the first college-rock band. We settled on R.E.M. The Smiths, I would argue, were the other pillar of the genre, while The Replacements and Husker [...]

... with a box of Theraflu. We're deliriously happy together. Well, we're delirious, anyway. But so my planned V-Day post is a little delayed. Here's something. I'm kind of sick of the Valentine's Day backlash. I am by no means a fan of the holiday; I don't really think we need to devote a whole day to celebrating people in couples by buying each other stuff. But it seems that retailers have caught on to the fact that chocolate and roses and expensive jewelry are not the stuff everyone's VD dreams are made [...]

A couple of weeks ago Chris at Gorilla vs. Bear turned me onto the mid-eighties psychedelic XTC spinoff group, The Dukes of Stratosphear. While I'd heard a number of Andy Partridge side-project related material over the years, this particular incarnation was news to me. If you're interested in checking out what The Stranger describes as "a [...]

• XTC - The Mayor Of Simpleton

Inspired by a post by John at Crooks and Liars , here's a whole bunch of XTC videos. "Statue of Liberty" : "Love on a farmboy's wages" : "Respectable Street" (with cleaned up lyrics): [...]

Inspired by a post by John at Crooks and Liars , here's a whole bunch of XTC videos. "Statue of Liberty" : "Love on a farmboy's wages" : "Respectable Street" (with cleaned up lyrics): [...]