Wake Up (XTC Song)
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Wake Up (XTC Song)
"Wake Up" is a song written by Colin Moulding of the English rock band XTC, released as the opening track on their 1984 album ''The Big Express''. It was the third and last single issued from the album, following "All You Pretty Girls" and "This World Over", and peaked at number 92 on the UK Singles Chart. Overview "Wake Up" opens the album with guitars and piano followed by a chorus lyric that proclaims "who cares, you might be dead". Colin Moulding explained: To write the song, Moulding started with a three-note piano figure, which he then overdubbed with two guitar riffs. He said: "The track didn't really happen until roducer David Lord got hold of it. A local girl came in and sang the 'choir', tracked up a load of times." Guitarist Andy Partridge said of Lord's embellishments: "He blew it up like one of those hot air balloons in the shape of a palace." Guitarist Dave Gregory commented: "We love confusing intros: records that start with a naked riff with no drum beat. And ...
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The Big Express
''The Big Express'' is the seventh studio album by English rock band XTC, released on 15 October 1984 by Virgin Records. It is an autobiographical concept album inspired by the band's hometown of Swindon and its railway system, the Swindon Works. In comparison to its predecessor ''Mummer'' (1983), which had a modest, pastoral approach to production, the album features a bright, uptempo sound marked by studio experimentation and denser arrangements, setting a template that they further developed on subsequent albums. XTC produced the album with Crescent Studios owner David Lord on a budget exceeding £75,000 (equivalent to £ in ). Like ''Mummer'', the Glitter Band's Pete Phipps was hired as a session drummer for the band. They continued extending their use of exotic colors, incorporating instruments such as LinnDrum, euphonium, and E-mu Emulator for the first time in their work. Much of the album showcased the band's psychedelic influences through its reliance on Mellotro ...
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Virgin Records
Virgin Records is a record label owned by Universal Music Group. It originally founded as a British independent record label in 1972 by entrepreneurs Richard Branson, Simon Draper, Nik Powell, and musician Tom Newman. It grew to be a worldwide success over time, with the success of platinum performers Paula Abdul, Janet Jackson, Devo, Tangerine Dream, Genesis, Phil Collins, OMD, the Human League, Culture Club, Simple Minds, Lenny Kravitz, the Sex Pistols, and Mike Oldfield among others, meaning that by the time it was sold, it was regarded as a major label, alongside other large international independents such as A&M and Island Records. Virgin Records was sold to EMI in 1992. EMI was in turn taken over by Universal Music Group (UMG) in 2012 with UMG creating the Virgin EMI Records division. The Virgin Records name continues to be used by UMG in certain markets such as Germany and Japan. Virgin Records America Virgin Records America, Inc. was the company's North American ...
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Colin Moulding
Colin Ivor Moulding (born 17 August 1955) is an English bassist, singer, and songwriter who was one of the core members of the rock band XTC. Though he was less prolific a songwriter than his bandmate Andy Partridge, Moulding wrote their first three charting UK singles: " Life Begins at the Hop" (1979), "Making Plans for Nigel" (1979) and "Generals and Majors" (1980). Life and career Moulding is self-taught as a bass player; he was learning rock riffs at the age of 15. He cites Andy Fraser of Free as an early musical influence, and has stated a preference for an intuitive approach to writing and playing rather than study.DouInterview of Colin Moulding ''Rundgren Radio'' (fansite), 7 December 2008, Retrieved 9 December 2008 When writing songs Moulding has used guitars and keyboards rather than the bass guitar. Outside his work with XTC (and their alter-ego side project The Dukes of Stratosphear), Moulding released a non-charting solo single ("Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen" b/w "I ...
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David Lord (producer)
David Lord (born 1944) is an English composer and record producer, known for his work with Peter Gabriel, the Korgis and XTC. Career Lord was born in 1944 in Oxford, England and educated at the Royal Academy of Music, under Richard Rodney Bennett. He worked as a producer for BBC Radio early in his career. He worked as a composer; his song‐cycle, '' The Wife of Winter'', was written in 1968, for Janet Baker while ''The History of the Flood'' (1969) has a libretto by John Heath-Stubbs. His 'cantata for children', "The Sea Journey", with a libretto by Michael Dennis Browne, is known to exist in two private pressings: one from the 1969 Farnham Festival, for which it was commissioned; the other recorded in 1982 by children from St. Catherine's British Embassy School, Athens, Greece. He also wrote a piece for Julian Bream and a test piece for a London Symphony Orchestra conductors' competition. He is responsible for the string arrangements on the chart hits "Everybody's Got t ...
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This World Over
"This World Over" is a song by the English rock band XTC, written by Andy Partridge, and the second single from their 1984 album ''The Big Express''. It reached number 99 on the UK Singles Chart during a one-week stay. Background and lyrics "This World Over" is a song protesting the use of nuclear weapons as a reaction to recent speeches by Ronald Reagan, which instigated Partridge's fears of another Cold War. According to Partridge, "My first child was on the way and just thought that, if I survived, how terrible it would be to have to tell her what life used to be like, that there was once a place called London and it was a fantastic place but it's not there anymore." It is one of two politically-charged songs on the album, the other being "Reign of Blows". Recording All of the drum sounds are pre-recorded samples. One of the guitar parts is a slew of sustained feedback notes played through a Marshall amplifier. The "high stratospheric squeaking noises in the last verse", Par ...
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The Mole From The Ministry
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the most frequently used word in the English language; studies and analyses of texts have found it to account for seven percent of all printed English-language words. It is derived from gendered articles in Old English which combined in Middle English and now has a single form used with nouns of any gender. The word can be used with both singular and plural nouns, and with a noun that starts with any letter. This is different from many other languages, which have different forms of the definite article for different genders or numbers. Pronunciation In most dialects, "the" is pronounced as (with the voiced dental fricative followed by a schwa) when followed by a consonant sound, and as (homophone of the archaic pr ...
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Rock Music
Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States and United Kingdom.W. E. Studwell and D. F. Lonergan, ''The Classic Rock and Roll Reader: Rock Music from its Beginnings to the mid-1970s'' (Abingdon: Routledge, 1999), p.xi It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, a style that drew directly from the blues and rhythm and blues genres of African-American music and from country music. Rock also drew strongly from a number of other genres such as electric blues and folk, and incorporated influences from jazz, classical, and other musical styles. For instrumentation, rock has centered on the electric guitar, usually as part of a rock group with electric bass guitar, drums, and one or more singers. Usually, rock is song-based music with a time signature using a verse–chorus form, ...
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All You Pretty Girls
"All You Pretty Girls" is a song written by Andy Partridge of the English rock band XTC, released on their 1984 album ''The Big Express''. It peaked at number 55 on the UK Singles Chart, and its music video cost £33,000 to make. Partridge remembers that song came about while he was "dicking around, playing some Hendrix. ... I was just playing this little two-note, quasi-Hendrix thing, and I liked the inherent melody in it." With the exception of the opening, all the drum sounds in the recording were made with a LinnDrum. The reed organ sound comes from a Prophet-5, while the choir sounds were a Mellotron sample played out of a speaker inside a fire bucket. Personnel XTC * Dave Gregory – keyboards *Colin Moulding *Andy Partridge Additional personnel *Pete Phipps Peter William Phipps (born 5 August 1951 in Clapham, South London) is a rock drummer, singer and songwriter known for his work with Gary Glitter, The Glitter Band, and later Eurythmics, XTC and Denim. Biograph ...
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UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-selling Single (music), singles in the United Kingdom, based upon physical sales, paid-for downloads and music streaming, streaming. The Official Chart, broadcast on BBC Radio 1 and MTV (Official UK Top 40), is the UK music industry's recognised official measure of singles and albums popularity because it is the most comprehensive research panel of its kind, today surveying over 15,000 retailers and digital services daily, capturing 99.9% of all singles consumed in Britain across the week, and over 98% of albums. To be eligible for the chart, a Single (music), single is currently defined by the Official Charts Company (OCC) as either a 'single bundle' having no more than four tracks and not lasting longer than 25 minutes or one digital audio ...
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Andy Partridge
Andrew John Partridge (born 11 November 1953) is an English guitarist, singer, songwriter, and record producer who founded the rock music, rock band XTC. He and Colin Moulding each acted as a songwriter and frontman for XTC, with Partridge writing and singing about two-thirds of the group's material. While the band were a formative punk rock, punk group, Partridge's music drew heavily from 1960s songwriters, and his style gradually shifted to more traditional pop music, pop, often with pastoral themes. The band's only UK top 10 hit, "Senses Working Overtime" (1982), was written by Partridge. Partridge is sometimes regarded as the "godfather" of Britpop. Since the 1980s, he has worked, written with, or produced for many other recording artists—efforts which include collaborative albums with Peter Blegvad, Harold Budd and Robyn Hitchcock. From 2002 to 2006, Partridge's APE House record label released several volumes of his demo (music), demos and songs as part of the ''Fuzzy War ...
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Dave Gregory (musician)
David Charles Gregory (born 21 September 1952) is an English guitarist from Swindon, best known for his work with the rock band XTC. He was a member of the group between the single " Life Begins at the Hop" (1979) and early sessions for the album '' Apple Venus Volume 1'' (1999), contributing guitar, keyboards, and occasional string arrangements. Career In '76/'77, before XTC Gregory was lead guitarist for Dave Heap's Forest of Dean based band, Gogmagog along with Jim Leach on keyboard. He joined XTC as guitarist immediately prior to the recording of the ''Drums and Wires'' LP in 1979, when he replaced Barry Andrews, eventually leaving the band in 1999. He also contributed keyboards and backing vocals to their work. Since leaving XTC Gregory has been much in demand as a session musician with a number of artists, including Peter Gabriel, Aimee Mann, Cud, Marc Almond, Bingo Durango, Johnny Hates Jazz, Jason Donovan, Martin Newell, Louis Philippe, Lulu, Mark Owen, R. Stevie M ...
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Songs Written By Colin Moulding
A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetition and variation of sections. Written words created specifically for music, or for which music is specifically created, are called lyrics. If a pre-existing poem is set to composed music in classical music it is an art song. Songs that are sung on repeated pitches without distinct contours and patterns that rise and fall are called chants. Songs composed in a simple style that are learned informally "by ear" are often referred to as folk songs. Songs that are composed for professional singers who sell their recordings or live shows to the mass market are called popular songs. These songs, which have broad appeal, are often composed by professional songwriters, composers, and lyricists. Art songs are composed by trained classical composers fo ...
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