In 1977, the group debuted on Virgin Records and were subsequently noted for their energetic live performances and their refusal to play conventional punk rock, instead synthesising influences from ska, 1960s pop, dub music and avant-garde.

[15] In early 1972, Partridge's constantly evolving group settled into "Star Park", a four-piece that featured himself with guitarist Dave Cartner, drummer Paul Wilson, and a bassist nicknamed "Nervous Steve".

"[19] At the end of 1972, Moulding and drummer Terry Chambers joined Partridge's band, replacing Nervous Steve and Paul Wilson, and the group was renamed "Star Park (Mark II)".

[12] NME ran a small profile on the "up and coming" band, which consisted of Partridge, Moulding, Chambers and guitarist Dave Cartner: "They aspire to attain the impossible dream of being able to throw a TV or two out of the window of an American hotel and have no one complain.

Ian Reid, owner of a Swindon club named The Affair, was their third manager[27] and brokered deals for the group to perform at more popular venues such as the Red Cow in Hammersmith, The Nashville Rooms and Islington's Hope and Anchor.

He reflected that the album was the sum of everything the band enjoyed, including the Beatles, Sun Ra, and Atomic Rooster,[14] but dismissed the contents as premature songs "built around this electric wordplay stuff".

[14] To follow up "Nigel", the band released "Wait Till Your Boat Goes Down" (1980), a reggae-influenced Partridge song with production by Phil Wainman of Bay City Rollers fame.

[14] Partridge at this point released a side project with Take Away / The Lure of Salvage in early 1980; a one-off record that appeared without much notice,[1] except in Japan, where it was hailed as a work of "electronic genius" and outsold all other XTC albums.

At this point, they were playing in arena stadiums while Partridge's mental state was beginning to deteriorate, and he requested to cease touring, but was opposed by Virgin, his bandmates, and the band's management.

During a live-broadcast gig in Paris on 18 March, Partridge stopped playing and ran off the stage during the opening song 'Respectable Street', and afterward, took a flight back to Swindon for treatment, which amounted to hypnotherapy.

"[14] For a period afterward, it was rumoured among fans and industry insiders that the group stopped performing because Partridge had died, and some American bands put on XTC tribute shows in his remembrance.

[47] The result, The Big Express, returned the group to a brighter and uptempo sound marked by studio experimentation and denser arrangements, setting a template that they would develop on subsequent albums.

[78][nb 3] In November 1984, one month after The Big Express's release, Partridge and John Leckie traveled to Monmouth to produce the album Miss America by singer-songwriter Mary Margaret O'Hara, who had recently signed with Virgin.

The band members have become the deans of a group of artists who make what can only be described as unpopular pop music, placing a high premium on melody and solid if idiosyncratic songcraft.

In Florida, a radio station received a bomb threat, and in New York, a student forced their school to play the song over its public-address system by holding a faculty member at knife-point.

[1] For their next album Oranges & Lemons, XTC traveled to Los Angeles to make use of a cheap studio rate arranged by Paul Fox, who was recruited by the band for his first production gig.

[1] In a retrospective review, The Quietus' Nick Reed notes: "Nearly every instrument is mixed to the forefront; it's too well-arranged to be cacophonous, but there's a degree of sensory overload, especially given the band's newfound tendency to blast synthesizers in our faces.

[93] Gregory commented that it was an "interesting" style of promotion, but "incredibly hard work", as the band performed at about four radio stations a day for three weeks: "We also did a live acoustic set for MTV in front of an audience which worried Andy a bit but he got through it.

[59] Moulding felt that "something a bit different" was appropriate for the band at this juncture, and shared Partridge's desire for a cohesive LP similar to soundtracks such as My Fair Lady and "stuff that Burt Bacharach wrote for various [films]".

[121] Months later, Partridge intimated that Moulding had moved and changed his phone number,[119] effectively ending all contact between the two and reducing their correspondence to emails exchanged via their manager to discuss the division of the band's assets.

"[143] Music journalist Peter Paphides felt that the songwriters' personalities "couldn't seem more different," with Moulding "phlegmatic, shy, and heartbreakingly pretty" and Partridge an "art-school dropout ... uptight, dominating and extrovert.

[19] This included Pete Phipps (Mummer and The Big Express), Prairie Prince (Skylarking and Apple Venus), Pat Mastelotto (Oranges & Lemons), and Dave Mattacks (Nonsuch).

"[58] The band's early influences included disco, dub reggae, music hall, the Beatles, Free, the Kinks, Captain Beefheart, the Stooges, the New York Dolls, Cockney Rebel, Motown, Can, David Bowie, the Groundhogs, Black Sabbath,[154] and the organ-dominated records of Johnny and the Hurricanes.

[154] Pitchfork writer Chris Dahlen characterised the band's original sound as punk meets "Buddy Holly-on-amphetamines ... danceable enough for the crowds at the clubs, and suspiciously poppy thanks to the catchy hooks and their trademark verse-chorus-verse-chorus-explode pattern.

[2] He later considered "Rook" (1992), "Wrapped in Grey" (1992) and "Easter Theatre" (1999) to be the "perfect songs" of his career, feeling that he had "exorcized a lot of those kind of Lennon-and-McCartney, Bacharach-and-David, Brian Wilson type ghosts out of my system by doing all that.

[170] Among the scores of songs Partridge wrote for XTC are perfect examples of a very English genre: rock music uprooted from the glamour and dazzle of the city, and recast as the soundtrack to life in suburbs, small towns, and the kind of places – like Swindon – that may be more sizeable, but are still held up as bywords for broken hopes and limited horizons.

"[172] British music critic John Harris identified Partridge's XTC compositions as within the same "lineage" of small town English songwriting invented by Ray Davies of the Kinks, and followed by the Jam, the Specials, "scores of half-forgotten punk and new wave bands," the Smiths and mid 1990s Britpop.

"[152] Writing for AllMusic, music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine recognised the group thusly: XTC was one of the smartest – and catchiest – British pop bands to emerge from the punk and new wave explosion of the late '70s.

[188] According to Chris Ingham, acts such as Kula Shaker, the Shamen and the Stone Roses recruited engineer John Leckie chiefly because of his productions for the retro-psychedelic Dukes of Stratosphear records.

To a nation that judges success in terms of tabloid coverage and appearances on Top of the Pops, the retiring bards of rural olde England didn't really strike too loud a chord with the record buying public.