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Label: Caroline
Release Date: 2002-08-06
List Price: $15.98
Buy Now: $5.97 - $13.99
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(Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered)
Additional Info: Tracks Reviews
Absolute perfection (5 stars)
This album took a little while to grow on me, but when I finally got it, it was absolutely life-changing. It is my favorite XTC album among many strong contenders and one of my favorite albums all-time. The mystery of this album is the fact that those of us who get it have little luck trying to convey its majesty to those who don't. To those folks I say keep trying, you will be amply rewarded. "Wake Up" and "Train Running Low on Soul Coal" are tracks beyond description. With encroaching age, I feel the pull and power of the latter track more every year. Consider this an album to grow up and old with - gracefully! |  | | | what's the confusion? it's an underrated classic, that's all (5 stars)
while we all are entitled to our opinions, i'm having difficulty understanding why this classic release would leave people scratching their heads. after all, this isn't 'ascension' by john coltrane or 'zero tolerance for silence' by pat metheny or something highly dissonant like those recordings. in my opinion, there are few albums that are as creatively, tunefully, and beautifully crafted as 'the big express'. from start to finish, it flows as one complete artistic statement, while each individual track has plenty to offer in and of itself. and contrary to other reviews, i would venture to say that 'mummer' and 'skylarking' are the weaker recordings (particularly 'mummer', although there are certainly great songs on it), with 'the big express' the superior, overlooked one sandwiched in between. a desert-island disc that i never tire of - HIGHLY recommended. | | | | A swift change of pace. (3 stars)
Never a band easily pigeon-holed, after a couple albums of gentler material, XTC turned the volume up for "The Big Express", but kept the detailed arrangements and stylings of the more recent efforts. The results, honestly, are pretty mixed, though this is more related to less consistent songwriting more than the sound of the record. Nonetheless, "The Big Express" ends up being a fine record.
At it's best, the songs here are fiercely unique and manage to pull off an overarranged new wave sound without sounding overblown-- Colin Moulding's opener, "Wake Up", pits two ska guitar lines out of phase with each other to provide a noisy background for his calmly intoned lyrics, "All You Pretty Girls" (penned by Andy Partridge) starts melodramatic before sinking into a swinging, funky rhythm, "The World Is Over" is reminiscent of the early ska/punk XTC, but buries this sound softly and quietly below a quiet haze and an impassioned vocal, and "Seagulls Screaming Kiss Her, Kiss Her" is totally bizarre, splashing keyboards switch to bizarre pop with swaggering trombones over the top.
It seems as if most the pieces on here have something interesting about them-- the jaunty guitar of "Shake You Donkey Up" and the slithering fretless bass of "I Remember the Sun", but the second half of the record in general seems to fizzle a bit ("I Bought Myself a Liarbird") and I did find one piece fairly unlistenable (the irritating percussion on "Reign of Blows"), but the batting average here is pretty high.
This reissue is remastered and sounds superb-- crisp and clean and really letting the subtlety of the arrangements shine, and augments the album with three b-sides, although overall none of them are particularly noteworthy.
"The Big Express" has the unfortunate position of being sandwiched in between two of the best records in XTC's catalog (it was preceeded by "Mummer" and followed by "Skylarking"). It's hard to consider the album without taking into account these two records (or for that matter, the superb "Oranges & Lemons" that followed "Skylarking"), and while it's a fine record in its own right, it's probably the band's weakest album of the '80s. | | | | Mixed Bag (4 stars)
When listening to this you have to wonder if XTC was not under some pressure to conform to the music industry they lashed out against on Mummer's "Funk-Pop-A-Roll". When my friends would hear "This World Over" they would say "Is that the Police"? Also songs like "Reign Of Blows" and "Train Running Low On Soul Coal" are among the hardest rocking tracks ever to be released by XTC. Coming off the pastoral "Mummer" this was quite a surprise. The release is a lot like a train for the most part, Big, Loud, and Noisy. The irony is that although is is big, bold, and brash, it still was not in step with increasingly pop flavored keyboard driven New-Wave music of the moment. If this was a last chance effort for a stab at rock stardom it is a pretty decent one. Still for a band that had accomplished as much as XTC, and was about to accomplish even more ("Skylarking" and "Oranges and Lemons") this one is not quite up to par with their best. | | | | One of my favorites! (5 stars)
I saw this album on the shelf in a store one day and it totally called to me and asked to be taken home. I hated it at first. It collected dust for a few months before finally finding its way back to the stereo. Now I put this disc in at least once a week and sing its entirety at the top of my lungs. The Big Express popped my XTC cherry and, lately, I can't get enough. All of the tracks are excellent, but as others have noted before, "This World Over" does tend to drag. Highly recommended! | | | |
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