Skylarking (2016 Steve Wilson Mix): Heavyweight Vinyl LP

Skylarking: XTC’s most commercially successful album was, for many years, also its most mythical with tales of “lost” multi-track tapes (sadly true of other XTC albums but not this one), a song originally dropped from the album only to be replaced when it inadvertently became a hit single in the USA, a perfect match, on paper, between the ideal Britpop band a decade before the term was invented & an Anglophile super-producer that turned rather imperfect in personality terms but still resulted in a classic album.

Still, a masterpiece remains a masterpiece however traumatic its origins & this is one of those few albums that sounded great at the time & sounds just as great, if not better, now.

When Steven Wilson remixed the album in 2016 – for new stereo & 5.1 Surround Sound editions on CD/Blu-ray, the release was successful again with both original & a new generation of fans. However, this remix was never released on vinyl.

Frequently requested as a vinyl release in recent years & with the new CD/Blu-ray release this Autumn in Dolby Atmos (remixed again by StevenWilson), the timing is ideal for Ape House to make the 2016 mix available on 200-gram vinyl the first of Steven’s XTC mixes to be issued on vinyl.

Tracklist:

A1. Summer's Cauldron
A2. Grass
A3. The Meeting Place
A4. That's Really Super Supergirl
A5. Ballet for a Rainy Day
A6. 1000 Umbrellas
A7. Season Cycle

B8. Earn Enough for Us
B9. Big Day
B10. Another Satellite
B11. Mermaid Smiled
B12. The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul
B13. Dear God
B14. Dying
B15. Sacrificial Bonfire