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The Big Express Lyrics, Xtc
Even hardcore fans remain ambivalent about this least organic and most dogmatic of all XTC albums, and this is the last place anyone should start building their collection. The Big Express has some strong tracks to offer, notably the Police-inspired nuclear-war lament "This World Over" and the bubblegum sea shanty "All You Pretty Girls," which sounds like "What Shall We Do with the Drunken Sailor" as performed by the cast of The King and I. For the more persistent and inquisitive, this 1984 collection features some challenges in the shape of the twitchy Captain Beefheart-at-the-hoedown "Shake Your Donkey Up" and "Everyday Story of Smalltown," which evokes Ray Davies in its lyrical observations of dawn milk rounds and laborers commuting to the Swindon railworks on bicycles. --Kevin Maidment