Editing XTC (section)

==Lyricism and English culture==
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| quote =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.
| source = —[[John Harris (critic)|John Harris]], 2010<ref name="Harris2010">{{cite news|last1=Harris|first1=John|author-link1=John Harris (critic)|title=The sound of the suburbs and literary tradition|url=https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2010/apr/03/suburbia-pop-betjeman-john-harris|newspaper=[[The Guardian]]|location=London|date=2 April 2010}}</ref>
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XTC are noted for their "Englishness". Partridge denied that this was conscious on his part: "I don't try to be English. I guess because I am English, it comes out English. But I don't sit down and think, "Cor blimey, can I put a union jack and a beefeater's outfit on, Mary?"<ref name="Lyrical">{{cite web |last1=Bernhardt |first1=Todd |last2=Partridge |first2=Andy |title=The Lyrical Andy Partridge |url=http://chalkhills.org/articles/XTCFans20060324.html |website=Chalkhills |access-date=18 October 2018 |date=24 March 2006}}</ref> British music critic [[John Harris (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]].<ref name="Harris2010"/> In Partridge's opinion, the band "never got beyond Swindon."{{sfn|Farmer|1998|pp=164–165}}{{refn|group=nb|Songs inspired by the town or its people included "Life Begins at the Hop", "Wait Till Your Boat Goes Down", "[[Ball and Chain (XTC song)|Ball and Chain]]", "The Everyday Story of Smalltown", "I Remember the Sun", "Red Brick Dream", "Grass", "[[The Meeting Place (song)|The Meeting Place]]", and "Boarded Up".{{sfn|Farmer|1998|pp=67, 127, 164–165, 170, 172, 174, 188–189, 292}}}} He also felt that XTC being described as "pastoral" was a compliment: "'Pastoral' to me means being more in touch with the country than the city, which I think we are. London gives me the willies."<ref name="George83"/> Lyrically, he cited Ray Davies, John Lennon, and Paul McCartney as his biggest influences.<ref name="Lyrical"/>

According to biographer Neville Farmer, Partridge and Moulding tended to write about "more general aspects of their lives and their attitudes".{{sfn|Farmer|1998|p=306}} Farmer added that "Colin nor Andy handle political or religious matters with subtlety. If they have an idea about something, they say it straightforwardly. They are no more embarrassed about their view on the world than Andy is about his sex life. That makes them easy targets for criticism."{{sfn|Farmer|1998|p=307}} For Partridge, other popular subject matter included financial shortage, factory work, [[comic book]] characters, seafaring, war, and ancient rituals.{{sfn|Farmer|1998|pp=106, 122}} He described himself as an [[atheist]] and said he did not become interested in politics until circa 1979, when he voted for [[Margaret Thatcher]] "purely because she was a woman. I was that naive. Now I'm very [[leftism|left]]."<ref name="heavyload"/>