The XTC Bumper Book of Fun, Complicated Game, What Do You Call That Noise and XTC Chalkhills and Children

The authors: Twomey, Bernhardt and Fisher

In this episode of What Do You Call That Noise? The XTC Podcast, guest presenter Kevin Winser discovers XTC are as good to read about as they are to listen to as he chats to three of the authors who have put the band in print.

This episode features Chris Twomey, author of XTC: Chalkhills and Children, “the definitive biography”, Todd Bernhardt, co-author with Andy Partridge of Complicated Game: Inside the Songs of XTC, and Mark Fisher, editor of Limelight, the 1980s fanzine, The XTC Bumper Book of Fun for Boys and Girls and What Do You Call That Noise? An XTC Discovery Book.

Elsewhere, young XTC fans Esther and Arthur pick some of their favourite songs – with English-language voiceovers by Polly and Hamish, courtesy of Strange Town theatre.

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About the author

MARK FISHER is a freelance theatre critic and feature writer based in Edinburgh and has written about theatre in Scotland since the late-1980s. He is a theatre critic for The Guardian, a former editor of The List magazine and a frequent contributor to the Scotsman and other publications. He is the co-editor of the play anthology Made in Scotland (1995), and the author of The Edinburgh Fringe Survival Guide (2012) and How to Write About Theatre (2015) – all Bloomsbury Methuen Drama. While at school, he set up the XTC fanzine Limelight, which he republished as The XTC Bumper Book of Fun for Boys and Girls (2017). He followed that with What Do You Call That Noise? An XTC Discovery Book (2019). In 2020, he launched What Do You Call That Noise? The XTC Podcast.

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