“Nonsuch” is the first in a series of expanded XTC album editions including 5.1 Surround mixes, new stereo mixes & High-Resolution stereo mixes of the original material along with a wealth of extra material. Acclaimed musician/producer Steven Wilson has produced the new mixes with the input of founder member Andy Partridge & full approval of the band.

“Nonsuch”, XTC’s tenth album was recorded in 1991 & originally issued in March 1992. It was a top 30 album in the UK (28) & Top 100 album in the USA (97), where it also made it to No. 1 in the, then significant, College album chart. It was also Grammy nominated in the ‘Alternative albums’ category in 1992. “We want our songs to be well-regarded. Love our songs, don’t love us” – as Andy Partridge was quoted as saying at the time, could have been the template for a band that had not appeared live for several years but whose albums were greeted with near unanimous acclaim & whose songs ranked among the finest, not just of their generation, but of any generation of British pop songwriters. XTC may have arrived (in recording terms at least) in 1977 but, unlike many of their contemporaries, the band chose to progress – not a word to be taken lightly by some of the punk police in those days – delivering a series of increasingly sophisticated, yet accessible, collections of pop songs that could only have been written/performed by XTC, while allowing the listener to hear hints of the broad breadth of 20th century song-writing that informed & influenced the recordings.

The album was recorded at Chipping Norton studios in 1991 & initially produced by Gus Dudgeon - best known for his work with Elton John – when the team of Steve Lillywhite & Hugh Padgham proved unavailable. Disappointed with the final mixes, the band moved to Rockfield Studios where the album was successfully completed by Nick Davis.

Following the slow burn success of the 1986 album “Skylarking”, 1989’s “Oranges & Lemons” had proved successful in the UK & US charts, so there was a general expectation that “Nonsuch” would take the band to the next level of mainstream success, especially when early critical response proved encouraging. ‘The Disappointed’ duly entered the Top 40 in the UK & ‘The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead’ was prepared as the follow-up. Issued the week that Virgin Records was bought by EMI, the single was lost amidst the corporate chaos that followed. A third planned single – the song that Virgin had always been earmarked as the one to push the album to a wider audience - ‘Wrapped in Grey’, was prepared for release but cancelled. The relationship between Virgin/EMI & band deteriorated & XTC made no further recordings for Virgin, spending much of the decade locked in legal battle with the label. Geffen, newly focused on home grown bands in the wake of its recent mega-success with Nirvana, realised that “grunge” & “XTC” didn’t fit in the same press release.

“Nonsuch”, nonetheless, sold well to the large XTC fanbase at the time & has sold consistently in the 21 years since release. When the band finally regained some control of the physical recordings in 2012, with the catalogue licensed to Andy Partridge’s Ape House label, (ironically just as EMI was being consumed by corporate music giant UMG), the album appealed to all concerned as a good place to begin the re-appraisal of the catalogue that such an expanded edition involves.

This edition adds a 5.1 surround mix & a new stereo mix, along with the original mix – all presented in High Resolution sound, while the Blu-Ray edition adds a number of audio & filmed extras to the package. One of the best albums of the period can finally be heard in the sort of sound quality unheard since the band approved the final mixes at Rockfield at the end of 1991.