XTC’s Andy Partridge debuts new trio The 3 Clubmen — hear first single “Aviatrix”

The 3 Clubmen | Photos via Stu Rowe

XTC founder Andy Partridge has been musically active the last few years, releasing an EP of new music with Robyn Hitchcock and a couple My Failed Songwriting Career releases. Now comes his next project, a new trio called The 3 Clubmen that debuted its first single this week.

The 3 Clubmen find Partridge joined by Jen Olive and Stu Rowe, and the trio will release its debut, self-titled EP on June 30, with CD editions of the four-song set available exclusively at Burning Shed.

You can hear their first song — the lilting “Aviatrix,” with Partridge and Olive trading vocals —  below.

The trio behind The 3 Clubmen have each worked together in some form since 2008. Rowe, like Partridge, is from Swindon in the U.K., while Olive hails from Los Angeles. During the pandemic, they decided to finish the songs they’d started years ago, which now comprise the forthcoming EP.

Of the project, Partridge says:

“Like an ‘action painter’ throws colour at a canvas, we tend to throw musical and sound things, knowing that we’ll cut through this seemingly insane mess later, to hopefully find some beautiful garden, hiding there. I throw paint, Jen throws paint, Stu throws paint… and we walk away. If, when we return, something in there calls to us, we’ll move heaven and earth to get it out and let it breath. Using whatever it takes, be it contrary musical ideas, parts in clashing keys incongruous sounds, contradictory words/phrases. Its all clay to us.”

The band’s name, The 3 Clubmen, dates back to when they first started working together in person, in 2010. The name, according to the trio’s bio, refers to “local defense volunteer groups formed during the English Civil War. Clubmen protected themselves from both armies by fighting on their own side — the name seemed to fit,”

Below, check out their debut single and EP tracklist..

The 3 Clubmen, The 3 Clubmen EP

1. “Aviatrix”
2. “Racecar”
3. “Green Green Grasshopper”
4. “Look At Those Stars”

PREVIOUSLY ON SLICING UP EYEBALLS

• Andy Partridge releasing new EP, reissuing XTC’s “Mummer” with original sleeve art
• XTC’s Andy Partridge to launch ‘My Failed Songwriting Career’ series with 4-song EP
• XTC’s ‘Oranges & Lemons’ to be reissued on 200-gram audiophile vinyl
• Andy Partridge gives away new song ‘Cavegirl’ from ‘aborted bubblegum sampler album’
• Robyn Hitchcock, Andy Partridge working on new LP that’ll be ‘a cheese fondue for the slag heaps’
• XTC’s Dukes of Stratosphear albums freshly remixed for new ‘Psurroundabout Ride’ set