XTC burst out of late 1970s Britain with hooks for days. While many of the punk bands around them proudly ignored anything before 1976, they took notes from The Beatles, Kinks, and Beach Boys and reformed them into pugnacious state-of-the-art pop. “Making Plans For Nigel,” “Generals and Majors” and “Senses Working Overtime” made their unique stamp on the UK Charts. But when XTC stopped playing live in 1982, their career took a much more interesting turn. Unable to sell their Englishness to the UK, instead via calamitous recording sessions with Todd Rundgren and a dismissed b-side, XTC landed a punch squarely below the Bible Belt. This is New British Canon, and this is the story of “Dear God.”